Los Cristianos
| Los Cristianos | |
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| Town | |
Los Cristianos harbor
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 Los Cristianos
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| Coordinates: 28°03′N 16°43′W / 28.050°N 16.717°W | |
| Country | Spain |
| Autonomous community | Canary Islands |
| Province | Santa Cruz de Tenerife |
| Island | Tenerife |
| Municipality | Arona |
| Time zone | WET (UTC0) |
| • Summer (DST) | WEST (UTC+1) |
Los Cristianos is a town in Spain with a population of 20,506 (2015), situated on the south coast of the Canary Island of Tenerife. Located in the municipality of Arona between the cone of the mountain Chayofita and the greater mountain Guaza. The town centre is around the Los Cristianos bay, but is rapidly expanding inland with modern development. The town is a popular tourist resort and includes a ferry port.
Unlike its bustling neighbour, Playa de las Américas, this town has a history that predates the tourist boom of the 1970s and 1980s. For many years this holiday hub was a quiet fishing village and evidence of its humble origins can still be seen in the typical Canarian architecture of the older buildings.
Nowadays however, the town offers a holiday experience, with two sandy beaches, a multitude of bars and restaurants and its year round sunny climate. There is a wealth of accommodation to suit all budgets, including hotels, self-catering apartments and timeshare resorts. There is also a wealth of excursions focused around the town's busy port including dolphin and whale watching as well as game fishing trips and party cruises.
Historical references to Los Cristianos date back to the 16th century, when it is described as a harbour by the Notary Hernán Guerra. Los Cristianos remained an important port for the south of Tenerife throughout the 17th, 18th and 19th Centuries but remained unsettled until the latter part of the 19th Century due to the threat of pirate raids as there was no significant population to warrant a castle or fort.
The first permanent settlement of Los Cristianos was in the 1860s when it was described by Pedro de Olive as “a hamlet in Arona, with three one-storey houses, a two-storey house and a hut.” It was officially recognised in governmental documents as being established in 1888 by 29 houses and a cave.
The population of Los Cristianos started to grow around the turn of the century with the advent of industry & trade. With the threat from pirates and privateers now a distant memory, Los Cristianos, with its natural harbour thrived as the import-export centre of the south of Tenerife. In 1909, the first Quay was built to ship the produce of a local distillery. It still remains today and is known as “El Puerto Viejo” (Old Quay). Other industries at the time included a resin factory, nearby salt mines and a fish salting factory.
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Wikipedia