“Appreciate the silence, close your eyes, recognize the wind, heed the bells of the sea, listen to the unique force of life, collect yourself, feel who we are, connect.”
With this invitation, formulated in an informative video, this Friday began the presentation of the program of activities that celebrates a date full of meaning: on a day like this August 9, fifty years ago, Timanfaya was granted the title of National Park.
“These thirty seconds of video summarize the essence of what the park represents for all of us who work in it and we want to share that feeling with all of you,” explained this morning Pascual Gil Muñoz, director and curator of the Timanfaya National Park since September 2020.
The objective of this 50th anniversary is to “activate curiosity, sensitivity and respect for this natural space”, that citizens participate in its protection and conservation, to guarantee that in another fifty years “our children and grandchildren can enjoy this wonder.”
And it is that Timanfaya is “much more than a magnificent tourist center,” explained Pascual Gil this morning. It is a set of volcanoes, jameos, lava flows, volcanic tubes that reach the sea, lichens and vascular plants “that teach us how the process of colonization of life occurs in an extreme environment.” Timanfaya is also a legacy: the inheritance of the culture of the volcano, a set of knowledge and resilience that the population demonstrated two centuries ago, facing the eruptions and adapting to their consequences.
Timanfaya is also a source of knowledge that has generated important and intense scientific research work in this half century.
“We want to value all this because many of these things are quite unknown to the population,” explained the head of the Timanfaya National Park.
On September 27, the Ministry of Ecological Transition and Energy of the Government of the Canary Islands, led by Mariano H. Zapata, will present in detail the program of talks, exhibitions and meetings in an institutional inauguration that will be attended by authorities from the island, regional and national levels.
The first of the exhibitions of this 50th anniversary will open to the public from this Saturday, August 10, 2024: Guardians of Timanfaya is a tribute to all the park workers (guides, drivers, guards, educators, maintenance personnel, etc.) who with “respect, enthusiasm and admiration” have managed to preserve the values of the Timanfaya National Park. The exhibition can be seen every day, from 9:00 a.m. to 4:00 p.m., except holidays, at the Mancha Blanca Visitor and Interpretation Center.
A good part of the scientific community linked to the park and that has been doing monitoring work for three decades will participate in the talks. Among other topics (geology, energy, public use, invasive species, ethnography) these public working groups will address some of the threats facing the Timanfaya National Park, such as “the massive influx of tourists” for which some media were asking this morning.
