Water, water everywhere... (Caleta De Fuste (Fuerteventura))

Member Name: grahamt

Product:	Caleta De Fuste (Fuerteventura)
Date:	29/11/04 (4544 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Reliable weather, Cheap

Disadvantages: Planes on your head

Imagine a desolate landscape, seemingly devoid of all life. Everywhere you look the scenery stretches away into the distance, red, brown and grey.

Welcome to Fuerteventura.

Fuerteventura is one of the islands that make up the Canary Isles. It is the next nearest to Africa after Lanzarote. Just off the coast of Morocco and just a sandstorm away from the Sahara Desert, you would expect the temperatures to be oppressive. Not so. The Atlantic Ocean has a welcome moderating effect. Indeed, the name means “Strong Winds”. A constant (and welcome) breeze it's true but not unpleasant.

The Canaries are of volcanic origin and it is this that determines the landscape. These islands display the typical basaltic rocks that give evidence to their creation and which also determine their lack of natural water. The natural vegetation is purely scrub that defies the the elements to cling desperately to life.

The population of this island (leaving aside the tourists) has always been sparce. Such an environment would not have supported a large human population before the technology to extract drinking water from the ocean came into existence. Indeed, in the past, as today, the majority population is goats, 75,000 of them. These hardy animals seem to be able to survive anywhere.

Like Malta, the water supply is entirely of desalinated sea water origin. You are recommended not to drink it or even cook with it but this is more to do with the taste than anything else. Our courier said she had made tea and coffee with it without ill effects. We used only bottled water, except for brushing our teeth.

Along the Africa-facing coasts of the North and the South of the island run extensive sand dunes. These are all composed of the sand that has been blown by storms from the Sahara. The middle third of the coastline however, has no such assets and here, as at Caleta, the local beach is entirely man-made.

The Travel Company
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We travelled with Thomas Cook from Gatwick. The choice was determined by the fact that we had a Boots money off voucher to use although we have used them before. In our experience there is little to choose between them. They all screw up from time to time but generally provide a reasonable service.

Unfortunately their website made no provision for using discount vouchers when booking. We did, however, identify the holiday we liked the look of but then had to phone up to book. They did, however, match the “Book Online” discount, and some, so it worked out OK in the end.

We were offered the opportunity to use the Executive Lounge at Gatwick whilst we waited for out flight the the cost of an additional £50. Sounds expensive I know but, with all the baggage handler strikes going on, we felt we could end up waiting hours for the flight so the opportunity to eat and drink for free in comfort whilst we did so was good insurance. We use the Servisair lounge in the South Terminal; perhaps not quite as luxurious as BA or BM but perfectly adequate all the same.

The flights were fine; Thomas Cook use their own planes. The seat spacing was somewhat on the tight side compared with most. I wouldn't have wanted the flight to have been any longer than the 3¾ hours it was. Only tea and coffee were free. The meals were no better, no worse than on most other airlines.

The local representatives were helpful and, of course, keen that you signed up for the organised trips. That's how they make their money. They certainly can't live on what the tour operators pay them. We did, mostly because they sounded interesting but you can probably do better by do-it-yourself.

You may have read that one of the young reps died in tragic circumstances in Caleta. It was at the Broncemar whilst we were there. We didn't witness it but came back just as the full impact was hitting the remaining reps.

They were clearly distraught but I take my hat to their professionalism. There first concern was the effect it had had on their guests. We were offered counselling if new needed it (we didn't).

Fuerteventura Airport
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Fuerteventura Airport is modern and pleasant. Very open and airy, it provides more than adequate facilities for those travelling to and from the island. You will find loads of check-in desks and we found no significant delays having our travel arrangements completed for our homeward flight.

The Departures lounge is upstairs and here there are loads of shops for those last-minute purchases plus several outlets for refreshments. We didn't actually need to try any of those as we had packed sandwiches and drinks for our return.

