Yaiza Castilla announced that 1.300.000 euros have been invested in enhancing the Camino de Santiago in Gran Canaria
Yaiza Castilla, Minister of Tourism, Industry and Commerce of the Government of the Canary Islands, inaugurated this morning the I Symposium of the Camino de Santiago between volcanoes, in which top-level experts on the Camino de Santiago reflected on the Camino and on concrete on the Canarian road. The event, organized by the Department of Tourism, Industry and Commerce of the Government of the Canary Islands, through the General Directorate of Tourism Planning and Promotion, aims to highlight the situation of the Canary Islands and its unique routes as a symbolic union point of the Camino de Santiago between continents.
Yaiza Castilla pointed out that “Tourism of the Canary Islands' commitment to this is unequivocal. From betting on the conditioning of the road in Gran Canaria to promoting its promotion. In this sense, from the Ministry that I direct, we have allocated more than 1.300.000 euros to different actions for the routes and elements through which the Camino runs. Castilla added that “through the 8 islands we want to form a unique path to Santiago between Volcanoes, with the mission of structuring the island territory, and developing other potentialities such as the Space Observation Path, perennially linked to the large telescopes established. on the islands, therefore, to Science”
Teodoro Sosa declared that “a path that has enormous landscape, heritage and ethnographic richness, which allows us to savor a unique landscape: the volcanic origin of the island, which contrasts with the green splendor of the centuries-old Gáldar Pines or the plains where The sheep that produce the world-famous flower cheese from the North of Gran Canaria graze. A path that shows us, above all, a way of life that allows us to grow hope that it is possible to revitalize rural life, the lives of all those people who show us the value of our land, our nature and the survival of those customs that have marked our idiosyncrasy.”
The first presentation was given by Ciprián Rivas and was titled The Camino de Santiago between Volcanoes: the tricontinental connection. Rivas defined the Camino de Santiago as a “state project” and highlighted its heritage, natural and tourist values. “Not only does the Camino de Santiago exist in Gran Canaria, there is also one in Tenerife, La Palma, La Gomera, El Hierro, Lanzarote, Fuerteventura and La Graciosa. They unite land, ocean and space. Through navigation they unite three continents, through space they unite us with the entire world,” he indicated.
The island director of Historical Heritage of the Cabildo of Gran Canaria, Juan Sebastián López García, described his intervention Santiago de Gáldar: at the foot of the volcano on the Atlantic Jacobean Way. López García discussed the extension of the Camino in the Middle Ages and how it reached the Canary Islands, as a bridge to America. “The saint is no longer exclusive to the Old Continent with his mixing and creolization in lands of new Christianization,” he highlighted.
Alfred Gutiérrez Kavanagh, a Middle East specialist at the Pontifical University of Comillas in Madrid, addressed the islands as berthing points for tolerance and encounters between cultures. He stated that “the uniqueness of the geography and orography of the Canary Islands has led, throughout history, to the meeting and settlement of people from very diverse cultures.”
Alex Chang, expert on the Camino de Santiago and manager of Fresco Tours, explained the meaning of being a pilgrim from his experience taking tourists to the Camino. “Being a pilgrim is learning to live with different cultures, nationalities, religions… because on the road we are all equal, we are pilgrims,” he said.
The last presentation was given by Juan Antonio Jiménez Villafranca, director of the Museo Instituto América-Centro Damián Bayón in Santa Fe (Granada), who reflected on the Colombian Towns of Spain project, which includes the towns of Palos de la Frontera (Huelva), Baiona a Real (Pontevedra) and Santa Fe (Granada). From that initiative arose the tourist-cultural project of the Columbian Route of the Meeting of Two Worlds.
The day closed with a round table titled Gastronomy and Culture, in which chef Borja Marrero Vázquez participated; gourmet Vanessa Santana; the journalist specialized in gastronomy, Xavier Agulló; Francisca Díaz Moreno, Tourism technician at the San Bartolomé de Tirajana City Council; Carmen Gloria Rodríguez Santana, director-conservator of the Cueva Pintada de Gáldar Museum and Archaeological Park, and José Armengol Martín, director of the Insular Institute for the Integrated Management of World Heritage and the Biosphere Reserve of Gran Canaria. This table addressed the possibilities of the rich gastronomic offer of the spaces related to the Camino de Santiago between volcanoes.