Attractions Tenerife

The city has established as objectives for the next 12 months to continue and re-launch the joint international promotion of these cities.

The major of La Laguna, Fernando Clavijo, will chair form next Wednesday 30^th of June, the ‘Grupo de Ciudades Patrimonio de la Humanidad de España” (Spain’s World Heritage Cities), formed by thirteen citied appointed by the UNESCO, with the goal of constructing guidelines for the quality tourism promotion and the defence of common interests.

The announcement was made last week during the general assembly of this group that took place in Salamanca, when the presidency of the major this city, Julián Lanzarote, finished. The new president of the group will be Fernando Clavijo, major of La Laguna in Tenerife, who will be for the next twelve months the new president of the Spain’s World Heritage Cities, having as main goals to continue and to renew the international promotion of these cities as a whole, according to the information provided in a press release by the La Laguna Council.

Likewise, during this meeting was approved the Strategic Plan 2010 – 2015, which sets the guidelines for the next five-year period. During this period, the institution will try to enhance the tourist relevance of these cities due to their historic and cultural value.

On the other hand, the assembly made a balance of the initiatives carried out during the previous year, which main actions were an international campaign of tourist promotion, the renewal of the agreement with Turespaña to make the re-launching of these cities as a joint brand in the potential tourists markets, and the training courses plan for the prevention and fighting of fires in museums and libraries.

To these actions it has to be added the signature of the “Declaración de Salamanca” (Salamanca’s Declaration), in which the cities part of this group agree on cooperative and communication lines with the UNESCO to analyze projects and actions of interest in each one of the protected areas.

PROMOTIONS OF INTERNATIONAL IMPACT

The different commissions that form part of the Spain’s World Heritage Cities group worked together in 2009 to put under way different actions. Among them, the Tourism Commission together with Turespaña, took promotional actions to contact tourism professionals in Japan, India, Brazil, Switzerland and the United States, carried out familiarizing trips for tourist agents and journalists.

Besides, this group was present at tourist exhibitions such as the JATA in Japan or the IBT in Berlin. At the same time, they produced a new line of brochures and promotional videos and got updated the content of their web site. The renewal of the agreement with Turespaña, will allow a new promotional boost in the consolidated markets as well as the opening to new European and transcontinental markets.

Likewise, the Culture Commission continued with the travelling photographs exhibition called “Trece Joyas de España” (Thirteen Spanish Jewels), from the photographer José Manuel Navia, who presented in the capital of Norway an exhibition about the thirteen cities part of the group, and made a film festival with the exhibition of movies form different times and styles shot in each one of these cities. The Education Commission, on the other hand, continued its educational project “Conocer las Ciudades Patrimonio” (Know the World Heritage Cities). This is the nine edition of this project that provides history and heritage awareness to the students.

The Security Commission has carried out several courses about fire prevention addressed to libraries and museums directors of these cities and to the emergency and security professionals. Other subjects handled by the rest of the commissions part of this group include a conference for town planning professionals about the integration of the modern architecture to the World Heritage Cities, the publishing of a guide about tourist resources for people with disabilities, and a diagnosis of the urban mobility, noise, pledges control and wastes disposal for each one of these cities.

2010 HERITAGE AWARD

During the group’s last assembly it was given the 2010 Heritage Award to the “Fundación Santa María la Real” from Aguilar de Campoó, which is devoted to raise the value of the cultural, natural and human heritage, giving also a special mention to the professor emeritus from the Heidelberg University, Géza Alföldy, who is a renown figure in the field of Roman History and Latin Epigraphy. In the last two editions, this award was given at the UNESCO World Heritage Center (2008) and at the “Atapuerca” researcher’s team (2009).

The Spain’s World Heritage Cities group is a non-profit organization founded in 1993 with the aim of acting together in the defence of the historical and cultural heritage of the cities part of this group, which are: Alcalá de Henares, Ávila, Cáceres, Córdoba, Cuenca, Ibiza, Mérida, Salamanca, San Cristóbal de la Laguna, Santiago de Compostela, Segovia, Tarragona and Toledo.