The toilets we found were clean and well maintained. Indeed, the whole airport seemed well looked-after. Whilst we were sitting waiting for our flight there were cleaners and cleaning machine constantly in action cleaning up after lazy travellers. There are also recycling bins for glass, cans and “green” waste, first time I've seen that in an airport.

Calete de Fuste
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As you will have gathered, there are almost no “historical” towns on Fuerteventura. Such a desolate environment would be a struggle for anyone in which to survive. There is evidence of individual dwellings of ancient age around the island but all are derelict, evidence of those who came and left.

Calete is one of the several towns built from scratch in recent years solely for the purposes of exploiting the holiday trade. As such, almost all of the properties in the town are modern. Even the beach has been built from scratch!

Calete is only ten minutes from the airport so no delays in transfers to your accommodation. That's the good news. The bad news is the flight path into and out of the airport (depending on the wind direction) passes right over the town at about a thousand feet! Had we known this before booking our holiday we might well have given it a miss.

In practice it isn't too bad. Although flights do start early in the morning and continue until quite late in the evening, during the day there are long periods with no flights. However, if it was a choice between a resort without this nuisance and one with you can guess which I would choose.

The Beach
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Calete is otherwise a reasonably pleasant resort. There is a harbour area backed by a man-made beach that is the only public beach here. The beach area is large and, whilst we were there admittedly in October, there was absolutely no problem in finding a space of your choice.

You can hire a sunlounger and shade for 7.5 Euros ($5) a day. It is clear that these have seen better days. There seems to be one single design for every sunlounger on the island. I never saw a different one anywhere. Unfortunately they are not the most user-friendly!

The water is crystal-clear, as it is everywhere in the Canaries. Paddling even just knee-deep, you are often surrounded by small fish. The kids love it. The tide has a wide range and at its highest threatens to surround some of the sunloungers nearest to the sea. The kids spend their time building walls of sand. Clearly they have never heard of King Canute!

There are many bars and restaurants around the beach where refreshments can be obtained. However, many close reasonably early. We wanted to get a drink at 5.00pm in one bar, only to be told they were closed for the rest of the day! The prices are quite reasonable and, if you want to walk a little further, five minutes will bring you to the main shopping centres as well.

Broncemar Beach Aparthotel
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We had decided to go self-catering, not because we particularly wanted to spend our time cooking but because we wanted to eat out as much as possible.

The Broncemar covers a large area right at the top of the main town, before you get to the main coastal road. Those apartments that are located cloosest to the road do suffer from some road noise but we didn't find the problem excessive but then there were some apartments between us and the road that muffled the noise a bit.

The entire property consists of two-story blocks of around six apartments to a block. We had a top floor apartment designed for two to four, accessed from an outside staircase. It had a double bedroom and a pull-out sofa-bed in the lounge. There was a bathroom with a bath and a shower over but no seperate shower. The kitchenette had a cooker hob and a microwave plus the usual utensils and cutlery. There was no kettle, just a coffee maker.

The apartment was large, clean and very comfortable. There was a terrace off of the lounge/kitchenette, accessed through sliding patio doors. It got the sun all day to the extent that you needed to draw the insulated curtains across to stop the apartment turning into an oven.

For those of a REALLY lazy frame of mind, you could almost have spent the entire holiday lying here in the sun with cold beer in the fridge and food to hand! The only drawback is that there are no sunloungers permitted on your terrace. Clearly the Management don't want you to get TOO comfy and not take advantage of the facilities.

The site has a small but fairly comprehensive supermarket of its own, where the prices weren't too much higher than the nearby shops. It was good enough for convenience buying.

There are a couple of bars, one showing the obligatory UK footy matches (also on show on just about every screen in the resort!) and one in the evening live entertainment showplace. They also serve snacks. As well there is a buffet restaurant that we tried and found adequate but somewhat unimaginative.

