Las Palmas, Gran Canaria

We arrived in Las Palmas late last night - a 4 hour journey in a hot and stuffy aircraft was not very comfortable, due to the air conditioning not working for some unknown reason. Early this morning Gavin and I went for a walk and Gavin went to the marina office to discuss some matters about the boat. It is an enormous marina as can be seen here, so a suitable place for the start of the ARC race later this year.

After breakfast we decided to walk to the beach from the hotel. We thought the receptionist said it was a 14 minute walk but it was actually a 40 minute walk - in 30C temperatures! Playa de las Canteras is said to be the largest city beach in Europe. It is 3km long with fine yellow sand, and we also walked nearly the length of the beach and the boys swam. The water is very clean and crystal clear. I have added an extra photo of this beach.

In the late afternoon we decided to visit Puerto de las Nieves on the recommendation of blipper Orchid99. It is a charming fishing village with Greek style blue and white houses, and beaches with black pebbles and black sand. It is also the ferry terminal for ferries to Tenerife (see extra photo) It has numerous excellent fish restaurants and we decided to stay for supper at one of these restaurants and watch the sun set. One can usually see Tenerife from here but the horizon was very hazy and we did not have a clear view. I think we were the only English tourists there and it was full of locals enjoying the beaches and restaurants and therefore very authentic and not very touristy. We thoroughly enjoyed the visit.

Now we are back at the hotel and it is very late so I will catch up on journals tomorrow.