Windsurfing & Kitesurfing

The Canary Islands are one of the best places on earth to windsurf or kitesurf, because the same trade wind that makes sunbathers reach for a windbreak blows here for most of the summer and never really stops in winter. Four spots do most of the work: El Médano on Tenerife, Sotavento on Fuerteventura, Famara and Costa Teguise on Lanzarote, and Pozo Izquierdo on Gran Canaria. Between them they cover everything from a first wobbling hour on a beginner board to world-tour competition in forty knots.

If the jargon is new, the difference is simple. A windsurfer stands on a board with a sail attached to it by a joint, and steers by tilting the rig. A kitesurfer rides a smaller board and is pulled along by a power kite flown on lines twenty-odd metres above, controlled with a bar. Both need wind rather than waves, which is what separates them from surfing on the islands, where the swell does the work and wind is usually the enemy.

What the islands add is reliability. Somewhere in northern Europe you wait for a forecast; here the wind arrives most afternoons of the summer like a scheduled service, warm enough to sail in shorts, and the water stays around 19-23C through the year. That combination is why half the world's professional board riders spend part of every summer on these four beaches.

Why the wind blows, and when

The engine is the north-east trade wind, the alisio, which sweeps down the Atlantic between the Azores high and the African coast. It blows hardest and most consistently from May to September, and it strengthens further as it squeezes around and between the islands: the gap between two land masses, or the narrow neck of a peninsula, acts as a funnel and can add ten knots to what is happening out at sea. That is why the good spots cluster in such specific places rather than being spread evenly along every coast.

High summer, roughly late June to early September, is the peak: strong, dependable and busy. Spring and autumn are lighter and better for learning. Winter still delivers plenty of sailable days, and it is when the north and west coasts pick up the Atlantic swell that wave sailors want, but it is less predictable day to day. Our fuller explanation of how windy the Canaries really are covers what this means for everyone else on the beach.

El Médano, Tenerife

El Médano is the most complete package of the four: a small, low-rise town on Tenerife's dry south coast where the wind blows across a long sandy bay and a dark volcanic cone rises straight out of the beach. It is the only one of these places that also works as a holiday town for people who do not sail, with a proper seafront of cafes and a laid-back, sandy-floored feel that the big southern resorts lost decades ago.

The wind funnels between the bulk of Teide inland and the sea, and the bay offers several different conditions within a few minutes of each other. The main town beach at Playa de El Médano is flatter and friendlier; the far side of Montaña Roja, the red cone, picks up more swell and is where the wave sailing happens; and the long open sweep of La Tejita next door gives everyone room to spread out. Schools, board shops and repair workshops are all within walking distance, which matters more than it sounds when a mast foot snaps at eleven in the morning.

Sotavento, Fuerteventura, and the lagoon that comes and goes

Playa de Sotavento runs for several kilometres down the eastern side of the Jandía peninsula, and it holds the single most distinctive feature in Canarian board sport. At the Risco del Paso end, a long sandbar traps the incoming tide and creates a shallow lagoon between the bar and the beach — a sheet of turquoise water a few hundred metres across and often no deeper than your thighs, completely flat despite a strong wind blowing over it. For learning to waterstart, or for practising freestyle tricks that involve falling over repeatedly, there is nowhere better, because you simply stand up again.

Here is the part nobody tells you until you arrive: the lagoon is a tidal feature, not a permanent one. It fills and empties with the tide, and around the spring tides it can turn into a proper waist-deep lake, while on a small neap tide it may be little more than damp sand. Regulars plan their week around a tide table before they plan anything else, and if you book a course here it is worth asking the school which hours of which days will actually have water in it. Outside the bar there is deeper, choppier, faster water for anyone who does not need the safety net.

Sotavento has hosted an international windsurfing World Cup event since the 1980s, usually in late July or August, and it is one of the longest-running fixtures on the tour. Dates shift, so check the organiser's calendar rather than assuming. Most visitors base themselves along the Costa Calma strip or further south at Morro Jable; the beach itself has hotels but no town.

Pozo Izquierdo, Gran Canaria

Pozo Izquierdo, on the bleak industrial south-east coast of Gran Canaria, is not pretty and is not for beginners. It is one of the windiest competition venues in the world, regularly recording over thirty knots on summer afternoons, with a shore-break launch onto rock and sand that punishes hesitation. The wave-sailing event held here each summer is on the professional tour precisely because the conditions are so extreme.