These are all located around the pools. The smaller pool is somewhat quieter for those who didn't come for a workout with the Reps. For those of a more energetic frame of mind, the larger pool is the one for you. Also, there are daily quizzes if you feel like demonstrating your intellectual prowess (in other words, you know which year ELO had a hit with “Mr Blue Sky”!!!!!)

All in all the Broncemar is a quite reasonable place to base yourself, especially if you have young kids or simply want somewhere to crash out after spending all your evenings and days off-site.

Shopping
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The Canaries, being a part of Spanish territory, uses the Euro (never go anywhere without them! Just how long do we have to wait whilst the UK fannies about. Join the Euro!!!! Just do it!!!!).

However, like the Channel Islands and the Isle of Man, they are not actually IN the EU. That means that you cannot walk through the Blue Channel when you get back to Blighty. You are subject to import restrictions like any other non-EU destination.

The main road up from the beach is dual carriageway and divides the resort in half. The Centro Comercial El Castillo is next to the Barcelo Hotel complex and is all pedestrianised. Here you will find all sorts of shops, mostly though selling cut-priced ciggies, booze and souvenirs. There are, though, some decent clothes and footware shops.

The prices are, in general extremely good but then the tax here is virtually non-existent. I got a 1 litre bottle of Aberlour Malt Whisky for 20 Euros (£14), a saving of around £12 on UK prices. Outstanding!

On the other side of the road you will find similar but this area is not pedestrianised. Everywhere there are more bars and eateries than anything else.

Eating Out
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There are no end of places to eat in Caleta, from snack bars to take-aways to restaurants in just about every style you would find anywhere else. In one week we couldn't try them all but even within those that we did find there were the Good, the Bad and the down-right Ugly.

The imaginatively named Restaurante Tipico Canario (Canaries Style Restaurant) just below the Broncemar on the edge of the Castillo centre was the first one we tried and turned out to be the best. We went there twice.

They specialise in fish dishes and they do them very well. Not only that they managed to find us a bottle of red Marques de Caceres Rioja even though only the white was on the menu. The meals both times were excellent and for the two of us cost a very reasonable 60 Euros (£40). Recommended.

The Gambrinus advertises itself as a Bavarian style restaurant. It's actually the on closest to the Broncemar, being located on the same block and just across the square from the Restaurante Tipico Canario.

Its tables are mostly located outside on the pedestrian area in front of the building. This area is quite large and there enough tables to ensure that even on the busiest nights you are unlikely to be turned away.

They had Carpaccio on the menu, one of my favourites. I had that for a starter whilst my wife had melon with ham. For the main course we shared a Paella Valenciana. We had a bottle of Faustino VII Rioja with it. The Carpaccio was OK but not the best I've had. The Paella was good. The Rioja was less impressive than its reputation, certainly not as good as the Caceres.

In all the meal was probably the second best we had and came to 64 Euros (£42). I would probably go there again.

We also tried some themed restaurants. Mexican Corner is in the shopping area on the other side of the main street. I would have thought that, with the Spanish association they would at least have got this right. I was wrong. This was probably the worst of the places we ate.

Service was slow. No attempt was made to separate smokers from non-smokers and we were surrounded by them. The food, when it arrived, was not especially good. We shared Fajita Mixta Grande but at least the bottle of Marques de Arterizo was good. The meal can to a very cheap 47 Euros (£36) and probably wasn't worth any more. We got a voucher for a free “English Breakfast”. We didn't take them up on their offer.

Having tried Mexican it was then necessary to try Chinese, of which there are many. We ate at the Hong Kong Restaurant, very close to the Mexican one. This was a more successful experience. However, here, unlike in the UK, chopsticks are not automatically provided; you have to ask for them.

We had the Set Menu B, which includes Crispy Duck (an essential!). However, these came with the thinnest pancakes I have ever seen. You could almost hold them up and see right through them! As you can guess, they rather fell apart.

Nevertheless, the meal was good and , with a bottle of Marques de Riscal came to just over 60 Euros (£40).

