The Canary Islands' vanishing heritage.
One of Tenerife's ancient footpaths is rent asunder by the forces of "progress".

Looking at the "before" and "after" photos of this ancient footpath, one might be forgiven for thinking that the volcano had finally unleashed its destructive might...

This is one of the last stretches of the ancient "Camino Real" or "Royal Path" in Northern Tenerife. It is sited in the Realejos municipality, close to the Rambla de Castro Nature Area.

Hikers using the path before the building works.

The path was destroyed by Telefónica de España, S.A. [telephone company] when laying an optical fibre cable link to La Palma. The cable was laid in a 40 mm tube, 477 metres long. The destruction of the path was completely unecessary, especially when one considers the relatively minor nature of the works involved.

The project was authorised by the Tenerife Government, which wilfully set aside the usual environmental protection measures and requirements for an impact study on the landscape and island's heritage. The works were pushed through under emergency legislation designed to deal with an imminent volcanic eruption. The authorities cynically used their special powers, which suspend normal safeguards when a volcanic eruption threatens. This gave the telephone company carte blanche to destroy this part of the Island's cultural heritage.

A jack hammer opens up a trench in the path.

The wrongful use of emergency powers is typical of the way the Canary Islands' government goes about things. While Tenerife's leaders have done nothing to expunge Franco, Mola, and other prominent Fascists from the Island's street names, they have few qualms about invoking special powers to rip up centuries-old paths. But then this is the Canary Islands, the place from which Franco launched his successful coup d'etat in 1936.

Given the utter contempt shown by the Island authorities' for Tenerife's natural and cultural heritage, this use of emergency powers to condone the destruction of even more of the environment hardly comes as a surprise.

The path after the "Telefonica" treatment.

Let's just hope the volcano erupts - preferably without causing mayhem - so that this modern variant of martial law can be brought to a swift end.

Given a choice between the natural forces unleashed by Teide (Tenerife's active volcano) and the unnatural political forces at work on the Island, there are plenty of reasons for choosing Nature over Art. Local politicians seem bent on vindicating Lenin's criticism of democracies as "elective dictatorships". But then Tenerife politics are rooted in Spain's disgraceful and not-so-distant past, while its its recipes for the future always seem to be based on the same indigestible ingredients - reinforced concrete, ever more tourists, and kickbacks.

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