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| Little uneven-shaped Nublo asteroid, just for the heck of it :) |
Artenara is one of the not-so-easily accessible villages on Gran Canaria. It is overlooking the Caldera de Tejeda, and is on a slightly higher level than Tejeda. There are even fewer buses, the one I caught was from Teror and I believe it is the only route — bus number 220.
We’d been through Artenara once before but it was literally that — going through with just a small pause at one of the miradores (I swear the village has more viewpoints per capita than anyplace else I’ve been before). My plan was to get there, to walk about the village, maybe have a lunch and head back.
So far Cruz de Tejeda is my favourite place to go on Gran Canaria. Somehow, even when the weather is terrible elsewhere, it changes by some miracle once I am on the pass, and there are views to die for in all directions. Only once did I catch the pass itself in clouds, but they were shifting and parting all the time, allowing the views down into the caldera, all the way to Teide on Tenerife and to the Gran Roques — Nublo and Bentayga.
This Sunday me and the kids went to the Celebration of almond bloom in Tejeda. In the morning I was very much in two minds about going — the day started really gloomy in Las Palmas, with short but intense showers of rain. We procrastinated for a goodish while, but then figured that we could go to San Mateo, and re-think again there.
When we arrived to San Mateo the drizzle was constant and it was “freezing” by Canarian standards — one of the chemist shops was showing +11 on their clock, plus the roads to San Mateo were very busy because of the Sunday market so it took a long time to get there. Everything was looking grey and flat, with only outlines visible. I was all for going right back, but the kids, to my surprise, wanted to carry on — and I am very glad we did.
I want to describe a short, nice (and unexpected) walk that I took a few days ago.
It might be useful for somebody who, like me, usually relies on maps to find their way around.
This walk, although it has an official number (S-85), is not specified on my Kompass map. It could be because there are so many walks in the area, but still it’s a shame this one is missing. It is one of those walks that combines simplicity, shortness, spectacular views and even the public transport at both start and finish. Believe me, it is rare.
At last, after almost a year of thinking about it, I am writing about two flamenco-themed photosessions that we had on Fuerteventura with Anna Villacampa Gómez, a beautiful lady and a great dancer. As usual, we procrastinated for an awfully long time before arranging the shoot — and the arrangement was finally made only because of our imminent departure.
One of the photoshoots was in the dunes of Corralejo, and the other in the malpais on the road to Tetir, by dead fig tree shaped by the prevailing winds. The second location was suggested by Anna, while we’ve been planning to do the dunes for two years. A piece of red gauze was bought to fly in the wind, Anna choose her own favourite dresses and off we went.
She proved to be a great model. Despite the heat on both days, she was happy to pose and move and dance. The minimalistic background of the dunes worked like a charm, and the dead tree, although making pictures a lot busier, always provided some parallels to the graceful movements of the dance. I enjoyed both days immensely, and so I hope did Anna.
Pictures in no particular order. Enjoy :)
In line with our moving plans, there are almost no place left on Fuerteventura where I really wanted to go and didn’t get yet.*
Last week we went for a walk in Barranco de las Penitas — one of the greenest places on the whole island. It’s a sort of continuation of the valley where the old capital of Fuerteventura, Betancuria, sits. The barranco (ravine) runs towards the west coast of the island, joining eventually with El Barranco de la Madre del Agua, to form even bigger Barranco del Ajuy, which flows into the ocean by (you’ve guessed it) Ajuy.
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| A view towards Villa Winter from Degollada de Cofete (Cofete Pass) |
Cofete is one of the places on Fuerteventura where I always wanted to go and somehow didn’t manage to do so. Even now I can only put a half-tick in that particular box (which is a bit nonsensical, same as the one-palmed clap). But I came close this time.
I have now so many people and organizations from Fuerteventura listed as contacts in Facebook that it brings me all sorts of useful info. On the page on Cabildo (sort of like the island’s council) I saw an announcement of the excursion to Cofete organized within a program called “Fuerteventura al Golpito”. They arrange excursions more or less every two weeks, provide a guide (or two, as it was in our case), and a free bus which picks people at Puerto del Rosario and Gran Tarajal. You have to phone and put your name on the list, and then they send you a message a couple of days in advance, stating the meeting place and time, plus in this case a change of route.
The original route was estimated to be two hours longer than the one that we eventually did, and I am jolly glad of the change too. It was hard going as it was, we were back in Morro Jable in six hours instead of the estimated four, and we didn’t stop for very long anywhere. Even the stop at Villa Winter was rather brief.
The Villa Winter itself was rather disappointing, I must say. I don’t know what I expected really, but the place has this aura of mystery about it (hidden rooms! secret passages! a submarine can come up right to the basement! etc.) so I didn’t expect goats, rubbish in the inner courtyard and peeling walls. Maybe, if the owners allowed us into the basement, as they sometimes do apparently, I would be more impressed, but they didn’t, so I wasn’t.
