When our children are little ones we usually tell them bedtime stories ... fairy tales whose plot unfolds in enchanted forest of gnarled trunks, wrapped in mist, upholstered with moss, ferns and where the treetops barely let in the sunlight. One of these fairytale forests is El Cedro Forest, is located in La Gomera, within the Garajonay National Park.
This magical forest, is located on the edge of National Park in the town of Hermigua, (northwest of the island). A forest where the soft murmur of the waters of a beautiful creek accompany you all the way.
El Cedro, is a beautiful laurel forest, bright green, wrapped in a soft and thick mists that arise from condensation in clouds of the trade winds from the north when they hit the peaks of the island.
Laurisilva takes this name because most tree species that compose present similar to the laurel leaves. It consists of more than twenty species of trees, shrubs, ferns, mosses, ivies, creepers ... giving the forest that mystery. Their existence is tied to a can humidity and mild temperatures with little fluctuations during the year.
Laursilva, is a mass of prehistoric vegetation, a living fossil of the subtropical forests that occupied much of Europe and North Africa several million years ago.
According to botanists, Garajonay, has one of the best examples of laurel forests in the world and was recognized as UNESCO declaring the Heritage Park Site in 1986.
If you visit La Gomera, know this unique enclave is simple as there are routes very well planned hiking and indicated that cross as Contadero-El Cedro route or that goes to the shrine of Our Lady of Lourdes, as a curiosity this trail was built in 1935 by order of an English governess who worked for a wealthy family Gomera.
If you want more stories and places of La Gomera, do not forget to give a tour of our blog.