Cross port
Puerto de la Cruz is a Spanish city and municipality belonging to the island of Tenerife, in the province of Santa Cruz de Tenerife, autonomous community of the Canary Islands.
Puerto de la Cruz was the place where tourism began in the Canary Islands. In 1886, the first sanatorium in the archipelago was established in this small port in the La Orotava valley to accommodate sick tourists. It was also the first Spanish tourist center in Europe. Together with the neighboring municipalities of Los Realejos and La Orotava, it forms the Metropolitan Area of Valle de La Orotava with 108,721 inhabitants (2019).
Toponymy and demonym
Originally it was called Puerto de la Orotava, as it was the main point of embarkation in that valley, although since the end of the 16th century It was also called Puerto de la Cruz, because the new settlers had planted a cross on the recently built dock.
- Gentile
Its inhabitants are known as portuenses, and in some cases they are generalized as "ranilleros", but originally this name belonged only to those from the Ranilla neighborhood within the same town and with a strong fishing tradition.[< i>citation required]
Symbols
Shield
The heraldic shield of the municipality was approved by Decree of 4 June 1964.
«Of gold, sinople dragon, linguate gules, surmounted by Latin cross gules. Azure campaign with three wavy silver girdles, loaded with a saber key. The bell, open royal crown."
Flag
Although it does not have an approved municipal flag, the city council unofficially uses a white banner with the heraldic shield in the center.
Physical geography
Location
It is located in the north of the island of Tenerife, in the valley of La Orotava, bordering the municipalities of Los Realejos and La Orotava.
It has an area of 8.73 km², making it the smallest municipality in the autonomous community of the Canary Islands.
The town center is 9 meters above sea level, with the highest point in the municipality at the foot of the Montaña de los Frailes, next to the La Montaña road.
Orography
The most prominent elevation in the municipality is the volcanic cone known as Montaña de la Horca or Las Arenas, with an altitude of 239 meters.
Hydrography
The main channels that cross the municipality are those of the ravines of Llarena, Araujo, Martiánez and San Felipe.
Climate
Puerto de la Cruz enjoys a warm semi-arid climate (Köppen climate classification: BSh) close to the tropical climate with a dry and wet season. The average annual temperature is 20.1 °C (68.2 °F).
 Average climate parameters of Puerto de la Cruz | |||||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Month | Ene. | Feb. | Mar. | Open up. | May. | Jun. | Jul. | Ago. | Sep. | Oct. | Nov. | Dec. | Annual |
| Average temperature (°C) | 20.4 | 20.7 | 21.2 | 21.8 | 23.1 | 24.8 | 26.7 | 27.8 | 26.6 | 25.6 | 23.4 | 21.0 | 23.6 |
| Average temperature (°C) | 17.0 | 17.2 | 17.7 | 18.2 | 19.4 | 21.2 | 22.9 | 23.8 | 23.0 | 22.1 | 20.0 | 17.8 | 20.1 |
| Temp. medium (°C) | 13.5 | 13.7 | 14.2 | 14.6 | 15.7 | 17.6 | 19.1 | 19.8 | 19.4 | 18.5 | 16.6 | 14.6 | 16.5 |
| Total precipitation (mm) | 56.0 | 29.2 | 37.3 | 24.0 | 9.1 | 3.2 | 1.0 | 2.0 | 7.3 | 23.0 | 56.5 | 47.1 | 295.7 |
| Source No. 1: Climate-data.org | |||||||||||||
| Source No. 2: Globalbioclimatics.org | |||||||||||||
Nature
Flora and vegetation
Virtually all of the municipality's natural vegetation has disappeared due to construction and human activities. However, on the coastal cliffs that extend from the mouth of the Llarena ravine to the Ladera de la Fuente de Martiánez, typical Canarian communities are preserved, such as the sea thyme Frankenia ericifolia and sea Astydamia latifolia, rupicolous communities formed by cliff cakes Aeonium tabulaeforme and sorrels Sonchus radicatus, as well as incense scrub Artemisia thuscula and cruets Rumex lunaria.
Communities of nitrophilous species, brambles of Rubus ulmifolius and reed beds of Arundo donax develop in the beds of the ravines. For its part, on the slopes located above Loro Parque there is a small bitter tabaibal of Euphorbia lamarckii, while communities of rabo gato Pennisetum setaceum grow around Montaña de la Horca. , as well as pine and eucalyptus plantations on its western slope.
