The Cabildo of Tenerife has approved this Tuesday for tourism companies to operate within the Teide National Park under conditions involving snow and ice, as reported by the island corporation in a statement.
This decision was reached following a meeting held this Tuesday, which included the councillor for the area, Blanca Pérez; insular director Pedro Millán; vice president and Tenerife island representative of Activa Canarias, Yolanda Afonso; alongside Tanausú Zumaquero and Antonio Hernández from the same company’s management, as well as Josué González, a representative of AEGM (Spanish Association of Mountain Guides).
Blanca Pérez explained that this initiative is complemented by a recent agreement with the Tenerife Mountaineering Federation, which aims to clarify and facilitate access to Pico Teide for federation members who are qualified to engage in activities on terrain covered in snow and ice.
These active tourism companies must fulfil certain criteria: they must be legally recognised to operate in the National Park and possess guides with the requisite qualifications (medium mountain sports technician or higher, and/or similar professional accreditation) to navigate through snowy environments, complete with the essential basic winter gear (technical clothing, crampons and ice axe). Furthermore, they must be registered in the Tenerife ON application.
Pedro Millán, the insular director of the Natural Environment, noted that the aim of the agreement is to ensure that “active tourism companies accessing Pico Teide in winter conditions, with ice and snow, will have qualified technicians to carry out this activity with the utmost safety. In this regard, Millán indicated, there is a “complete agreement between the island administration and the active tourism companies that, in addition to safety, we must collaborate to protect the natural values of the Teide National Park.”
