Piscinas de La Caleta
Natural sea pools at La Caleta, a small coastal hamlet in the municipality of Valverde on the eastern side of El Hierro. The sea comes in over lava flows and leaves bathing pools with an uneven bottom. The island's official tourism portal lists them as a bathing site with an entry of their own.
La Caleta is a fishing hamlet on the east of El Hierro, in the municipality of Valverde, and its main draw is the set of pools that the lava left where it met the sea. Bathing happens in natural pools open to the Atlantic rather than on a beach: the bottom is rock, the rim is lava, and you get in by steps and concrete platforms. Footwear that grips on wet rock is worth having, because the surface is slippery. Sites of this kind are the standard way of swimming on El Hierro, an island with hardly any sand.
Look at the sea before going in: when the swell comes from the north the pools take repeated hits of water and bathing stops being sensible. The drive is from Valverde down the road to the coast, and parking is whatever the hamlet offers, which is limited on busy days. Do not confuse it with the other places called La Caleta in the archipelago, in Tenerife or Lanzarote; this one belongs to El Hierro. Tamaduste and Pozo de las Calcosas, on the same coast, are separate places and deserve their own visit.
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