El Tanque

El Tanque is a municipality belonging to the Spanish province of Santa Cruz de Tenerife in the Canary Islands. Located in the northwest of the island.  It is one of three municipalities on the island of Tenerife, together with Tegueste and Vilaflor, which has no coastline.

In the area there are the following towns: Bajo El Tanque, El Tanque Alto, Ruigomez, Erjos El Tanque and San Jose de Los Llanos.

Festivals

The holidays in this town include:

Finales de abril y 1 de mayo. Fiestas de San Alejo, a pilgrimage which runs through the core El Tanque High and Low.
June 13 – Celebration of the festival in honor of it’s Patron, Saint Anthony of Padua, in the parish of the same name in El Tanque Low.
August 31 – Festivities in honor of the Virgen del Buen Viaje.

We must also mention, an ancient tradition, within the El Tanque that takes place at twelve o’clock on Christmas Eve (December 24) under the square of the El Tanque with most of the inhabitants of that area.

In El Tanque High the feast of San Antonio Abad is held, the weekend after January 17.
The second weekend of September we celebrate the feast in honor of Our Lady of Coromoto, immigrants from the town leave their homes to move to the so-called eighth island, Venezuela.
The third weekend of October includes the celebrations of the Holy Christ of Calvary.
In the area of Ruigomez there is a festival in honor of San Isidro Labrador, and their pilgrimage is mid-May.
In Erjos during the first week of June there is a festival in honor of Our Lady of Begona, and in the second week of October in honor of Our Lady of the Miraculous.
In San Jose de Los Llanos, San Antonio Abad is celebrated on 27 and 28 January, San Jose, on March 19 and again San Jose in the third weekend of September.

Monuments and places of interest

The church of San Antonio de Padua, in the core population of El Tanque Low, has its origins in ancient hermitage founded in the sixteenth century. This shrine was destroyed in 1706 by a volcanic eruption, which also affected the neighboring municipality of Garachico.

After this natural disaster in 1728, the reconstruction of the building work began that lasted a remarkably long time during the following decades. In the middle of last century, the threat of bankruptcy forced the authorities to address a reform of the whole expansion of the tower of the temple.

The structure of the church is made up from a single nave, a rectangular and a square chapel. On the south side lies the Chapel of the Rosary, built in 1772, which was long after the sacristy were added and the parsonage house. The chapel of the Rosary is separated from the nave by an arch of half point toral stonework on columns of smooth bole. The roof has four skirts of Arabic tiles. The chapel has four exterior decks as well as geometric and floral decoration.