![]() ![]() We reach a viewpoint high up on the mountain of Arucas that gives breathtaking views over banana plantations, vegetable plots, the coastline, rings of cloud on mountain peaks. The road runs through volcanic landscapes, as harsh as they are beautiful, and suddenly we're in a completely different area, where the dark ochre volcanic soil is carpeted with vivid green banana foliage. We leave the capital, Las Palmas and take the road inland to Arucas. We're on the island of Grand Canary, the roundest in the archipelago and where 20% of all Canary bananas are grown. Over a century has passed since those exciting early days and, after visiting several plantations of this leafy crop, we found that Canary Island growers are still preserving traditional farming methods combined with scientific pest control techniques. From that time onwards, a number of British companies set up their headquarters in the Canary Islands and began to export Canary-grown fruit and vegetables bound for a single primary destination: the port of London. By the 19th century, a free trade route had been set up with the port of origin and destination in the Canaries. In the 15th century, Spanish caravels and other vessels sailing to the Americas made stopovers in the Canary Islands and took bananas on board part of their catalogue of plants, seeds and other products to barter with settlers in the new territories. By the 5th century bananas had reached the African continent via the island of Madagascar and it was the Portuguese, on their many voyages across the Atlantic, who took it to the Canary Islands, the Azores and Madeira. ![]() The absence of reliable evidence means that we can't trace the exact origins of this fruit or its subsequent journey, although experts think it may have come from south-east Asia. Before its arrival in the Canary Islands, the history of this tropical fruit includes episodes dating back some two thousand years, although researchers have a difficult job pinpointing precise historic references to back this up. ![]()
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