Yaiza is a village that looks as though someone scrubbed it, in the nicest possible way. The houses are white with green shutters, the streets are tidy, and the gardens are full of palms, flowers and succulents, in a landscape that is otherwise black, red and brown. It has won awards for being one of the loveliest villages in Spain, and it owes a good deal of that to the influence of César Manrique, who persuaded the island to keep its architecture simple. The village is quiet, with a church, a small square and a handful of restaurants, and it feels calm after the coast.
Yaiza lies at the edge of Timanfaya National Park, the Fire Mountains, where the great eruptions of 1730 to 1736 buried villages and poured lava across a quarter of the island. The landscape is lunar: black cones, rust-red slopes, fields of rough lava and a silence that feels strange. The park is protected, and you cannot ride in freely, but a bus tour runs along a marked road through the most dramatic parts, with demonstrations of the heat below the surface, where water poured into a hole erupts as steam. A restaurant uses the volcanic heat to grill chicken, which is a novelty, if not a haute cuisine experience.
The road from Yaiza to the north runs through La Geria, a wine region that makes no sense on paper: the vines grow in individual pits dug into the black volcanic ash, each surrounded by a small stone wall to shelter it from the wind, and the grape is the Malvasía, producing a dry or sweet white. The pattern of black craters and green vines is one of the most remarkable farming landscapes in Europe. Many bodegas offer tastings, though the rider must keep a clear head. Roads here are smooth, with gentle bends, and the traffic is light, though the wind can be strong.
For fuel, Yaiza's own pumps are small, so a safer plan is to fill the tank at Puerto del Carmen, about ten kilometres away, or in Arrecife before you set out. Camels carry tourists across the ash at a slow plod, and you may find yourself stuck behind a line of them. Late afternoon is the best time, with warm light turning the cones to copper. A plate of local goat stew and a glass of Malvasía under the palms is a fine way to end the day.