 Welcome back to Ascentric Nature, I'm Merrick Hayden and hey! I would love to say that I've got a magnificent garden tour for you today, but the fact is, there really aren't any on the Palma. Well there is one succulent garden called the Palmex Cactus that has about 700 species of cactus, but other than that, nada, there is nothing. Which, with its other amazing natural phenomenon, is perfectly okay. Hey, did you know that there are a couple of really cool buttons right below this video that are fun to click? Yeah, be sure to hit that like button, give a hearty tap on the subscribe and hit that bell with confidence knowing you'll receive oodles of fun and kooky videos from me and the future. Woohoo! Onward to the Volcanoes! Like all of the Canary Islands, La Palma originally was formed from the power of submarine volcanic activity. Along with Tenerife, La Palma is currently the most volcanically active of the Canary Islands with the last eruption happening in 1971. We recently spent a whole week on La Palma and on our first day we were dreadfully ambitious and took a 4 hour hike up one of the volcanoes and were luckily rewarded with some amazing weather and brilliant views. I mean, check that out! Yeah baby! That's awesome! Volcanic creatures hanging in the wind, don't go over the edge or you'll die. This also gives me a great chance to talk about the very wicked cool cloud effects caused by the Atlantic trade winds. It's called the Sea of Clouds or it's scientifically known as the phone effect. And without getting too technical in my video here, basically what it does is it keeps the clouds trapped in certain areas on the island creating these brilliant cloud formations. You will also see other impressive effects of the trade winds just off the coast of the island where you can see a rim of clouds that's kept away from the island itself thereby creating this spectacular cloud line all around the coast at many times. I mean, it's really impressive to behold. Seeing the cloud formations was definitely one of my favorite things on the island. Natural phenomenon baby, you can't beat that! Let's talk some sweet island facts. In 2002 UNESCO declared the entire island a World Biosphere Reserve. Also, La Palma was actually made the first starlight reserve in the world in 2012, which means that facilities for stargazers are kept in tip-top condition and there are tough restrictions in place to prevent light pollution on the island. La Palma is also home to the Grand Telescopio Canarius, the largest telescope in the world as of 2009. We didn't actually take time to go up and see it because it's up a really psycho-crazy windy road on the top of one of the volcanoes and it really didn't seem that worth it, you know? And while La Palma is actually considered one of the best places for stargazing on the planet, we didn't unfortunately get much stargazing in as it was rather windy and chilly most of the time we were there in the evenings. So when we went outside we kind of looked at the stars for about 39 seconds and hop back in the car or in the house to eliminate all numbness and shivering of our bodies. Yeah, they actually get pretty severe temperature variations in the morning and night, especially when those winds are cooking. Woo! Let me tell you, those winds can be nasty. It's not windy at all! So instead of stargazing, we tried to take advantage of the other big local attractions, the beaches. One of the unique aspects of La Palma is that all of the beaches are black sand, a rare phenomenon on the earth, but really cool if you get a chance to see it. This is apparently because of the high iron content that you'll find in volcanic rock. Dope somewhere, see some black sand. Another funny thing about La Palma is that most of the beaches are on the west side of the island because of the trade winds, which make the east side of the island much cloudier than the west normally. But now we're heading down to the beach via the well-tended, but slightly rocky walk. Walkup's gonna be fun, but yeah, this beach better be worth it. We've been told it's the most beautiful beach on the island, so here we go. Whoa, it just keeps going on, doesn't it? Ooh, there's water down there, thanks for the demonstration, Eric. Just tossed a rock down there, I don't know if it shows up. That's where we're going. I can't even get the magnitude of this cliff in one shot. Now we actually did find great beaches on both sides of the island, but not without some major stress caused by the incredibly windy roads that traverse the whole island and I am absolutely not kidding here, people. These were some crazy roads. There is maybe one or two areas where you get a mile or two of straight road on the whole island, and in order to get anywhere on this island, you have to deal with these ultra-scary roads every day. Traversing these roads was made not very easy thanks to Google Maps. Lots of love for you right now, Google Maps, would you do things like tell us, take a slight left. And then suddenly you're being plunged down what feels like a 45 degree road going straight down down a tight, single, squirrely, squirrely lane road. Dang, I mean, yeah, these were some scary roads. Absolutely a freaky effect that drove me bonkers several times while driving around. I mean, it actually drove me nuts every day. So yes, this was our entire trip, travel under heavy stress and get somewhere peaceful and wonderful, relax. And endure these crazy, stressful roads over and over again. So not exactly the peaceful getaway we were hoping for. That said, there were still many fantastic moments on this trip. One of the best was on our last days on the island where we found the natural pool of Charcot Azul. Here's what you essentially get on the travel brochure. Charcot Azul can be literally translated as the blue puddle due to its marvelous shades of blue. This remarkable, sheltered lagoon is great for swimming even as the ocean water flows into it. So even when the outer ocean is somewhat rough, the waves remain crystal clear and almost unbothered. Yeah, that's so not what we got. We got this full on stormy sea mayhem, which although it didn't allow swimming was still very impressive just to behold and enjoy for its breathtaking waves. Here comes one. Yes, come waves, I invoke your power. We also found some fun rock formations with a huge collection of some of the island's local inhabitants. Oh look at those cute little lizards. So awesome. Hey there cute buddy. So yes, that was our trip. Lots of incredibly beautiful moments straddled by, oh my god, oh my god, I'm gonna die, my car's gonna plunge into the Atlantic Ocean. Not the peaceful oasis we were dreaming of, but certainly a memory well worth having. Thanks so much for watching. If you haven't done it yet, the like and subscribe buttons are beckoning you. Go ahead, clickity click them, it'll make my soul glow with happiness. If you want to see some fun videos much like this one, please check out the Budapest Garden and City Tour or the Prague Garden and City Tour. Have you had a totally crazy trip before? Please let me know in the comment section down below. Until next time, you guys take care of each other. May all of your adventures be memorable and preferably stress free.