Tenerife without the crowds: where the queues are not

Tenerife has a reputation for being packed, and in places it is. But the crowding on this island is very unevenly spread: it concentrates in a few kilometres of southern coast and three or four specific attractions. Outside that there are towns where the only noise at nine in the morning is the bakery.

Why the north is emptier

It is not chance and it is not a secret: it is the weather. The northern slope takes the trade winds and, in summer, the low cloud locals call *panza de burro*. That pushed sun-and-beach tourism south fifty years ago and there it stayed. The result is that the green side of the island — the ravines, the laurel forest, the towns with listed old quarters — is comparatively deserted.

Where there genuinely is nobody

The Chinyero lava field

Tenerife's last eruption, 1909, and a trail network that needs no permit. It is one of the few first-rank routes on the island where you can turn up on a Tuesday morning and pass three people.

Barranco de Ruiz

A Site of Scientific Interest right off the TF-5, with parking at the entrance, where the shift from heath woodland to laurel forest is almost textbook clear. Half an hour from Icod and a stop almost nobody makes.

The north-western towns midweek

Icod, Garachico, Los Silos, Buenavista. Garachico gets visitors, but it empties at six in the evening. Icod, the dragon tree aside, is a town getting on with its life. The difference from the south is not that there is less to do: it is that what is there was not built for you.

What is busy, and when to go

• The Teide cable car. Book online and take the first run. By mid-morning the queue is real.
• Masca. The car park is tiny. Either very early, or on your way to Teno.
• El Caletón in Garachico in August and at weekends. Midweek in the morning is a different place.
• The Millennial Dragon Tree mid-morning, when the coaches arrive. First thing it is quiet.
• Punta de Teno. Paradoxically, the car ban saved it: the 369 bus caps how many people fit.