We decided again to set off just under genoa (smaller head/front sail), with the strength of wind we were still getting 4-5 knots so saw no point in complicating matters further for such a short sail with all day to get there. We were also anticipating the wind acceleration zone between Lanzarote and Fuerteventura, a kind of wind tunnelling effect cause by the high land masses, which increases the wind strength in those areas. As soon as we were about 2-3 miles off Lanzarote the wind did start to build to about 25 knots at maximum, so we just furled the genoa a little and pressed on. The seas are also a little confused in the area as the seas funnelled either side of Lanzarote meet and then try to squeeze down the narrower Rio between Fuerteventura and Isla Los Lobos. However, though a little bumpy it was still a fun sail and at that speed we were soon beginning to pick out the landmarks of Corralejo more clearly to make our approaches. We opted to leave Los Lobos for another day rather than rush to do both in one day, the swell in the Rio was fairly high which was comfortable downwind but from the looks of the other catamaran to our port was pretty uncomfortable to take beam (side of boat) on! Obviously as soon as we were making the approaches to Corralejo having not passed another boat all the way across, we had no one but two ferries approaching us from astern (behind). Although strictly speaking they would have to avoid us according to maritime law, we decided to do a small turn to wind to let them over take us, this way we could follow their lead into this new harbour as there are rocks surrounding the entrance.
Isla de Lobos
As soon as we neared the new visitors pontoon Kevin learned about from Mick & Patti (a nice Irish couple living on La Gomera who visited Graciosa), the port official shouted over to check how long we were staying and advise us where to moor and tell us to check straight in. It is slightly complex to have such conversations in broken English (my Spanish studying has not progressed that far yet), whilst preparing the mooring lines and fenders and trying to avoid other shipping traffic, still we went to the berth indicated and Kevin did a great job of bringing us in with the strong wind blowing us off the pontoon. Another British sailor, Bill moored behind us, helped to take our lines and invited us for a cold beer when we were settled so we went to check in, paid our 12 Euros per night and went to join him. He gave us some pointers of where to find things around the town and told us a little about his travels before we headed off to do some provisioning ourselves.
We went for a wander around the town that evening to the Rogues Gallery bar advised by Bill, then to a couple of other bars. The old harbour area of the town nearest to the marina is full of narrow streets and restaurants, where many British tourists were wandering round with varying states of white/red skin to mark them out. Each of the restaurants had hosts on the streets to draw people in to their establishments, having only ever been on one package holiday in my life before this was all rather alien to me, but as we had bought some lovely fresh prawns from the supermarket we declined their offers. It was interesting to be back in such a crowed area and we enjoyed a bit of people watching. The two sights that really caught my eye was a funeral wake occurring in a night club with music at full volume blasting into the street at 7pm and the flowers laid on the pool table out front, from what we could understand it was for someone living locally, probably the only wake I have seen which breaks convention so that the character of the departed can be guessed at. The second was passing a children’s playground in a square in the middle of the town where there must have been 100 people there with their children, with ladies in full Arabic costume, local Spanish/Canarian fathers and British tourists with their children playing alongside each other, probably the only place I have seen that degree of mixing anywhere.
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