GR131 Canary Islands: Day 22 – Tuesday, Feb 3, 2026
We spent a cozy night at Tamahuche Hotel Rural in Vallehermoso. We only had a measly 3 km (1.9 miles) left of the GR131 here on La Gomera, but we intentionally saved those final steps for today. After rolling into town just thirty minutes before sunset yesterday, we weren’t about to rush the finish line in the dark!

The trail ends right at the water’s edge at Playa de Vallehermoso. It’s a rugged spot with zero facilities and no roads heading further out. Since it’s a 3 km (1.9 miles) trek down, and you have to hike the same way back to civilization, it ended up being a solid 6 km (3.7 miles) morning walk—which we knocked out right after breakfast.

Island Hopping: Onward to La Palma!
And just like that, the first of the three smaller islands is officially in the bag! Next up: La Palma and El Hierro. We’ve decided to tackle La Palma first.
To get there, we had to hop a bus from Vallehermoso to San Sebastián. There’s an early bird bus at dawn, but we decided to sleep in a bit and caught the 1:30 PM departure instead.

White-Knuckle Driving
The 70-minute bus ride along the north side of the island was an experience in itself! The GM-1 road was exactly as advertised: incredibly steep, narrow, and winding. We were hugging sheer cliffside drops in a landscape that was, frankly, breathtakingly dramatic. Not for the faint of heart, but definitely worth the view!

In San Sebastián, we caught the 8:00 PM Armas ferry bound for Santa Cruz de La Palma. The crossing usually takes two hours, but the ferry was already running behind schedule when it docked. We didn’t finally pull into Santa Cruz until 10:30 PM.

​By that point, we were tired, so we were incredibly relieved that it was only a short walk to Pension La Cubana, where we had a double room waiting for us.