Barranco del Infierno (“Hell’s Gorge”) is a ravine and a Nature Reserve where only 300 people can enter a day, in order to preserve the environment and not alter the development of the species, the flora and the fauna. To visit the ravine a previous reservation is essential. They open the entrance at 08.30 and it costs about 8.50 euros for an adult tourist. (Cheaper for children and locals)

When we visited Adeje in the south of the island of Tenerife, just over a month ago, we rented an apartment next to the reserve border. Ideal for exciting hikes in the mountains along winding goat paths. It was warm and steep, but the view was always seductive.

Canaries (Serinus canaria) and Canary Chiffchaff (Phylloscopus canariensis) sang everywhere, and African blue tit (Cyanistes teneriffae) was often seen among the bushes. Sometimes it rattles on the ground when a lizard ran away. Tenerife lizard (Gallotia galloti), an endemic species. The male is large and has a blueish stain on both sides of its head, the female is smaller with brown lines on the sides or molted.

The entrance to the ravine was just 100 meters from our accommodation so we took a chance and went there early one morning, hoping that there would be an opportunity to visit the reserve, but no! Only bookings are possible. The ravine is so popular to visit and only 300 guests are admitted per day. We bought tickets for a visit a few days later.

Then came Calima, the sandstorm and ravine closed immediately for visits. In 2009, a deadly accident happened, and the ravine was then closed to visitors for six years. Today, it is open again after extensive maintenance work to secure the trail. Our booking was moved forward a few days but, in the end, we got a clear sign.

The instructions are clear. All visitors wear helmets – all the time. No one is allowed to leave the hiking trail and on some extra risky paths one should not stop but be in motion all the time.

The further into the ravine you get, the steeper the rock walls feel. You are asked to be quiet during parts of the hike, a sympathetic condition that I would like to salute at all, but here is the idea that you should hear stones that collapse and be warned in time. We keep up the speed to keep a distance from a group of loud visitors who laugh, talk and shout to each other …

It was an exciting landscape and according to all the nice information boards there were lots of interesting endemic species of all kinds, both terrestrial and aquatic. For the invertebrate it should be around 416 species among which the groups of arthropods, millipedes, arachnids and mollusks stand out… I say!

The trail ended at the highest waterfall on Tenerife, about 200 meters high. Here water flows all year round and a small levada leads it via an old mill down to Adeje.

Wish we had a little more time to explore the gorge. Three and a half hours it was thought that the tour would take, and you knew that more visitors were waiting for the day. It did not get completely relaxing. Probably prefer “our own” nature reserves, where there is endless space, hardly a human and absolutely no cactus.

But as I said, very interesting and exciting. Well maintained! Well worth a visit.

No problems with the language, it’s universal. The Barbary partridge (Alectoris barbara) say, do you have a sandwich?