What to Do in La Gomera: Whale Watching, Laurisilva Forest & the Smallest Canary Island
Updated: Oct 4
La Gomera is the second-smallest of the main Canary Islands and the least visited. It has no airport, which means everyone arrives by ferry from Los Cristianos in Tenerife — and that 40-minute crossing is what keeps it quiet. The island has three things that place it in a different category from the rest of the Canaries: the whale and dolphin watching channel between La Gomera and Tenerife is among the most productive cetacean waters in the Atlantic, the Garajonay National Park is one of the last intact laurisilva forests in the world, and the island has barely been touched by mass tourism.
April is the right month. The spring brings the highest cetacean diversity of the year, the laurisilva wildflowers are in peak bloom, and the island is free of the summer heat that makes the black-sand beaches in the south almost unusable.
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Best for First-Timers: Whale & Dolphin Watching — La Gomera Channel
The channel between La Gomera and Tenerife is one of the great cetacean corridors in the Atlantic. Resident populations of short-finned pilot whales and bottlenose dolphins are present year-round. In spring, the list extends significantly: sperm whales (the most reliable in Spanish waters), Bryde's whales, sei whales, false killer whales, and occasionally blue whales are all recorded in April and May as the spring prey movement brings pelagic species closer inshore.
The boat tours depart from San Sebastián de La Gomera (the main port, where the ferry arrives) and run 3–4 hours. The guides are typically marine biologists or experienced naturalists who have been working this channel for years. The data on individual whale identification (fluke patterns for sperm whales, dorsal fin notches for pilot whales) is genuinely impressive.
Tours: La Gomera: whale & dolphin watching — spring diversity season · Tenerife: whale watching La Gomera channel — departure from Los Cristianos · Browse all La Gomera & Tenerife wildlife tours → · Search Viator →
Best for Families & Kids: Garajonay National Park — Laurisilva Forest Walk
The Garajonay National Park covers the central massif of La Gomera — a UNESCO World Heritage laurisilva forest (the subtropical laurel forest type that covered the Mediterranean basin 20 million years ago, now surviving only in the Canaries and Madeira). The cloud that forms above the forest canopy in the afternoons keeps it permanently green and gives it the mist and atmosphere that photographs can't quite capture.
The main walking circuit from the Alto de Garajonay (highest point at 1,487m) takes 2–3 hours through forest that genuinely feels ancient — the trees are draped in moss and epiphytic ferns, the light filters through the canopy in shafts, and the silence is absolute. For worldschooling families: this is the Miocene, still alive. The guides who work the national park can identify the endemic bird species (Bolle's pigeon, Laurel pigeon) and the medicinal plants.
Tours: La Gomera: Garajonay National Park guided laurisilva forest walk · Browse all La Gomera hiking & nature tours → · Search Viator →
Best if You Only Have a Few Hours: Silbo Gomero — The Whistled Language Demonstration
Silbo Gomero is the whistled language of La Gomera — a complete communication system (not a code; it conveys full sentences) developed by the island's Guanche inhabitants to carry messages across the deep ravines of the interior. UNESCO declared it an Intangible Cultural Heritage in 2009. The island teaches it in schools; practising silbadores can hold full conversations at ranges of 3–4 kilometres.
A demonstration and context session with a practising silbador is one of the most specifically unusual things you can do in the Canaries — genuinely educational, genuinely local, and completely unlike anything available on the other islands.
Tours: La Gomera: Silbo Gomero whistled language guided demonstration · Browse all La Gomera cultural experiences → · Search Viator →
Most Unique: Roque de Agando & Benchijigua Viewpoint Hike
The Roques de La Gomera — volcanic basalt monoliths rising to 1,250 metres from the forest floor — are the island's most dramatic landscape feature and the view that appears on every map and tourist image of La Gomera. The hike to the Roque de Agando viewpoint from the TF-713 road junction takes about 2 hours return and gives you the monolith at close range with the Garajonay forest behind and the sea below on both sides. In clear April weather, Tenerife and El Teide are visible from the top.
Tours: La Gomera: Roques and Benchijigua guided volcanic landscape hike · Browse all La Gomera hiking & geology tours → · Search Viator →
Best Guided Experience: La Gomera Full-Day Island Circuit with Local Guide
La Gomera's road network rings the island and crosses through the Garajonay park — the full circuit takes a day and covers the contrasts that make the island distinctive: the arid south coast and the black-sand beaches, the cloud-forest interior, the terraced north coast, and the viewpoints that show the whole island at once. A local guide covers the geology (La Gomera is the oldest of the main Canary Islands and has the most eroded landscape), the history, and the endemic species throughout.
Tours: La Gomera: full-island guided circuit with local naturalist · Browse all La Gomera guided day tours → · Search Viator →
Looking for Somewhere to Stay?
San Sebastián de La Gomera (the main port town) has the most accommodation and is well placed for both ferry connections and day trips into the island. Playa de Santiago in the south is the beach base. The national park area has rural guesthouses for those who want the forest immediately outside the door. Browse hotels in La Gomera →
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