Their web site is www.ciudadespatrimonio.org. [Spanish]

Next 8th of July from 9 p.m., Tenerife is to host the national preview of the movie ‘Unahora más en Canarias’ (One more hour in Canarias) which was shot in the island. Themovie will be presented at the ‘Yelmo Cines’ in Santa Cruz de Tenerife, and will countwith the presence of the director, David Serrano, and the two leading actors QuimGutiérrez and Angie Cepada.The councillor of tourism of the island, José Manuel Bermúdez, highlighted on a pressrelease that thanks to the effort made by Turismo de Tenerife (public entity in charge ofthe tourist promotion of the island), “it was possible to bring to the island the shootingof this film, which has served not only as an excellent promotional tool but also hasprovided subcontracts to several companies from Tenerife and job for more than 700extras”. With this regard, Bermúdez said to the press that “the island had profits above774,000 euros from this movie”.http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8GrOG_LE0JI&feature=related‘Una hora más en Canarias’, which will be released on Spanish cinemas next 16thof July, was shot in 30 locations of Tenerife, most of them in the municipality ofGarachico, and for that reason, the neighbours of this municipality will receive a specialfree pass to watch the preview of this film. The movie was shot also at Icod de losVinos, La Laguna, Playa del Bollullo, Aeropuerto Reina Sofía and Buenavista delNorte, among other locations.This film counts with the participation of the leading actors Quim Gutiérrez, (BestNew Artist winner at the Goya Awards for the movie ‘Azuloscurocasinegro’), theColombian actresses Angie Cepeda (from ‘Los Protegidos’) and Juana Acosta (from themovies ‘Carlos’, ‘El Comisario’ and ‘Hospital Central’), as well as the television starMiren Ibarguren (from ‘Aída’) and the supporting actors Eduardo Blanco (from ‘El hijode la Novia’), Kiti Manver (from ‘Los Abrazos Rotos’) and Isabel Ordaz (from ‘La quese avecina’).The film was produced by ‘Telespan 2000’ (production company partof ‘Vértice 360º’) is association with ‘La Zona Films’, and co-produced with theColombian ‘Dynamo’. ‘Una hora más en Canarias’ was made in collaboration withTVE (Spanish Television), Canal Plus, the Council of Tenerife, the entity ‘Turismo deTenerife’ and the Tourism Department of the Canarias Government. ‘Vértice Cine’ hasthe distribution of this movie in Spain.The movie, which is the third one shot by this director, involves the characters in ascrewball comedy full of craziness, ridiculous situations and musicals full of fantasyand humour. The film was recently presented at the 13th edition of the Malaga Festival,where it was received by the audience with laughter and applauses.Bermúdez, said that Turismo de Tenerife, through its Film Comission, “gave its supportlast year to a total of 75 shooting projects, recordings and photographic sessions, whichwere an excellent way to promote the island and its natural scenaries”.The island had in 2009; 262 days of shooting, 200 enquires and 164 permit applications.These national and international film productions left incomes above 4 million euroslast year, which doubles the incomes in 2008.

The hotel “Bahía del Duque”, located in the municipality of Adeje in Tenerife, is processing a permit to install a new water desalination plant that will be able to process 600m2 of water per day using the seawater reverse osmosis (SWRO) system.

The “Consejo Insular de Aguas de Tenerife” (Tenerife regional water supply authority), presented today this information in the Official Canarias Bulletin, informing that the project and its authorization will be published for 20 days. During that period, any statement with regards to this issue could be presented.

Following, we will discover a very special hotel located in the northern region of Tenerife: Hotel Botánico.

The Hotel Botánico is a luxurious five stars hotel located in the north area of the island, and in fact, it is the first hotel in Canarias to be included in the ‘The Leading Hotels of the World’. It is situated at Puerto de La Cruz in the residential area, just few minutes from downtown and in the middle of the Orotava valley.

The hotel got its name from the botanic garden located next to it, which was created in 1788 by a royal law issued by King Carlos III. Since then, many tropical species brought from the Spanish colonies were grown in this botanic garden.

The Botanic Hotel is a classic, traditional and family oriented hotel. It has been operating for several years and, like fine wine, it has become better through the years. Since 1995, it is property of the “Loro Parque” owners, one of the most visited theme parks in Tenerife.

One of most remarkable things is the luxuriant garden the hotel has, an oasis of tranquillity that counts with a variety of palm trees, fountains, water lilies and goldfish ponds. The hotel also has a small vegetables garden where dozens of aromatic herbs and spices are grown to provide a unique flavour to the dishes served in their four à la carte restaurants.

