Tenerife: Teide Quad Adventure from Playa de las Américas

4.65

(300 reviews)

What’s the experience like?

We kicked up dust leaving Playa de las Américas, the ocean still in the rearview and that salty breeze clinging to my jacket. The quad rumbled under me—louder than I expected—and our guide, Dani, shouted something about holding tight before we veered off onto the road heading for Arona. The asphalt was smooth at first, but you could already smell pine and something earthy as we started climbing. I kept glancing over at my friend behind me, her helmet slightly crooked (she never fixes it) and she just grinned back like a kid on a carnival ride.

Somewhere past La Escalona, the air got cooler and there were these sudden pockets of silence when we’d stop—just birds and the faint click of engines cooling down. Vilaflor was our pit stop; it’s this sleepy mountain town where time feels slow. We wandered into a café with old men playing cards out front. I tried to order coffee in Spanish—got a smile and something way stronger than I meant to ask for. After that, back on the quads, Dani pointed out how the forest thins out fast as you climb higher; suddenly everything’s rock and ash and it looks like another planet up there.

The last stretch into Cañadas del Teide was all light shifting across black lava fields, Mount Teide just looming ahead. We stopped at Boca del Tauce and honestly—I didn’t expect to feel so small standing there with all that space around us. The air was thin but clean in a way you almost taste it. Everyone got quiet for a minute, even Dani (which is saying something). I still think about that view sometimes when I’m stuck in traffic back home.