Bandama Natural Monument

Walk into a volcanic caldera in Gran Canaria

Walking into the Bandama caldera is like going back millions of years in time to an epoch of colossal underground explosions that produced this circular caldera a kilometre across. Just twenty minutes drive from central Las Palmas, Bandama is an impressive natural monument with a concave floor of grey volcanic ash covered in copses of native trees and surrounded by the vertical caldera walls.

The best Bandama caldera lookout point

Adjacent to the caldera is the 575 metre volcanic cinder cone of Pico de Bandama. It’s the islands most recent cone and has the best view of the caldera from its lookout point right at the top. To walk into the caldera use the network of paths that take you 170 metres to the caldera floor. As you descend look out for the cliff caves used by the island’s aboriginal inhabitants to store grain, and find the old grape press and old houses that are the vestiges of the calderas hundreds of years of human habitation.