Friday 1 February 2013

ETERNAL SUNSHINE ON MY SPOTLESS MIND

I thought I would warm myself up with some shots of Feurteventura.  Think of them as cups of  cortado.

Here is where I usually enjoyed my morning cortado.

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There are four requirements for a January holiday - sun, sun, sun, and coffee.  Here I could enjoy them all.  Fuerteventura is known as the 'Island of Eternal Spring',with an average temperature of 23 degrees (although it did plummet to 15 degrees once, someone seemed to remember) and a rainfall of about a coffee-cupful a year.  It is the second largest of the Canary Islands, taking almost a whole day to drive from one end to the other and back, visiting every town and village (and taking a break for lunch) (and of course coffee). This cafe is on the marina quay at Puerto de Fuste, a Barcelo dominated resort with a great (imported) beach.  It is in the old lighthouse

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and also serves fresh grilled fish in the evening.   This is the beach

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You get a sense from this picture, both how deserted it was in January, but also how deserted permanently the island is outside of the resorts.  Can you see the mountains?On a couple of days, we walked into the next village.  This is the road.

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And here's the main road heading north.

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About an hour's drive out of Puerto de Fuste, you come to these sand dunes.  I assume all this sand has come over from Morocco.

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And the interior of the island looks like this.

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There are actually farms in there.  Here's one

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The walk out of town north is very nicely paved, with a cycle track and even street lights.  There's still nothing there, but I was impressed to see that there was probably a vision with this infrastructure already provided.  The main industry on the island of course is now tourism.

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There are a couple of little villages in the interior which are attractive to see.  This is Betancuria.


And this is the old fishing village of Corallejo.

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  And nowhere was there any snow!

7 comments:

  1. Sun, coffee and a lack of other tourists.....what more could you ask???

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  2. Intersting. Thank you for posting these photos. Fuerteventura looks similar to many of the other islands with their voilcanic landscapes but with some unique features. What always disappoints me about the Canaries is the difficulty of finding a good swimming beach. Have you ever had any luck?

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    1. The beach at Puerte de Fuente (above) was pretty good and, although I didn't go to the beach at the dunes (too much sand), that is supposed to be good too. Morro Jable looks nice, but didn't get there either - too far away and nothing else there http://youtu.be/psN6qcftYxg.

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    2. Actually, I think the resort is called Caleta de Fuste.

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  3. I did not imagine it all so picturesque! looks like a great holiday spot!

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    1. I've featured everything to do there, Mo, except the Salt Museum, which you might find exciting, and in the summer I imagine it's a bit swamped with those who go on holiday to drink beer and watch football, but in the winter it's delightful I thought.

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