Ajuy: where the oldest rocks in the Canary Islands come to the surface
A fishing village on the west coast and a short walk to caves open to the sea. Beneath it all, a lesson in geology: the ancient ocean floor, lifted into daylight.
Calma Society · Fuerteventura
Culture
Betancuria, the first capital; Tindaya and its engraved footprints; and Unamuno's months of exile.
Betancuria, Fuerteventura's first capital: Normans, pirates and a valley in the shade
Founded in 1404, sacked in 1593 and the island's capital until 1834. A small village in an inland valley, best read early, before the coaches arrive.
Tindaya, the mountain of engraved feet (and the Chillida work that never was)
The sacred mountain of the Majos holds hundreds of footprint outlines carved into the rock at its summit. For a quarter of a century it was also the site of a Chillida work that was never built. It is to be seen from below.
Unamuno in Fuerteventura: four months of exile that changed how the island is seen
In 1924 Primo de Rivera's dictatorship banished Miguel de Unamuno to an island almost nobody looked at. He found an oasis in its bareness. The house where he lived, in Puerto del Rosario, is now a museum.