The garden of this hotel is full of birds that move freely through the plants and trees without worrying about human presence. There are plenty more options. There is a swimming pool with canopied beds and an open restaurant called “La Palmera Real” where you can take a dink enjoying the magnificent view. At the Hotel Botánico, to take breakfast listening to the birds singing is a must, as well as having lunch listening to the music of Roberto Carlos.

This hotel counts with 252 rooms, being the 85% of them double ones, which makes it perfect for families with children. All of them have a nice view to the Orotava and Teide valleys or to the Atlantic Ocean.

Each room was personally decorated by the wife of the owner, the Consul of Thailand, who has been in charge of the management of this hotel for three years now.  When you arrive to this hotel, you are welcomed with a little cuddly elephant: the Good Luck White Elephant or Royal Elephant which is place on every bed.

The public entity Turismo de Tenerife, through its Convention Bureau, is starting this week a promotional campaign in the United Kingdom to promote Tenerife as congress and incentive travel destination, addressed to travel agents specialized in this sector of the market. Likewise, a dozen hotels and associated companies will participate in this campaign.

The insular councillor of tourism, José Manuel Bermúdez, said during a press conference that due to the work done by Turismo de Tenerife, the island “has achieved a remarkable position as destination for social and corporative events”. In fact, Tenerife is the leader among the Canarias islands in this sector of the market, having hosted last year more than 800 national and international events, which brought to the island about 60,000 visitors.

The promotional activities in the United Kingdom started today with the visit to fourteen travel agencies located in Manchester, Cheshire and Chester. Tomorrow, it is scheduled a presentation of the island and its events’ offer. About a hundred travel agencies specialized in congress and incentive travels have confirmed their assistance to this event.

Tenerife offers quality facilities as well as professional event planning companies. In addition to this, the cool weather the island has all over the year, and its proximity – about four hours from any European capital – make Tenerife the perfect destination for this kind of events.

Tenerife Conventions Bureau is the Turismo de Tenerife department in charge of the pre-capturing of congresses – counting with the offer’s dossier and promotional support – and also the planning and hosting of them, providing advising and information about the suppliers and companies in the sector. Besides, they conduct promotional activities to show the events’ offer of the island, and provide maps and brochures of Tenerife to the travel agents of this sector among other services.

The Council of Tenerife informed in a press release that the island is in the fifth place among the favourite holyday destinations chosen by families according to Tripadvisor’s web site, being above Turkey, Portugal and Gran Canaria.
In relation with this, the Tourism councillor and director of Turismo de Tenerife, José Manuel Bermúdez, said that “this is a clear signal that the tourism offer the island provides for families is one of the most accepted and appreciated among tourists who prefer it over other European destinations. This is great news, because the ranking provided by this web site is made by tourists who have visited the different destinations listed there and provide a realistic and objective opinion”.
The family tourism offer of the island has been reinforced during these years and includes the different theme parks located in the northern and southern regions of Tenerife, the different leisure activities – at sea or at the countryside – and a varied hostelry offer for families with children.

This is not the first time Tenerife heads the ranking of the favourite destinations on a travel web site, because the island ended in second place among the most searched destinations in 2010 by the British tourists who uses the Skyscanner travel resources web site.

This ranking was elaborated at the beginning of this year over 50 favourite destinations chosen by their users for their holyday. Tenerife overcome  cities such as New York, Paris or Rome.
Finally, the press release says that Tenerife has been one of the favourite destinations for the German users of the check24.de portal as well. In March, the island received almost 60,000 votes as favourite holyday destination, only overcame by Malaga.

This summer, Tenerife will count with 600,000 more airplane seats than in 2009, when the number reached 5.9 million, being programmed for this year a total of 6.5 million seats.

This way, from the 6.5 million airplane seats, one part will be for 12 new companies that will start flying to Tenerife, increasing to 34 the number of routes to the island this summer season, according to the information provided by the Council of Tenerife in a press release.

In relation with this, the vice councillor of Tenerife, José Manuel Bermúdez, said that “this is the result of the effort made by Turismo de Tenerife to increase flights connections to the island” that has increased the number of seats 10 percent.

Likewise, he said that airlines and tourist operators “still trust and bet on the island”, which shows “the attractive tourist offer we provide, even in the present moments of international economic crisis”.