Icod dragon tree: free viewpoint or paid entry?

It is the question the tourist office hears most and the one guidebooks answer worst: do you have to pay to see the dragon tree? The short answer is no — but what you see for free and what you see with a ticket are not the same thing. Here is the difference, with the prices and hours the official box office publishes.

What it actually is

The free version

From the Plaza de la Constitución — the Plaza de la Pila to everyone here — you see the dragon tree's crown above the wall, with the church of San Marcos behind. It is a good view, well framed, and the one in almost every photograph of Icod. It costs nothing, has no opening hours, and you can come back as often as you like.

What you cannot see from there is the base. And the base is precisely what impresses: some seventeen metres around, a trunk that looks like a bundle of trunks fused together. From the square it stays hidden behind the wall and the planting.

The paid version

The Parque del Drago is a three-hectare botanical enclosure around the tree. You go in from Calle Las Angustias, walk down and around it and end up looking at it from below, which is the view that justifies the ticket. Along the way there are paths through the island's ecosystems, a recreated Guanche cave, an ethnographic area and viewpoints towards Teide and the Atlantic.

Which to choose

• If you are passing through Icod on the way somewhere else, the square does the job. Ten minutes, the photograph, onwards.
• If you came to see the dragon tree, pay the €5. Without the base you have not seen the tree, you have seen a crown.
• If you are with children, the park takes 45–60 minutes and the Guanche cave works better for them than the tree does. The butterfly house is opposite and the two chain nicely.
• If you are a Canary resident, the ticket drops to €2, and under-sixes go free.

When to go

The park opens at nine all year and closes at eight from April to October, at six from November to March. Coach tours arrive mid-morning and leave before lunch: if you can get in at nine, or after five, you will have the place almost to yourself. It is five minutes by car from the house, so an early start costs little here.