Alternative adventures on a Canary Island
Story and photos by Lindsay Mackenzie
"Where are we going? Come on, you can tell me now, we’re at the airport," I reminded him.
"No," he said.
Hmm. Didn’t think that was going to work.
You see, my boyfriend Geoff thought it would be cute (it was) to not tell me where we were going for a 10-day vacation until we got to the airport. He only told me what to pack, that it would involve windsurfing, and that our destination was "sort-of" in Europe.
As we finally walked up to the ticket counter to check in, we were greeted with an enthusiastic "hola" from the ticket-woman. Instantly images of Spain appeared in my mind: wandering along La Rambla in Barcelona, visiting Granada’s Alhambra, sipping sangria in Sevilla.…
"Two for Fuerteventura please," Geoff announced to the ticket-woman. Then he looked at me smiling smugly, happy he didn’t let the secret out until that instant, just the way he planned it. I grinned back, not wanting to ruin the moment by having absolutely no idea where he was talking about.
Still smiling, I put my bags on the conveyer belt and watched them roll away, hoping they knew more about where we were going than I did.
Once I was sure the moment had passed, I asked Geoff where exactly it was that we were going.
"Fuer-te-ven-tura," he spelled out, knowing my ability to retain foreign languages ranges somewhere between dismal and utterly non-existent.
"It’s not really in Spain," he explained. "It’s one of the Canary Islands. You know where the Canaries are don’t you?"
"Oh sure I do (lie). Wow, the Canaries, I can’t wait."
Still no closer to knowing where we were going, I reassured myself with the facts: it’s an island, somewhere near Spain, and he told me to pack warm clothing. Sounded fine to me.
Hey Romeo, sand dunes aren’t romantic
Being new to the tropical vacation scene, I was expecting palm trees and beach cabanas set amidst a leafy jungle backdrop bursting with parrots and colourful flowers (after all, it was an island). You might imagine my surprise when I looked out the airplane window as we approached our destination to see what appeared more like a desolate dumping ground for exiled criminals. The island we were about to land on was covered in lava-rock and sand dunes, hardly a patch of greenery as far as my sleepy, jetlagged eyes could see. There were some old volcanic craters, but no palm trees.
Silly Geoff, sand dunes aren’t romantic.
It turns out that Fuerteventura ("Fuerte") is one of seven main islands that together make up the Canaries, situated southwest of Spain and west of Morocco. About 100 kilometres long and 30 km wide, Fuerte is the second largest of the islands. It’s also the closest to the Moroccan coast, with 95 km of ocean separating one piece of the Sahara from another. Each of the seven islands has a surprisingly different landscape; from arid, volcanic moonscape to misty cloud forest to green grape fields.
We happened to go to Fuerte, the one with the arid desert landscape.
However, that desert setting does have its advantages. All of that sand results in Fuerte having the longest beaches of all the Canary Islands. Fine, bleached-white sand set against a backdrop of clear water rings virtually the entire 340 km coastline. Where the ocean meets the beach the water is a light, transparent blue, deepening in the distance to a dark indigo.
One other advantage of the desolate, windswept-island-look is that it makes Fuerte a legendary windsurfing destination. Fuerte is to windsurfing as Whistler is to skiing and snowboarding. It’s the place to go, the right of passage, the place windsurfers daydream of while landlocked and office-bound.
The (wind) gods work in mysterious ways
After arriving at the airport in Puerto del Rosario, we were picked up by an employee of one of the local windsurfing companies through whom we had arranged our accommodation. Our driver, a strapping young Swiss man, told us that he had dropped out of university in Britain after taking one too many days off to learn to windsurf.
The scenery on the way to our destination, the northern resort town of Corralejo, was only slightly less moon-like than what I had seen from the plane. Massive crater holes marked the spot where I assume the rest of a volcano must have once stood. In the foreground goats wandered placidly along sand dunes, munching on what little vegetation could survive in the arid desert.
As I pondered what it was about Europe that made it okay for everyone to drive like a deranged Mario Andretti, Geoff inquired about the windsurfing conditions.
"So how’s the wind these days?" Geoff asked the driver, who was swerving dangerously into the oncoming lane to avoid an errant goat.
"Well it was really windy last week," the driver replied in his thick German/British accent. "But it died down in the last few days. It’s supposed to start blowing again on Wednesday."
Geoff’s expression changed to that of a small child who’s just been told that Santa doesn’t exist. Wednesday wasn’t for another five days.
As it turned out, the wind never came. Out of our 10-day stay there was only sufficient wind to go windsurfing on one day – the day we had to leave.
Since we couldn’t windsurf, we decided to see what else there was to do on the island, and were pleasantly surprised by the abundance of activities. Like eating.
Forgive the excessive alliteration, but the food in Fuerte is fabulous. One of the signature starters in Fuerte is Canarian potatoes with mojo sauce (as in a spicy red garlic sauce, not what Dr. Evil stole from Austin Powers). After that you have your choice of fresh seafood dishes, Spanish style, accompanied by sangria. Lots of sangria.
Once you can eat no more you can conveniently waddle down to the beach to digest. If you happen to feel more adventurous, you can snorkel, fish, bike or surf, among other activities.
Surfing in Fuerte is more popular in the winter when the waves consistently exceed head-height, but if you don’t mind smaller waves summer surfing is a great way to work up an appetite. Having only ever surfed in Tofino, the luxury of not having to wear booties and a wet-suit was reason enough for us to rent surf boards and a car and drive to the beach in El Cotillo, a sleepy surf town on the island’s North Shore.
Once we had a rental car, we decided to explore the rest of the island. At the moment development on Fuerte is concentrated in the cities, leaving an abundance of wide-open spaces and unoccupied beaches to explore. The entire southwestern coast is virtually deserted, except for the goats, and a visit to any of the mountain viewpoints is well worth the spectacular view.
Since we weren’t doing much windsurfing, we also quickly discovered the wonder that is the siesta. If you ever try to get anything accomplished between the hours of noon and 5 p.m. on Fuerte, you’ll be disappointed. Try as you might, you won’t be able to rent equipment, get groceries, or do anything other than have lunch or take a nap in that time-period. But not to worry, the siesta is the secret to the good life.
Yes, it seems that the wind gods work in mysterious ways. Had it been windy, we wouldn’t have had the fortune of slowing down to let the unique beauty of the island’s landscape grow on us, or had the chance to indulge in the Spanish way of life for a week (i.e. had lots of sangria and siestas).
And so my advice to the traveller whose plans may not work out quite the way they were envisioned: don’t fight it. Chance discoveries are usually better than anything you can plan.
