Mount Teide · In the Very Middle of the Island

Mount Teide stands in the centre of Tenerife and is the highest peak in Spain; beyond the summit crater lies a whole older crater system already weathered away, the rock blown by wind into blade-like shapes.

The indigenous Guanche people treated the mountain as forbidden ground, saying an evil god lived inside, and climbed only to the middle slopes in the grazing season.

The observatory is built on the summit, because the cloud layer always stops halfway up. Stargazers at night say that from up there the whole island looks as if it is floating on the clouds.

Natural Mysteries / Tenerife · Spain / Time immemorial