Entry Date: 13.11.2009, at 22:12:32 hrs (UTC)

Las Palmas - Las Palmas

Gran Canaria

Today we had a great sight seeing tour into the mountains of Gran Canaria. The ARC had organized a bus tour and Maria, our tour guide gave us a great introduction of the island and its people. Gran Canaria is the third highest island of the totally 13 Canaries Islands. Four of those islands are only rocks in the Atlantic without any population. More then 800.000 people live on Gran Canaria, about 400.000 of them in the Canarian capital Las Palmas de Gran Canaria. The islands are volcanic and about 14 million years old. They are about 210 km west of Africa and 1250 km south west from Europe. About 40% of the 1532 sqkm sized island is protected. Tourists find 60km golden beaches, mainly in the southwest, cliffs and rocks in the northern and western part of the island and mountains up to almost 2000m height in the middle. There was even snow sometimes in winter, but the average temperature is 22 – 24 C. Tourism is the main income of the people. The agriculture can barely support the own population.

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