While protests against mass tourism rage on neighbouring islands, El Hierro – the wildest and most westerly of the Canary Islands – has quietly chosen to do things very differently.
隔壁的岛上正在进行着反对大规模旅游业的抗议活动，而位于加纳利群岛最西端的最原生态的El Hierro耶罗岛却悄悄地选择了一种截然不同的方式。
I had only been hiking for two hours but already I'd passed through a fairy-tale forest of ancient laurels, trunks wrapped in velvety moss and branches dripping with lichen, walked along trails flanked with luxuriant ferns and reached the black ash slopes of a volcanic caldera. Now, before me was yet another scene of jaw-dropping natural beauty: the vast amphitheatre of El Golfo, whose brooding cliffs loomed over a fertile plain and craggy coastline lashed by white-tipped turquoise waves. It was one of the most wild and beautiful places I'd ever seen.
在我这短短的两小时徒步旅行途中，我穿越过了一片只在童话中出现的古老月桂林，林中的树干被天鹅绒般的苔藓包裹着，地衣遍布。沿着两旁长满茂盛蕨类植物的小径继续往前走后，我到达了火山口的黑灰坡。而呈现在我面前的是另一番令人瞠目结舌的自然景观：巨大的El Golfo圆形凹地，险峻的峭壁在肥沃的平原和崎岖的海岸线之上隐约可见，绿松石般的浪潮拍打着海岸线。这是我见过的最美丽而又最野生的风景之一。
I was in El Hierro, a heart-shaped rock formation off the west coast of Africa that's the youngest, most westerly and second smallest of the Canary Islands. The island emerged from the Atlantic Ocean around 1.2 million years ago following millennia of violent undersea volcanic eruptions, creating a wild landscape of fertile valleys that yield to evergreen forests, sky-high cliffs, volcanic cones and lunar-like badlands.
这片景致就位于我现在所在的耶罗岛上，这是非洲西海岸的一个心形岩层，是加那利群岛中最年轻、最西端的第二小岩层。大约120万年前，经过数千年的海底火山爆发活动，该岛从大西洋中出现，形成了一片肥沃的山谷、常绿森林、高耸的悬崖、火山锥和、类月面荒地。
But what's especially distinctive about this tiny isle is that in a year when protests have raged against mass tourism on neighbouring islands and other regions of Spain, El Hierro has chosen to do things very differently.
但是更为特殊的是，在邻近岛屿和西班牙的其他地区爆发着抗议大规模旅游活动的一年里，耶罗岛选择了截然不同的做法。
El Hierro's population hovers around just 11,000, and its dramatic topography doesn't lend itself to sprawling resorts or skyscrapers. In addition, the island has no direct flights from outside the archipelago, which means it receives only a handful of visitors compared to its neighbours – approximately 20,300 visitors in 2023, while Tenerife, the largest Canary Island, saw more than 6.57 million.
耶罗岛的人口仅为11000人左右，其崎岖的地形不适合建造庞大的度假村或摩天大楼。此外，该岛并没有来自群岛以外的直达航班，这意味着与邻岛相比，它会接待更少的游客——2023年约20300名，而加纳利群岛中最大的Tenerife岛则接待了657多万游客。
During my visit, I zigzagged up and down vertigo-inducing volcanic stone paths and trekked through forests of soaring Canary pines, fields of fiery red poppies and past plots of pineapples. And I crunched over black lava sprinkled with vivid green succulents then swam in a luminous-blue natural rock pool – all with barely another soul in sight.
在我于岛上旅游期间，我在起起伏伏的火山石小径上蜿蜒而行，穿过了高耸的金丝雀松林、火红的罂粟田和成片的菠萝地。我在铺满了鲜艳绿色多肉植物的黑色熔岩上艰难行走，然后又在一片由熠熠闪光的蓝色海水填满的天然岩石泳池中游泳——视野所及之处几乎空无一人。
El Hierro's aim was always to grow visitor numbers gradually. The forward-thinking island has been committed to a wide-ranging sustainable development plan since 1997, including creating museums and visitor centres (there are seven now) that promote its culture and traditions, focussing on activities with limited environment impact and improving the island's infrastructure while preserving nature (it didn't get its first paved road until 1962 and there's famously only one traffic light).
耶罗岛的目标一直是逐步增加游客数量。自1997年以来，这个具有前瞻性的岛屿一直致力于一项广泛的可持续发展计划，包括创建博物馆和游客中心（现在已有七个），以促进其文化和传统，并专注于进行那些对环境只会造成有限影响的活动，在保护自然的同时改善岛上的基础设施（直到1962年岛上才有第一条铺好的道路，而且路上仅有一个红绿灯也是一个广为人知的特点）
We want to increase tourism and continue to improve the island's standard of living, but not to the detriment of the residents' quality of life or the island's natural resources," said Davinia Suárez Armas, island director of tourism and transport. "We prefer to maintain our culture and share our quiet way of life with visitors."
“我们希望增加旅游业发展，继续提高岛上的生活水平，但不能损害到居民的生活质量或是岛上的自然资源，”岛上旅游和交通主管Davinia Suárez Armas说道。“我们更喜欢保持我们的文化，与游客分享我们安静的生活方式。”
The landscape here changes as quickly as the weather; you can travel from the sun-baked southern coast through barren volcanic badlands and sun-dappled forest, arriving at its diminutive mist-shrouded mountain capital, Valverde, in less than an hour. The island has a multitude of microclimates as well as more than 100 endemic species of flora and fauna, including the critically endangered El Hierro giant lizard, leading Unesco to declare the entire island and a large area of its waters a Biosphere Reserve in 2000 and a Geopark in 2014.
这里的风景变化和天气一样快。你可以从阳光普照的南部海岸出发，穿过贫瘠的火山荒地和阳光斑驳的森林，在不到一个小时的时间里到达薄雾笼罩的小山都Valverde。该岛拥有众多的小型气候群以及100多种特有的动植物物种，包括极度濒危的耶罗巨蜥，这也促使联合国教科文组织于2000年宣布整个岛屿及其周围大片水域为生物圈保护区，并于2014年宣布其为地质公园。
I took a white-knuckle drive up a series of hair-raising hairpin bends to reach La Dehesa, a windswept high pasture of hardy shrubs, sculptural volcanic stone and El Sabinar, the most famous of a group of ancient juniper trees in the area. A symbol of the island's resilience, their branches swept the ground and the tortured trunks were twisted and bent by centuries of savage trade winds.
我开着车驶过一系列令人汗毛直竖的发夹弯到达了La Dehesa，一片被风席卷的广袤牧草高地，这里有着高寒灌木、雕塑般的火山石和El Sabinar——该地区最为著名的一组古代桧树。作为该岛坚韧的象征，它们的树枝扫过地面，饱受折磨的树干被几个世纪的野蛮信风吹得扭曲而弯折。