History
Guanche period: before the fifteenth century
The territory that makes up the modern municipal area has been inhabited since Guanche times, as evidenced by the archaeological sites found.
This area belonged to the kingdom or menceyato of Taoro, the main settlements being located in the natural caves of the Riscos de Martiánez. In this area there are also necropolises and places of worship made up of ceremonial sets of bowls and channels excavated in the rock.
European Conquest and Colonization: 15th and 16th Centuries
The origins of the city go back to the beginning of the 16th century, since in 1502 there was already port activity on the port coast, although the nucleus of population depended on La Orotava.
Originally it was a fishing village that grew as local trade increased. The sugar trade gave way to that of wine, establishing its export boom in the second half of the xvi century, fostering a process of social and economic development.
Old Regime: 17th and 18th centuries
In 1603 it was decided to indicate a specific place in Puerto de la Cruz where to build a church and its corresponding square.
In the middle of the 17th century the residents began to express their desire to establish themselves in a differentiated place, receiving the Royal Provision of Felipe IV on the 3rd of May 1651, which empowered them to appoint a village mayor.
Puerto de la Cruz became the most important port on the island when a volcanic eruption destroyed Garachico in 1706. During the last years of the xviii< century< /span> and the beginning of the xix, the trade of the Canary Islands, both for export and import -with the exception of the trade that came from the Spanish West Indies and from South America-, it can be said that it was concentrated in the Port of La Orotava. Although it is true that Santa Cruz de Tenerife was the main town at that time, since it retained the military and financial government, every mercantile house was related to La Orotava. This provided the Islands with articles of foreign manufacture.
Until 1772 it belonged to the municipality of La Orotava, being in that year when the election of a municipal board elected by the residents took place.
The Tenerife historian José de Viera y Clavijo describes the place at the end of the 18th century as follows:
OROTAVA, or CRUZ. This place, a colony of the villa, of which half a league is located on the shore of the sea on a flat and low tip that makes the land almost in the middle of the valley, to whose sides there are two gulls that form the mouths of the ravines of Martiánez and Puertoviejo. It only has the name of port. In reality, it is a good emergence for merchant ships that, when it rises temporarily, must be made to the candle and run in wide sea. The population is beautiful, a healthy, cheerful, heatless and cold that bothers. Good streets and wide, good farmhouse, good dishes, good promenades in the marina, good water, good orchards on the site of Martiánez, excellent garden in the Peace, a great fountain in the square of the parish. This is of 3 naves and of an elegant architecture, well adorned, with benefited priest provision of the king and some clergy. They consider some merchants and there are flows.
It has a convent of Santo Domingo, as of 16 friars; another of San Francisco, as of 20, and another of Dominican nuns as of 40. The parish is 3,180 people. There are three hermitages: San Telmo, in La Hoya; La Peña de Fuerteventura, in La Ranilla; and San Antonio, in his payment. There is also a castle with other platforms and a dock.José de Viera and Clavijo, 1772-1773.
Modern Period: 19th and 20th centuries
In 1808 full municipal autonomy was obtained, at that time changing the name to the modern Puerto de la Cruz.
Between 1812 and 1815 the Port of La Orotava achieved great commercial activity, shipping significant quantities each year to Great Britain and other places.
The valley of La Orotava attracted many enlightened European scientists and artists during the xix century, the date on which the so-called «scientific discovery» took place » from the Canary Islands. Notable visitors such as Sabin Berthelot, Olivia Stone, Philip Barker Webb, Christen Smith, Leopold von Buch or Elizabeth Murray, among others, were the first to head to the islands with scientific interest. From then on, the natural and climatic benefits of the Valley of La Orotava were really known in Europe. In addition, the qualities of many of the agricultural products from the north of Tenerife were extolled, such as wine, already named by William Shakespeare in the XVI through its characters and literary descriptions.
Precisely for these reasons, tourism began to have an important weight in the local economy at the end of the xix. It was in those years when the Gran Hotel Taoro was built and old family houses, such as Marquesa or Monopol, began to be remodeled to transform them into the first hotel centers in the city. Finally, the real tourist explosion came in the 1950s, when the city began its transformation to become a tourist reference point for the island and the entire archipelago. Fact that will in turn trigger an urban explosion with serious effects on the natural environment, both coastal and agricultural.
By Decree of the Ministry of the Interior of July 26, 1956, the title of city was granted to Puerto de la Cruz due to the «prestige achieved from the cultural, urban, economic, demographic, social and tourist, which have made it one of the most important towns in the Canary archipelago".