The route was beautiful if somewhat hard. Shame that we didn’t have time to come down to the water level, but that would probably have delayed us a lot more, and the bus driver was apparently getting really impatient as he was counting on the shorter time.
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| Face of the barranco. Chess Pieces. Moai of Fuerteventura. Take your pick |
I wanted to find this particular ravine, El Barranco de Los Enamorados (or de los Encantados), ever since I saw some amazing pictures of it in Facebook. It proved to be not that easy — my excellent KOMPASS map doesn’t have this name, and all the local maps I saw so far don’t have even the most basic stuff, let alone barrancos. I wanted to join one of the excursions that are organized by local walking groups — that didn’t happen somehow. I asked for the directions and got contradictory answers (it’s close to Lajares — no, actually, to La Oliva — no, it’s very close to the Playa de Esquinzo — it’s to the left — no, to the right — actually, just carry on straight...). I asked to point it out on a map; even that was a bit vague. So. I am inclined to think people talk about somewhat different places, but all of those places share one thing — amazing smooth water patterns on the sandstone.
Choosing the directions that pleased me by their simplicity (“just take the unused branch of Lajares roundabout and carry on straight, you can’t miss it”) I went there with a friend. We followed a huge barranco that starts close to Lajares roundabout; when we came to the place where it separated into three branches we started to walk the middle one. We soon met a small group of people, all looking local, and asked them for directions, just to make sure. The main guy took the words out of my mouth — “El Barranco de los Enamorados? No, you took a wrong turn, we are going that way, follow us and then I show you were to go”. (So much for “it’s straight, you can’t miss it”). We followed them to where they parked their 4x4; he told us that “from here it’s probably one more kilometer that way”. Off we went. Problem is, barrancos tend to branch off. That day we took a “wrong” branch — it was nice and had some interesting sandstone structures which were probably petrified plants — but we haven’t found what we were looking for.
So, we went again. This time we found all the stuff you can see on the pictures. I am still not that sure that we found “the” barranco, but I will give the route we followed, and point out at least one alternative I found. I can tell you without false modesty that my pictures are a lot better than what I saw before, but can’t tell if that is because we found a better place or it’s just because I haven’t seen other pictures that do the place justice.
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| We didn’t have much luck with the sun during this excursion. One of a few small pools of light on the landscape |
Montaña de la Arena is a small dark mountain between Lajares and Villaverde/La Oliva. I passed it many times when doing a part of trans-Fuerteventura path GR 131. Once we tried to go up it with friends, but turned back when we discovered that the side of the mountain that we choose was one large scree. That was the side which looks at Lajares, northern face more of less.
When I saw the announcement of the excursion to the Montaña de la Arena on Facebook, I joined. I figured that maybe there is a good path up that I failed to spot myself.
Well, I was wrong. Where we went, there is no good path. There are bits when it looks sort of like one; but those are separated by stretches of pure picon, black volcanic gravel. You step up and slide down by the same amount, and you step up again, and you guessed the rest. It’s not an easy climb, and I don’t recommend to go where we went — southern face.
While Europe is getting an unhealthy share of snow and cold, it’s getting hot and summery here on Fuerteventura. So I figured it’s time to do this walk before it becomes impossible, or at least very, very uncomfortable.
Pico de Zarza is the highest point of Fuerteventura, just over 800 meters high (just now I found a figure of 807, but it seems to me that I saw some other heights somewhere). When the sky is clear you can see all of Fuerteventura, Gran Canaria and Teide on Tenerife from there. The sky wasn’t that clear when we went, so we didn’t see the other islands. Still, the views are spectacular and the walk well worth doing.
Above is the view along the wild Cofete beach (btw, the only remaining point of the island that I really want to visit and haven’t visited yet).
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| The urge to climb and then jump off the sharp rock is irresistible to some |
Last Saturday we went for a long walk with my former Spanish class. The walk started around La Pared village on the west coast of Fuerteventura, ran along the shore for the goodish while, and then started to traverse the island. It ended up at main road FV-1, at the level of southern end of Playa de Sotavento de Jandia.
I liked the walk a lot, the coastal path is absolutely spectacular, but there are a few somewhat difficult points about it that I’d like to record.
First, logistically it’s not easy to organize on your own. It’s not circular, and if you want to go by car, you will have to go through a palaver of arranging at least one at the end of the walk, then ferrying people between the end and the start. We had it easy, as the center provided the bus that brought us to the start and picked us up at the end. I am not sure if the walk is doable by just public transport, but inclined to think that it isn’t.
Second point — most of the route runs along the sandstone ledge not much above the high water level, and under a tall wall of sandstone. There is no or very little mobile reception; so not a great idea to try the walk on your own even if you managed to somehow arrange the transport. Apart from our large group, we met very few people along the path.
Third point, linked to the previous — sandstone ledge runs out occasionally, or becomes quite steep. Nothing too bad, but — watch out and have somebody else watching out for you.
Apart from that, nothing much I can add. Enjoy the views :)
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