So it's been a long long time since there's been an update, but just gonna pick up where we left off. Here's a little recap of our spring break in Lanzarote.
Lanzarote is the 4th largest of the Canary Islands, and the closest to Africa...when the sun is out it is very, very HOT. Most of the landscape is volcanic ash as the island is volcanic in origin, yet there are vegetated mountains and beautiful vallys in the north of the island. We were a little worried about how our trip was going to turn out as we booked everything pretty late in the game, and had a lot of trouble finding direct and detailed information about the island on the internet. Needless to say, Lanzarote is the most beautiful and relaxing place I have ever been.
The island's airport is in the capital "city" (more like a big town) Arrecife, where there are regular flights to and from Madrid, as well as a few other European locations such as London Gatwick. Although we had read that Lanzarote averages about 8 inches a year in rainfall, it started to drizzle as soon as we walked out of the airport...really. BUT it was very early in the morning and cleared up within an hour, and the rest of the week we had beautiful weather.
Puerto del Carmen, Playa Blanca and Costa Teguise are the three main areas that tourists stay. We had a lot of trouble finding a hotel and ended up booking an apartment in Playa del Carmen, which turned out to be the best decision we could have made. There aren't many hotels on the island, more villas and apartments that people rent. We ended up paying about 80 euro each (there were 3 of us) for 7 nights, which was a very, very good deal. We ate all of our meals at the apartment (huge delicious dinners, a great break from Córdoban dorm food) which also saved us a lot of money. Although Puerto del Carmen was perfectly nice (especially since we had no interest in going out, we were actual grandmother's who went to bed at 10 every single night...), there were mainly British families staying in the area, so I'd say that Playa Blanca or Teguise are probably better places for younger people to stay.
We really wanted to see all the crazy things that we had read about the island, so we signed up for the "Grand Tour" with Last Minute Travel--we were definitely the only people under the age of 50 on the tour, but it really was worth it as we saw basically everything in one day.
Timanfaya National Park: a volcanic landscape the covers a huge part of the island's surface, with volcanoes that are still ACTIVE, and may erupt anyyyy day.
Jameos del agua: An underground volcanic tunnel, with cueva de los verdes (literally,green cave) as a part of the tunnel--amazing contrast of colors and light.
Guinate Tropical Park: 11 acres of land at the foot of the island's tallest volcano, with botanical gardens and all sorts of exotic birds and animals. Amazing views.
El Golfo: The green lagoon, where sea water in the form of a lake has turned bright green from the algae--not very pretty, but definitely a cool thing to see.
La Geria: The wine producing region of the island. Farmers use volcanic rock as mulch, a dry cultivation method unique to Lanzarote. Amazing wine.
We rented a car for the rest of the week for about 60 euro, and explored the rest of the island with Margaret as our amazing driver (once we realized the parking break was on). Playa Famara, a white sand beach very popular with surfers (oh yea), and Playa Papagayo, a secluded beach in a small cove, were our two favorite beaches by far.
We drove the entire island in under an hour, so everything is very easy to get to. Also check out Haria, a little town in the north surrounded by huge valleys of palm trees...it's pretty amazing.
Some helpful websites, second link is for the Last Minute Travel tour we went on:
http://www.spain-lanzarote.com/uk/index.html
http://www.lanzaroteguidebook.com/excursion/exploring-lanzarote-guided-tours
