How to explore the Canary Islands on a budget
Isabella is one of the writers on the new Canary Islands guidebook, spending weeks researching Tenerife and Lanzarote. Here she shares her top tips on stretching your budget on your next sun trip.
Unlike Spain’s famously glamorous Balearic Islands, the Canaries are widely considered a good-value destination, with a raft of sensibly priced accommodation, dining options, monuments and activities to tempt budget-conscious travelers. That doesn’t make them a shoestring destination though, and major local events – like Carnaval – paired with a double beach-holiday season can send costs skyrocketing.
Planning your trip to the Canary Islands to sidestep the peak tourism months is the most obvious way to keep things budget-friendly, while choosing one of the smaller, more offbeat islands, such as charmingly rural El Hierro, can also mean lighter expenses.
Efficient public transport makes getting around the islands on a budget easy, and meals at many Canarian restaurants are pretty affordable by European standards, especially once you step away from the main tourism hubs. Plenty of the archipelago’s key attractions can be enjoyed at relatively low rates or even entirely for free, from hiking through moon-like landscapes to splashing around in salt-water pools and exploring uniquely architecture-rich towns. Here are our tips for making the most of the dazzling Canary Islands without breaking the bank.
Daily costs
- Surf hostel dorm: from €20 (US$22)
- Hotel room for two: from €90 (US$99)
- One-bedroom self-catering apartment: varies hugely, perhaps from €50 (US$55)
- Coffee: €1.50-2 (US$1.65-2)
- Ración of cheese with mojos: from €5 (US$5.50)
- Tourist office walking tour: free
- Glass of wine: €3-6 (US$3.20-6.60)
Travel around by local guagua (bus)
All seven main islands have excellent, efficient bus systems, each operated by a single island-wide company; in Tenerife there’s also a handy tram linking the capital Santa Cruz with the historic town of La Laguna. With a little advance planning, it’s perfectly possible to explore much of each island by hopping on public transport. Bus tickets for Tenerife’s South Airport, for example, cost just €3.20 to/from Los Cristianos and €9.35 to/from Santa Cruz with TITSA. Many bus networks also have multiday or multitrip passes that visitors can take advantage of.
That said, if you’re traveling as a group and splitting the price, it is sometimes more cost-effective to hire a car.
