If you manage to peel yourself away from one of Fuerteventura’s 152 beaches, you’ll notice the massive herds of goats tramping the arid landscape. It may be Spain, but there’s no mistaking that Africa is just 100km away; not much grows here unless it’s under plastic sheeting. Spanish poet Miguel de Unamuno compared the land to a skull, and I can see why. But it wasn’t always this way. It’s thought that Fuerteventura, along with the other islands in the Canaries, was once Homer’s famed Elysium: the lush, abundant place where heroes enjoyed their afterlife.
The lushness has faded – due to the exploitation and over-farming of the land by the conquistadores – but to watersports nuts,‘Fuerte’ still has paradisiacal properties. There are year-round, warm-water waves caused by regular Atlantic swells that hit the northwestern and northern shores, earning the Canaries a reputation as ‘Europe’s Hawaii’.
Beach breaks are the safest spots for beginners to learn in, as the waves form on a sand bar rather than a rocky reef, and Castillo beach near the northwestern surfer’s town of El Cotillo is a prime example. We head there with our surf coach, Peter, who runs Natural Surf Camps. The hostel is small, with room for a maximum of six people in the bunkroom, and this means the owners are able to give you a lot of individual attention. There are three of us, two complete beginners, and me, and we all have far more enthusiasm than skill.
With a bit of practice and some tips from Peter, I am standing up and riding the foamy white water into the shore more often than not. However, on the glassy surface of the small waves,
I plunge into nosedive after nosedive over the front of the board. Peter gives me confidence-bolstering advice in his softly-spoken Dutch accent: ‘I can tell you’ve done this before – try standing further back on the board next time.’
And then, just for a moment, just once, I get it. I feel the board using the power of the jade-green wave, everything is balanced, my feet are in the right place. I come out of the sea crusted with salt like a Canarian potato with seaweed for hair and on an incredible high.
Peter’s camps are a great option if money is tight. The colourful hostel is not far from El Cotillo and only a short taxi ride from the larger fishing town of Corralejo, where there are some good restaurants and bars, including Rock Island Bar, which has stomping live acoustic music.
Intermediate or advanced surfers will prefer to hit up the different point breaks and lava rock reef breaks on the north shore of the island. The best time of the year for bigger waves of up to 10m is between October and April. Chris Thomson of surf tour operator Errant Surf Travel says: ‘It can be massive on the exposed north coast, and small and fun on the east, west or even south coast.’ Errant runs surf ‘tours’, which means that a rep will drive you in a 4x4 to the best break for the conditions and your ability.
The pro surfers may congregate in Fuerte over the winter, avoiding mainland Europe’s storms, but for windsurfers it is a different story. In the summer, ideal windsurfing conditions are reliably dished up by sea breezes and trade winds. There is some of the best windsurfing in the world here, with world championships held at Playa de Sotavento on the southwest coast every July. The world’s largest windsurfing centre, René Egli, is based here on a kilometre-long stretch of beach. You can hire kit and get lessons in windsurfing and kitesurfing from René Egli’s school: rental starts on a per day basis but is cheaper for longer stretches. If you want to stay near the beach, there’s a modern four-star hotel called Hotel Melia Gorriones. Kitesurfing instruction is carried out at the lagoon on the beach.
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