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Since Tenerife's international airport is on the southern coast , this hot and dusty region forms most visitors' first impression of the island. Though now overshadowed by the vast resorts of nearby Las Americas and Los Cristianos, the tourist resorts here were going strong a decade earlier, and the rate of new development in them today still matches that of its larger neighbours. The massive hotel complex Ten-Bel , beside the small workaday town of Las Galletas , was one of the island's first truly huge holiday complexes and, despite the presence of only a slim shingle beach, the large bland resort area known as the Costa del Silencio , has grown up beside it. Further east is the Golf del Sur , a new resort centred around two large golf courses. Further east still is the most stylish and picturesque town along this stretch of coast, El Medano , whose vast, windswept beaches are the only significant natural ones on the island. While the southern coastal region is largely flat and barren, the monotony is broken by a number of hills: Rasca in the west and Roja and Pelada in the east are all designated as nature reserves to protect the area's delicate ecosystems, and each offers pretty coastal hikes and excellent mountain-bike opportunities. The coastal waters also attract the active, with numerous diving concerns operating in the relatively clear waters beside Las Galletas and El Medano usually thronging with large numbers of windsurfers attracted to the world-class conditions here.
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