The Edge of the World

The western edge of El Hierro used to be the edge of the world. In the second century AD, Ptolemy made it the zero meridian, marking all longitudes east from there. In 1634, France decided it was exactly 20º west of the Paris meridian, and some old French maps mark longitude in both degrees from Paris and degrees from El Hierro.

When they found that El Hierro is 20° 23' 9" west of Paris, they kept the Paris meridian. And an international conference moved it to Greenwich in 1884.

Today there's a monument on the old zero meridian. It really does feel like the end of the world. The whole island's rather dry, and this is the drier end of it, so there's no trees or grass, just scrubby little bushes which look very odd to English eyes. The minor road turns into an unclassified road and then a dirt track. Then we had to park and walk a mile. No houses in sight. The mobile phone had no signal. As we arrived, a couple of people were just leaving in a 4x4, and that was the only other car we saw the whole time.

The monument itself is modest – just a block of concrete with half an iron globe poking out of it. But it was amazing to think that we were the most westerly of the 497,000,000 people in the EU.

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Where the Heck is El Hierro?

El Hierro is the smallest of the Canary Islands, at the bottom left-hand corner of the archipelago which lies off the coast of Morocco (7.7º north and 18.0º west). It's shaped rather like an equilateral triangle that's sucking its cheeks in, and each side of the triangle is only about 12 miles (7.5 miles) long. Just 10,500 people live there, give or take. For all that, it's incredibly varied. You spend a week there and still not see all of it.

The island is volcanic, and still has over 500 visible cones, besides the ones covered by more recent eruptions. Today it forms a three-pointed star, with the highest point rising to 1501 m. The top of the ridge is frequently covered in cloud made by the moisture-laden trade winds being forced upwards by the island.

The island's capital town, Valverde, is 590 m above sea-level, and noticeably cooler. It's a pleasant little town, as long as you're not expecting a major shopping centre.

There are ferries and flights to Tenerife, plus three ferries a week to La Palma (Saturday, Tuesday and Thursday) and one direct ferry from La Palma to El Hierro (Sunday evening).


View El Hierro in a larger map

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