So, Mexican, Chinese, what next? It was a toss-up between Greek, Indian and Spanish. Greek won.

Restaurante Syrtaki is also in the same area, just up the hill from the others. They offer all the usual “Tourist Greek” dishes. I had the Beef Stifado. The meat was a but on the tough side, which is unusual for what is basically a stew. Not uneatable though and not bad enough to complain.

My wife had lamb and enjoyed it. We had a bottle El Coto Rioja which was fine but once again, did not live up to its reputation. All told it came to 57 Euros (£38). Not the worst restaurant but by no means the best.

Because we went on a number of day trips we didn't often eat out at lunchtime. On the one occasion that we did we came across a gem by pure accident. El Meson Gallego is in the Aparthotel Castillo Suites just back up the road from the beach. At the roundabout you turn right and go down a flight of steps. The restaurant is at the bottom.

This is a Tapas bar and it was here that we had probably the best food we had at any time in Caleta. Had we found it earlier we would have gone there again and probably tried their evening meals.

As you would gather, being a Tapas bar, we had a number of dishes of different types. They included “Hot and Spicy”, Mild, Vegetable only... All were delicious. With a bottle of Marques de Caceras Rose Rioja the whole came to an exceptional 32 Euros (£21). Highly Recommended.

Day Trips
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A number of trips are offered but the one we really wanted to do we couldn't. On Wednesday they do an island tour. However, Wednesday was the day we arrived and left so that was out-of-the-question.

You can ride camels if you want. You can go and “hunt” for whales and dolphins. You can take a day trip to neighbouring Lanzarote. You can enjoy a show put on by the Reps.

We chose three trips, two land-based and one sea trip.

Correlejo
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Wanting to see a bit more of the island, just to confirm that Caleta isn't representative, we chose the trip to Correlejo at the Northern tip of the island. Called the Correlejo Express, it was anything but, as the coach seemed to take every detour possible to pick up passenger from here, there and everywhere!

When eventually we got there it was evident that Correlejo was actually just more of the same. Much larger than Caleta it nevertheless was evident that its primary function was also to be a holiday destination.

We were dropped off first of all at an open-air market to do a couple of hours shopping for fake goods and ethnic artwork. We resisted most “temptations” until almost the end, when my wife took a shine to some “sand art”.

Actually, these pictures were quite interesting. Made from a thick coating of different coloured sands glued to a plywood backing, they were quite attractive so I didn't begrudge. We acquired six for 70 Euros (£45), an improvement on the original offer of one for 30 Euros (£20). They now hang in pride of place in our newly redecorated home. I quite like them.

We couldn't occupy ourselves in the market for the full time allotted so we wandered down the road to the shopping area. Here there are all the usual kinds of tourist outlets and loads of bars and restaurants. As we were feeling thirsty we decided to stop for a drink.

The first place was a complete waste of time. We sat there for five minutes without any sign of anyone interested in serving us, even though the place wasn't exactly heaving with trade. I wandered over to the bar to see if we were expected to serve ourselves. No, we were expected to wait. It was clear that there was minimal staff on duty so we left.

A little further on we spotted a Rock Cafe (NOT Hard Rock Cafe!). There's loads of these all over Fuerteventura. Similar idea to HRC but different décor. We had a couple of beers and, in anticipation of an afternoon sunbathing in the dunes, we ordered a couple of ham and cheese sandwiches to take away. No problem except, when they arrived we discovered they were toasted... with chips!

By the time we got to the beach the chips were inedible. The toasties were OK though.

The beach at which we were dropped was La Oliva, in the dunes about five miles south of Corralejo. It's located between two Riu holiday destinations, one a hotel and the other, apartments. The beach is open to the public and not restricted to the hotel. The beach is clean. The water is beautiful.