What makes the place remarkable is what it has produced. This unglamorous stretch of coast, within sight of a power station and a desalination plant, is the home beach of some of the most decorated windsurfers in the sport's history, including a pair of twin sisters from the island who between them have taken a barely believable haul of world wave titles. Drive down on a strong afternoon and you will find teenagers on the water who would win a national championship anywhere else. If you are an intermediate wanting a look, go to watch, and sail the calmer beaches nearer Playa de Vargas or Arinaga along the same coast.

Famara and Costa Teguise, Lanzarote

Lanzarote splits its wind sports between two very different coasts. Playa de Famara in the north-west is a huge sweep of sand under a six-hundred-metre cliff wall, exposed to Atlantic swell and side-shore wind. It is a wave sailor's and a kitesurfer's beach, spectacular to look at and genuinely serious to sail — strong currents, shallow reefs at the northern end, and a rip that catches people out most summers. The village of La Caleta de Famara has the schools and the surf-town atmosphere, and nearby Lajares on Fuerteventura plays the same role across the strait.

On the east coast, Costa Teguise is the tamer option. The bay at Las Cucharas gets reliable acceleration around the headland with far less swell, and it has been Lanzarote's windsurfing centre since the resort was built, with rental centres on the sand and instructors who will take complete beginners out in the morning lull. For a family where one person sails and the rest want a beach, it is the easiest compromise on the island.

Which spot suits you

Lessons and schools

Every one of these places has established schools, most of them multilingual and used to British and Irish visitors. A beginner windsurfing course is typically six to nine hours spread over three days, starting on a wide, stable board with a small sail, often in a lagoon or a roped-off area of flat water. Expect to be sailing across the wind and back by the end of it, and expect to be comfortably more tired than you predicted.

Kitesurfing takes longer and is taught differently, because the kite has to be mastered before the board is introduced at all. Reckon on nine to twelve hours over three or four days, starting with a small trainer kite on the beach, then body dragging in the water, and only then a board. Schools teach with radio helmets so the instructor can talk to you from the shore. A group lesson costs meaningfully less than private tuition, and most schools will not put more than three or four students with one instructor. Prices vary between islands and seasons; budget the sort of money a day's guided diving costs and you will not be far out.

Hiring gear, or bringing your own

You do not need to travel with equipment. Every major spot has rental centres carrying current boards and sails, and the usual arrangement is a daily or weekly rate that includes as many changes of sail size as the day demands — which is the real value, since the wind can go from a 5.0 to a 4.0 afternoon in an hour. Multi-day and weekly tickets bring the daily cost down sharply, and most centres will store your kit overnight.

If you do bring your own, check the airline's sports baggage rules and price before you book the flight rather than after. Board bags are charged as oversized items, the allowance differs enormously between carriers, and a long bag can cost more than the seat. Bring your own harness and boots regardless — hire harnesses are the one item that never quite fits. Pack a rash vest and a shorty wetsuit for winter; in August many people sail in nothing but board shorts and a serious amount of sun cream, since wind on wet skin hides how much you are burning.

Staying out of trouble

The main hazards are the ones the wind hides. An offshore or cross-offshore breeze will carry a tired sailor away from the beach faster than they can return, and the next landfall downwind of these islands is a long way south. Currents at the exposed beaches are strong, rocks and reefs sit just under the surface at low water, and the lifeguard flags on the busy beaches apply to you as much as to swimmers — the guide to what the beach flags mean is worth two minutes of your time.

Kitesurfing in particular is zoned. On beaches shared with swimmers, kites are restricted to marked corridors and launch areas, and in a few places they are banned outright; the rules are posted and are enforced by local police in season. Never launch a kite alone on a crowded beach, never fly one over people's heads, and give paddleboarders and kayakers a very wide berth. If you are unsure about a spot, walk into the nearest school and ask — they would far rather advise you than help fish you out.

Before you book

Pick the spot before you pick the hotel. A beginner who books Famara because the photographs look dramatic will spend the week watching; an expert who books Costa Teguise in April will be bored by Wednesday. For a first attempt at either sport, Sotavento's lagoon and the gentler end of El Médano are the two obvious choices, and El Médano wins if other people in the party need somewhere to eat, swim and wander in the evening.

Time it for June to September if the wind is the point, and expect the islands to feel busier and more expensive in those weeks than in the winter season that British visitors know. A hire car helps at every spot except El Médano — the wind can be blowing at one end of an island and not the other, and the ability to move is worth a lot. If board sport is only one part of the trip, the wider round-up of boat trips and watersports covers the calmer days, and the month-by-month picture of when to visit will help you place the week.