Lanzarote
and the Canary Islands
The Canary Isle group consists of 7 large islands and 6 smaller
ones of reefs, stretching approx. 500 km from east to west and
more than 200 km. from north to south , and covering an area of
7499 square kilometres in all.
Lanzarote, the north-easternmost
island in the archipelago, only 125 km from the African mainland,
has a total area of 795 km, making it the 4th largest of the Canary
Isles.
Lanzarote a World Biosphere Reserve
Lanzarote, unique among the Canary Isles, has
a strange, bizarre, lunar landscape.
No expanses of green, scarcely any trees, but
plenty of black lava sculpted by the great volcanic eruptions
of the 18th century.
From 1730 to 1736, the earth spat fire almost continuously and
lava masses buried a third of the entire island.
Whole villages disappeared, and what had once been fertile ground
was covered by metre-high lava ash.
This was the birth of the "Montanas del Fuego or Fire Mountains".
In the six years of eruptions, more than 100 volcanos rose up,
covering more than 50 square kilometres.
In 1968, the region of the Fire Mountains was declared a national
park, the "Parque Nacional de Timanfaya".
A trip to the park is an absolute must for every visitor to Lanzarote.
Because of their location in the Atlantic, the climate of the
Canary Isles (islands of eternal spring) is dominated by the regular
north-eastern trade wind and the warm Canary stream.
These two factors have a compensatory effect that ensures springlike
temperatures the whole year round.