You can hire a sunlounger and a parasol like anywhere else on Fuerteventura and, yes, they are exactly the same design. The cost is higher, 9 Euros here. However, the cost does include a free drink at the bar on the beach. What they don't tell you is that this isn't just any drink, not a beer for instance. You can only have a Sangria! I hate Sangria.

Morro Jable (Jandia)
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Our second outing was to the other end of the island, to Morro Jable, more usually known as Jandia. Jandia is about twice as far from Caleta as Corralejo. The trip took nearly two hours. A new road is being built part of the way and the journey will probably take a lot less in future. Nevertheless, had we known we probably wouldn't have bothered.

This end of the island is definitely greener, there being more irrigation and cultivation of plant life. You pass through Costa Calma, which is a little oasis on the coast and looks like it might actually be the nicest holiday destination on the island. The beach there is vast.

On the way you also pass the island's only cow! 75,000 goats and one cow! Poor Moo.

Jandia seems to be the destination for the Germans. Everywhere you see German bars and restaurants. It is also on the beach that the German influence is noticed. Jandia's beach is nudist-friendly.

Now, I don't know if you have every done the naturist thing. In my experience it's no big deal, not that I'm claiming I have anything specifically to boast about you understand. It's not an exhibitionist thing. But it is a very liberating experience.

We've done it on the Cote Sauvage on France's Atlantic coast, the great naturist destination of Europe. Miles and miles of outstanding beaches with hardly anyone around.

You would think that things could get very embarrassing should you be surrounded by any “Heavenly Bodies” well, embarrassing for the men that is; women can get away with anything where that's concerned! But it doesn't actually happen like that.

Occasionally you do see some absolutely stunning people letting it “All Hang Out” but for the most part and especially here in Jandia, I would estimate the average age of these sun-worshippers to be around 70. Sadly, gravity and the sun have not treated them kindly. The word “walnuts” comes to mind.

We were probably the most beautiful people on the beach! For my part that probably isn't saying much. My wife, however, more than adequately kept up the British honour.

As elsewhere, you can hire sun-loungers and parasols. On this occasion we didn't. I dug my sun pit in the sand and covered my delicate bits in total sunblock and settled down to while away a very pleasant couple of hours. The sea was a little rough and certainly on the cool side of the Big Toe Test. I ventured just a couple of dips to cool off.

And that was the problem you see. Because of the length of the journey, all we had was a couple of hours before we had to return. Very disappointing but I suspect that Jandia might actually prove to be one of the best holiday bases on the island. We saw a number of very attractive hotels. If we ever go back I suspect that would be where we would go.

It was fascinating to hear all the comments from our fellow trippers on the way back. I guess few had indulged in the all-over tan. I don't know if we were recognised. We just chuckled to ourselves.

Ocean Cat
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The final trip was a day out on a catamaran. Well, actually it was only an afternoon.

The catamaran is based at Correlejo so, once again we had the “pleasure” of an hour's (at least) coach journey. We arrived around midday and were told to wait on the harbour wall. It was then that I realised that the trip operators clearly did two trips a day, one in the morning and one in the afternoon. They were still clearing up after the previous trippers.

When eventually we did set sail we headed out to Isla de Lobos, a little island between Fuerteventura and Lanzarote. We anchored in the bay by its jetty, along with a whole load of other boats. The entertainment on offer was snorkelling and banana boat rides. That's all.

The water turned out to be way too cold for snorkelling for me. The banana boat rides was an extra cost and not included in the price. I declined both offers. The bananas were in any case towed by waterbikes not powerboats so only two people were capable of being carried at a time.

I have to say I found this trip very disappointing and not a patch on the catamaran trip we had at Barbados during our anniversary cruise this summer. I certainly wouldn't do it again.

Conclusion
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The holiday made a nice break. We both needed time off to recharge our batteries.

Would we go back again? On balance, no, at least, certainly not to Caleta de Fuste. If we were to go back again and I doubt we ever will, we would probably go to Costa Calma or more probably Jandia.

All we have to decide now is where to go next year.

Summary: