The intention behind our recent trip to Tenerife was twofold: enjoying some sunshine at the end of our first European winter, plus naturally visiting the World Heritage Sites on Tenerife and the adjacent La Gomera island. Organising our visits to the sites actually on Tenerife were easy, but it proved to be a bit tricky when it came to visiting Garanjonay National Park on La Gomera.

Our tentative plan was to take the ferry over, spend a day exploring, stay the night, then return the next day before our flight out of Tenerife South airport in the afternoon. However, firstly, there's virtually no hotels or Airbnbs on La Gomera that allow dogs (as we were travelling with our dog, like usual). We could have made do with the rustic options open to us, but then we realised a second issue. We wanted to hire a car for a day (not take a car across from Tenerife). But my husband these days only drives an auto, and we couldn't find a single auto car rental available on La Gomera. We knew there was a bus option, but after reading previous reviews weren't happy to depend upon it. 

Luckily, we found an alternative. On GetYourGuide, we came across a day trip option: "La Gomera Full-Day Hiking Tour from Tenerife". Unlike most of the other day trips that mention "visiting the national park", but just drive through the park on a bus, this tour mentioned hiking in the national park. Plus, the cost of the tour was barely more than the price of the (expensive) ferry trip. Normally we avoid organised tours, but this was perfect.

The tour and our visit to Garanjonay National Park ended up being a great day. The tour is bi-lingual, with a German guide, who provided information in both German (for the majority of the group) plus English. On our hike, we firstly hiked on the "Las Creces" path through the heath forest, then next to a spectacular section of canyon, just outside of the national park on the dryer side.

The only downside was that despite the tour running from 8am (for those meeting at the port in Los Cristianos) to nearly 6pm (back at the port), once you took out the ferry trip and the bus trip, there wasn't that much time spent hiking. Plus, I would have loved to stop countless times at the lookouts on the way back to the ferry, but there also wasn't time. Oh well, we'll have to return one time and spend more time exploring the spectacular landscapes of La Gomera. (Although it would be a very long journey from our native Australia!)