We headed off at a very leisurely pace, as we weren’t expecting to be able to do the full trip in daylight, therefore, we didn’t want to arrive in the middle of the night. We raised just the genoa and sailed gently along at 3 knots, looking at the coastline, trailing the fishing rods and generally enjoying the ride. The development of the various towns and villages along the way seemed to have progressed somewhat since our pilot books were written and the sleepy fishing villages seem to be a thing of the past. We were waiting for the vast expanses of white sand dunes and beaches, but the bigger ones were, perhaps predictably, surrounded by large hotel complexes. We hadn’t found anywhere that we wanted to anchor up by the time we were drawing close to Morro Jable, which surprised us by being rather cleaner and nicer looking that we had expected. The old town could be clearly seen on the south end, the modern part of the town extending a long way along a very pristine beach where the inevitable hotel complexes were sited. The town did look better architected than a lot we have seen and we decided we may as well pull in for the evening as with an early start in the morning we would now be able to make Gran Canaria in the day. There were also a number of catamarans buzzing around plus the apparently inevitable pirate boat, which suggested signs of life.
We dropped the sails and motored into Morro Jable in preparation for the potential 50 knot gusts! We didn’t get anything like that more in the 20 – 25 knot range. The reason for these potentially strong winds appears to be the fact the port sits at the bottom of a valley under a large hill and the string winds blow down it, as the mistral wind in the mediterrean is generated by wind blowing down from the Alps but on a small scale. Apparently this wind is more likely when there is cloud on top of the hills, which there was as we approached, but we did not receive the full force of the blast.
Morro Jable
We moored on one of the visitor pontoons to the west of the harbour, which seemed to have a lot of local boats also moored plus a few cruiser boats with little signs of life. We grabbed some food and freshened up when we arrived and were a little surprised to see people swimming in the harbour, which although cleaner than your average British harbour, was nonetheless still a harbour. We had also spotted a small natural beach on the other side of the breakwater from the visitor pontoons as we were approaching and there were a number of cars pulled up, we later realised after a walk into town this was where all the locals were escaping the predominantly German invasion!
Morro Jable beach from the Old Town
There is no water or electricity to the visitor pontoons in Morro Jable and only one has walk-on access to shore (albeit this is a lashed on affair). We wondered round to the harbour office a good 5mins walk round the circumference of the harbour on the off chance we might find someone to pay at the weekend. The Gran Canaria ferry that we had seen in Gran Tarajal was also moored here ready to embark and they have a full passenger boarding building complete with bar/restaurant and toilets, where the port office was also located (closed). A little further round is a petrol station with a pump on the jetty side for boats, though it is on an L-shaped wall so I think you’d need to motor in and reverse out. The third visitor pontoon which is described in the pilot books is actually used by dayboats and there was no space there when we arrived.
We hiked into the old town area up some winding stone steps at the back of the ferry office, then through a small estate of houses and up another hill into the old town. The old town area was quite nice, lots of narrow streets and tree-shaded seating areas sprawling down right to the water’s edge to a narrow path that bordered the beach and a number of pavement cafes/restaurants. The beach was a beautiful white sand creating that fabulous turquoise appearance of the water. Infact that end of town was lovely quite idyllic if you ignored the hundreds and hundreds of tourists disrupting the tranquillity! We walked along the water’s edge up yet another hill in the full heat of the sun. The beach stretches about 2- 3miles along the front of several enormous modern hotels, with the accompanying identikit sunloungers and shades on the front. The end of the beach is marked by a large new light house which doesn’t appear to represent any navigational benefit lying part way along a flat coastline which is presumably lit up like a Christmas tree with all those hotels, so perhaps it is there for the tourists? The town continued on some way, with more hotels, we had seen enough though and moved a street back from the front to find a bar.
We’d been trying to listen in to conversations to work out where everyone was from and judging by the bar selling currywurst and bratwurst and the conversations passing us the resort seemed to be predominantly German. The bar owners were German and then it became a challenge to know what language to speak to them in, we plumped for Spanish as I can’t remember much German for school. We had a couple of beers and did some people watching. The row back from the beach was basically row on row of shops and shopping arcades, an aspect of package holidays which was new to me, but seems to be becoming a theme. I went to pay for the beers and the bar owner seemed amused I couldn’t understand her heavily accented Spanish (I’ve had no problem when talking to the Spanish), after some discussion as they thought I was Italian – the tan is obviously improving - she said the price in English. We walked back to the old town and had another beer at the Cofradia (cooperative) Social, which seemed to be a bar run by the locals, it had off duty post ladies and other various locals all chatting animatedly round the bar, it was not as plush as the other bars, so there was just Kevin & I enjoying the tables outside over looking the beach. More people watching then, back to the boat for a tomato salad and an early night.
A resident Fueteventuran Chipmunk (there is apparently a colony on the island)
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