Fuerteventura: April 1-4

A plane ticket bought on impulse turned into one of the best weekends of my life. I didn't even think about it. I just went ahead and booked a flight to Fuerteventura with a couple of my friends. I mean, why wouldn't anyone want to go to a tropical island?

The flight left early, like every Ryanair flight I've taken, so naturally we were all exhausted. The flight from Valencia to Fuerteventura took about two and a half hours. Once we got to the island, we didn't know how we were going to get to Correlejo, one of the main towns on the northeastern edge of the island. Most of our friends had gotten car rentals so four of us decided to rent a car last minute, which turned out to be a great decision.

After we found our car in the parking lot, we headed to Correlejo to find our apartment and drop off all of our stuff and get to the beach. The sand was white and the water was a mesmerizing blue. I have never seen water like this. We spent the whole first day sleeping in the sun at the beach with beautiful clear blue water.

Arroz Negro

That night, the search for food began and there were some nice looking restaurants at the beach. We came across a place right on the beach that had good looking paellas and decided to try it. I got the Arroz Negro, which translates to "black rice". It is a rice dish with squid similar to paella that uses squid ink, hence the black. It was pretty interesting and I would try it again if I had the opportunity.

Since we rented a car, we decided to explore the island a little bit and set out to Playas Negras, the black beaches on the south western side of the island. From the north eastern side to the south western side of the island it is about 1.5 hours by car. Outside of Correlejo, there aren't many gas stations along the way, so this trip turned out to be more of an adventure than we expected.

Black Beaches in Fuerteventura

We set off thinking that we had plenty of gas to get us to our destination. However, we underestimated the number of mountains and twists and turns we would encounter along the way. About halfway there, we were dangerously close to running out of gas and the closest gas station was 10km away. Luckily, we ended up coasting to the gas station at the bottom of the hill. Close call.

We finally made it to the black beaches and met our other friends there. Most of us just hung out at the beach, but some of them rented surf boards and wet suits at the local surf shop. It was amazing to see such a difference in the kind of sand that one island can have. On the eastern side, and much of the western side they have super white sand, and only a short drive away is a totally different view. The black sand is caused by fragments of the volcanic lava on the island.

Caldera de la Laguna

After we stayed for a couple hours, we decided to head back and explore a little on the way. Fuerteventura is a volcanic island, so there are a lot of calderas. A caldera is a large volcanic crater, and since it's my last name, I had to climb one.

We stopped at the Caldera de la Laguna, on the southern part of the island closer to east coast. We had a limited amount of daylight to climb it and half of us were wearing flip flops (which I would not suggest trying to climb a mountain in flip flops), but we made it and it was a spectacular view. They way back down was a lot harder though. It got dark to the point where I was getting worried about getting back down safely, but all of us made it without a scratch.

At the bottom of the caldera was a little community center, so we decided to stop in before we left. It was closed but we could see people inside and they let us in anyways. Turns out, the guy who owned this place was making it into a volcano museum so tourists could learn about volcanos. I didn't feel like there were many tourists coming around to that part of the island, but I could be wrong. Anyway, he invited us inside for a drink and told us some great stories. He was quite a character and I wish I could remember his name.

Luke, Janelle, Julian, Lea, the man who owned the community center,
 me, Ronald, and Alexis(from left to right) 

The next day we wanted to see some more of the water, so we looked into our options. We found an opportunity to rent a catamaran and take a tour of the island from the water. It cost about 40 euros a person for 3 hours, but it was probably the best money I have ever spent. The tour was open to anyone, but we were the only ones who showed up for the tour so we got the whole boat to ourselves (plus the captain of course).  We could bring whatever food and drinks we wanted onto the boat, we got to listen to our iPod on the speakers and we could do whatever we wanted. There were kayaks, snorkels, room for sunbathing, you name it. It was perfect for everyone. It was the first time I had ever tried snorkeling, and we got to feed the fish in the beautiful water. On top of everything else, our captain/tourguide was really cool and took us out for an extra hour or so.

A View from the Catamaran

After a weekend like that, I would suggest anyone take the opportunity to go to Fuerteventura. Soak up the sun, and explore what this tiny island has to offer. Just remember to have enough gas in your tank.