During the second edition of the Ecological and Nature Film Festival in Puerto de la Cruz, taking advantage of the trip of various people invited to give conferences and give round tables, the Tenerife Manifesto was made public on May 29, 1983. This text is a precursor of political environmentalism in Spain, which would initiate a process that would culminate in the founding of the Los Verdes political party.[citation required]
21st century
Demographics
| Graphic of demographic evolution of Puerto de la Cruz between 1900 and 2021 |
 |
Official regular residents according to ISTAC population censuses. |
As of January 1, 2018, Puerto de la Cruz had a total of 30,483 inhabitants, ranking 8th in number of inhabitants both on the island of Tenerife and in the province of Santa Cruz from Tenerife.
The relative population on January 1, 2014 was 3,313.75 inhabitants/km², Puerto de la Cruz being the municipality with the highest population density in Tenerife and second in the Canary Islands after Las Palmas from Gran Canaria.
| Las Arenas | 1838 |
| The Botanics | 287 |
| Las Dehesas | 1773 |
| The Durazno | 640 |
| Guacimara | 207 |
| La Paz | 1137 |
| Port of the Cross | 11 615 |
| Punta Brava | 1439 |
| San Antonio-El Esquilón | 2292 |
| San Fernando | 889 |
| St. Nicholas | 608 |
| Most Holy Eagles | 345 |
| Taoro-Malpais | 359 |
| The Top | 1503 |
| La Vera | 3997 |
| TOTAL | 28 929 |
Administration and politics
City Hall
The municipality is governed by its town council, made up of the mayor-president and twenty councillors.
List of mayors since the 1979 democratic elections
Following the May 1995 elections, CC filed a motion of censorship with the PP against the prospering socialist mayor, accessing the mayor's office Marcos Brito. In 2003 a government of pact between CC and PP was formed, which was broken by nationalists in 2004 supported by a popular councillor who declared himself independent and did not deliver the record; which was denounced as a case of transfuguism. In 2007, a pact was made between the PSOE and the PP, which would last until October 2008 when it was unilaterally broken by the socialists. On 6 October 2009, a motion for censorship against the socialist mayor by CC and PP thrived, giving the mayor's office to the nationalists. On October 23, 2014, the nationalist Sandra Rodriguez was once elected mayor after the death of Mayor Marcos Brito. After the 2015 elections, a government of pact between the PP and CC is formed, granting the mayor's office to the popular Lope Afonso. After the 2019 elections a pact between PSOE and ASAMBLEA CIUDADANA PORTUENSE grants the mayor's office to Marco Antonio González Mesa (PSOE) Territorial organizationThe entire municipality is included in the La Orotava Valley region. Port of the Cross forms a unique population entity, divided into fifteen nuclei:
Economy View of the Port of the Cross. Port of the Cross is presented in the history of tourism with a specific reality. The export economy established by European colonizers after conquest in the century xv for decades it generated large commercial and travel movements. The first foreign visitors were quickly attracted by the beneficial climatic qualities of the La Orotava valley. Thus, prior to the current mass tourism model, there was in the Port of the Cross a tourism of privileged minorities, of elites who are interested in the weather, the botany and the sosiego of this location. The Canary Islands is not too far from Europe and health travel is one of the first engines to launch the tourist factory The environmental factor in the choice of Puerto de la Cruz as a tourist destination is, at the end of the century xviii and beginnings xix the attraction pole of numerous researchers and exclusive groups of the European high class. At this stage the Port of the Cross became a cultural centre of first order, which hosted numerous illustrious travelers and writers, including William Wilde, Alexander von Humboldt or Sabin Berthelot. Mute witnesses of this period are the Jardin Sitio Litre, the oldest in Tenerife with more than 220 years, as well as the Jardin de Aclimatación de La Orotava founded at the end of the century xviii, being then the only garden of these features existing in Spain together with the Royal Botanical Garden of Madrid. The Port of the Cross was won by then a name among the illustris of the European international framework, which later, with the arrival of the model of modern tourism, of accessible tourist leisure, will make it own an advantageous position in front of other locations. Social welfareEducationThis city is home to the Vulcanological Institute of the Canary Islands. HealthCitizen securityCommunicationsRoadsAccess to the municipality mainly by the TF-5 North Autopistas well as roads TF-31, TF-312, TF-320 and TF-315. Public transportationPuerto de la Cruz has numerous taxi stopsas well as one bus station or guaguas, being connected by the following lines of TITSA:
