Nice new walkways to improve access, and better facillities can make a big difference to Tenerife beaches, but sometimes the warning bells start ringing when the word improvement is used. Playa de la Enramada between Playa del Duque and La Caleta is a classic example. Last week the first stage of “improvements” were officially unveiled and blessed by the Adeje council, but visiting, a few days later, I was shocked to see what a mess has been made of the once wonderful beach after transforming it from the old look (top pic) to new.

Let’s pop back in time a few months to when  rolling banks of pebbles led down to the often wild sea, and there was a lovely white sand chill out area at the La Calete end, called El Chiringuito, which included a bar and a beach volleyball court. sadly this was all demolished as part of the 550,000 euros project. In April the first Costa Adeje Triathlon started from the beach, and was a great success, with the rugged nature of the sea, a fitting challenge to the contestants.

Now the beach has been scraped flat (below) and covered with tons of sand from the old Los Cristianos beach, other “improved” beaches around the coast have already found that new sand doesn’t bed down very well, and the new sand has been eroded near the shore, so swimmers still have to walk over pebbles. The beach is backed by high banking and has no natural character any more. there are 2 more phases to be completed, including a walkway along the rear of the beach and a park area just above and behind the sea front.

I suspect the overall idea is to make the beach more attractive to the posh 4 and 5 star hotels on the edge of El Duque, but it has just made it look bland. There was no pressing need to do anything to this beach, it’s nice to have a variety of bathing and swimming spots along the coast, but the council would no doubt call this progress -what a great shame.