In Tenerife, there are place names that conceal a specific scene or a human gesture that determined the name of a location.
One such name, situated nearly 900 metres above sea level and surrounded by pine forests and cloud forests, is the administrative capital of El Rosario. To understand why it is called La Esperanza, one must delve into the heart of the conquest and follow the retreat of an army seeking salvation.
The History
Local tradition, recorded by the Town Hall of El Rosario, recounts that Adelantado Alonso Fernández de Lugo reached this height following the defeat at the Matanza de Acentejo in 1494.
From the site where the parish church now stands, he could see the real de Añaza, on the coast of present-day Santa Cruz. That sight signified salvation, allowing his forces to retreat after the setback inflicted by the Guanches, and some survivors viewed it as a miracle (a common interpretation at the time).
Thus, he vowed to erect a chapel to the Virgin of Hope if he arrived safely with his men. From that promise, the toponym was born.
The Great Virtual Encyclopedia of the Canary Islands (GEVIC) provides the same explanation: the name refers to the feeling of “hope” experienced by the Castilians who escaped the battle and spotted their camp from these heights.
Today, the memory also persists in the nearby Forest of the Adelantado, a small enclave of laurisilva located within the town, named in honour of Fernández de Lugo’s passage during that retreat.
In 1964, the town was additionally granted the title of villa.
Gateway to Teide
La Esperanza is the administrative capital of El Rosario, a municipality in the northeast of Tenerife with approximately 18,000 inhabitants. Its districts are distributed between the midlands (La Esperanza, Las Rosas, Llano del Moro…) and the coast (Radazul, Tabaiba), explaining its diverse landscapes.
On an island scale, El Rosario encompasses 39.43 km² and forms part of the Santa Cruz–La Laguna metropolitan area. The locality of La Esperanza sits at an altitude of around 850–900 metres, while the Forest of the Adelantado preserves 25,397 m² of cloud forest between 850 and 875 metres.
Furthermore, the town is one of the classic access points to the Teide National Park via the TF-24, Carretera de La Esperanza. This route (known as the “dorsal road”) serves as the eastern entrance to the park and is the scenic route chosen by many visitors.
Remnants of the Promise: Chapel, Parish, and Town
The chapel that recalled the Adelantado’s promise eventually led to the current Church of Our Lady of La Esperanza, which is styled neo-colonial.
The temple was established as a parish in 1929, separating from La Concepción (La Laguna), according to municipal information and island heritage records.
The institutional narrative positions the origin of the name precisely here: from this vantage point, the troops saw the camp at Añaza, and the Adelantado’s promise was born.
That La Esperanza is now the capital of a municipality with both sea and mountains summarises its character: a high ground overlooking the Teide, a historical passage in the island routes, and a toponym born from a promise made during the conquest.
