One of the nearest cities from where we stayed at our last trip, is the very cool surfer paradise El Medano. Of course, at that time we didn’t know that…
We were taking a roadtrip at the east coast of Tenerife and made a first stop at the small town of El Medano in the south.
We stepped out of our rental car – and was nearly blown away by the very strong winds.
Despite the winds, we bravely walked a bit at the shoreline, trying to grasp what kind of place this was and if there were anything particularly we wanted to photograph.
We did take a look at the town from there and thought it looked rather empty – as well as the shoreline surrounding it, no nice beaches, nothing.
We decided that it didn’t look especially inviting to us and went back to the nice warmth in the car.
Big mistake!!!
This only shows that we should stick to what we usually do: a proper research of all places to visit in advance. That way, we don’t miss important stuff.
Important stuff about El Medano
We totally missed that El Medano has:
- Several (!) long sandy beaches
- Nature areas with sand dunes
- Interesting plant & birdlife at the mountains
- A great esplanade with shops
- A very pleasant town square
- Narrow streets bars and cafes
- Restaurants with international cousine
- Secluded & naturist beaches
Not only that: Tenerife’s probably most famous beach is in El Medano, the most popular among kite- and windsurfers because of the strong winds.
Even the world windsurfing championships has been held there!
Can you imagine my cursing when I found out afterward?
I can only say to our defense that we were there during the winter, it was the beginning of January and while we were there, we didn’t saw one single kite- or windsurfer there.
…and certainly not any sunbathers, swimmers – nude or not.
THAT we would have noticed even if we were totally blind when it came to other things… *giggles*
Lifecruiser ♥ Beaches
One always learn from mistakes and you certainly did it the hard way – besides: its easy to say afterwords and at least you have now warned others.
I so much remember when I saw the big surfing beaches in Australia. I did not dare to try then and now I’m probably too old
Don’t you want to kick yourselves for missing all that? I’ve done exactly the same sort of thing during a trip. Never mind, perhaps you’ll go back to Tenerife one day and you can make up for what you’ve missed.
It’s a pity you had such a bad weather ! A couple of my painting course had been in Tenerife just one week later and they had wonderful weather ! They stayed in Torviscas where we used to stay too.
Well, maybe you could send them a postcard to the town’s mayor, and apologize for passing them over. Bet he’ll send you an invitation to come visit again. With lots of free wine and banquets.
So many times that happens to me. I get home and find I’ve missed at least half of what i should have seen. But there’s always the next time.
It proved that you should tell us where you’ll head to before your next travel so that anyone of us could remind you to not miss those landmarks
Or you could sponsor me to go along, then I’ll study thoroughly the destination and be your tour guide….
The place is amazing. On this blog I’ve found some great windsurfing destinations which I must visit. Keep up the good work!