Rental of vehiclesIn the Port of the Cross there are plenty of car rental companies with which to travel the entire city easily, and leave to other points of the island. There are both multinational companies, such as Europcar or AVIS, as local companies with a great experience, such as Autos 3000 or Cicar. HeritageThe municipality has several declared heritage elements Good of Cultural Interest:
CultureCultural facilities
 Museum of Contemporary Art Eduardo Westerdahl at the Customs House
Cultural developmentsSan Felipe Castle annually since 1993 Certamen de Arte Joven del Puerto de la Cruzartewith categories of painting, story, poetry, photography, short film and video art. There are also small concerts called "Matinees" every Sunday in the cultural space Castillo San Felipe.[chuckles]required] During the Holy Week and since 2002, the Festival de Música Antigua y Barroca de Puerto de la Cruz by the Cultural Association Reyes Bartlet. Since 1994 there has been the Cultural Collective 7 islands, composed of painters, poets, musicians and photographers who have exhibits, recitals and contests.[chuckles]required] Mueca is an art festival that is held in the streets of Puerto de la Cruz, on the island of Tenerife, Spain. It is a weekend in which people enjoy, from stage to stage, with the performances of the most diverse artists. More information at festivalmueca.com FestivalsIn the municipality there are several parties, being days local public holidays on May 3, Exaltation of the Holy Cross and commemoration of the foundation of the city, and on July 15, the feast of the Virgin of Carmen.
 Altar of Our Lady of Carmen. Procession of the Virgen del Carmen and San Telmo. The images are carried by the local fishermen and boarded at the fishing pier, where they carry out a maritime procession along the coast of the municipality. But this starts from 9am with the Mass to the Virgin of Carmen, at the hermitage of the pier with an influx of Portuguese and tourists from several countries, at first hour. Then they distribute sweets with chocolate to start with the parties. For most fishermen this is a long-awaited day, in which they sing to the virgin the Salve Queen of the Seas. At the end of the boat the Virgin is carried in procession through the Portuguese streets and to end there is an exhibition of fireworks. More than 30 000 people arrive at their boat and procession from different points of the Canary Islands, which makes it the boat to this most massive Marian advocation in the Canary Islands. On the day of the boat people bathe in the fishing pier. It is also a tradition that consists of a very greasy and slippery stick placed on the water in a horizontal position, at a height of about 3 meters, with a flag at the end. Participants must travel the stick without falling to achieve the flag. On the eve of this celebration is held on the beach of San Telmo the "Sardinada", where a lot of portuens gather to eat roasted sardines and dance with the music.
 Carnivals of the year 2008. The International Carnival of the Port of La Cruz highlights the following events:
A delegation of the Carnivals of Düsseldorf, a German city with which the municipality has been sisterd since 1972, is usually part of these parties.
On the eve of the saint (29 November), at dusk, the children of Puerto de la Cruz are dedicated to "running the cacharro", taking out the "cacharreras" that they have previously prepared. People usually celebrate that night with salty fish, wet, gofio and roasted chestnuts. Sport El Peñón Municipal Stadium. Puerto de la Cruz has one of the best baseball teams in Spain: the Marlins Puerto de la Cruz. He plays the top Spanish division and has won on one occasion the CEB Cup, the most important baseball championship in Europe. In other sports areas, football and basketball stand out, where there are numerous stadiums and sports where they are practiced. In football, highlights the rivalry between Club Deportivo Vera and Club Deportivo Puerto Cruz. Currently, the CD Vera contests the third RFEF of national football, while the CD Puerto Cruz contests the Preferred Regional category. Other important sports are tennis and water polo, with the Club Natación Martiánez at the front. Religion Parish of Our Lady Of The Dolores and Saint Philip the Apostle. The believing population of the municipality mostly professes the Catholic religion, while the parishioner is divided into nine parishes belonging to the archpriest of La Orotava in the diocese of Tenerife:
In Port of the Cross there are also temples of other Christian faiths, such as the evangelical, Anglican churches (the Church of All Saints), Swedish and the Kingdom Hall of Jehovah's Christian Witnesses.
The city is under the religious patronage of the Holy Cross, although the most devotional images of the municipality are that of the Virgin of Carmen and that of the Great Power of God, both appointed by the Portuguese City Council Mayor and Mayor Honorary and Perpetual of the city in July 2011. Heritage Garden Beach.  San Telmo promenade.  The interior of the hermitage of St.John the Baptist, which is a side nave of the church of St. Francis.  Royal Customs House.
High profilesTwinnings
Gallery
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