Fuerteventura, part nine - Pozo Negro & Montana Blanca.

After the super day at Cofete, we decided to have a lazy beach morning on the Thursday. We had lunch in the beach cafe, and it was delicious! Anywhere here that's not 'fast food' seems to compete for freshness and taste. The salads are amazing.

In the afternoon, we took the car up Montana Blanca, the 'hill' we could see the sun setting over from our balcony. It's not that pretty, we were just being nosy!

It's a very strange place - and has the feel of a 'ghost town'. The views from here are pretty good over to Puerto Rosario, but it was noticeably cooler (and a lot windier than at sea level).

The views inland were stunning!

However, the place was, again like so much other stuff, unfinished. Lots of materials and rusted tools were around. Oh, there were people living there in some of the properties that had been built previously, but it looked very weird, having the mature stuff side by side with the new and unfinished It was very sad, and a bit eerie. There;s no WAY I would buy a place up here. Apart from the wind etc, you are SO FAR from the town, so 'popping down' wasn't really an option.

As we arrived on a Sunday, we didn't see these cranes moving. However, we noticed that they didn't move AT ALL, and that's why we came up here to find out why?

A wqaste of time - there were lots of these signs around, but most of the new property was either empty, or unfinished. A glut of housing that no-one wants. The burst bubble, the lost dream.

We left, feeling a bit sad for the place.

The next morning, Friday, we headed across country on the main F2 road, but decided to turn off and visit a small place called 'Pozo Negro'. Sue had read about an ancient settlement here, and we wanted to see it, but first - the beach and a beer! It never ceases to amaze me that, even at such small and remote places - there's always a little bar/cafe, and always SOMEONE in them.

Even a place as small as this has a bar. From the look of the food, it looked good too. One lady was cooking, serving and anything else.

The 'beach' was black sand, with a couple of boats dragged up onto it.
The waves were tame, east-side ripples. None of the massive rollers here. The day was VERY warm,and we lazed about, walking along the beach and just relaxing.

A VERY rare sight on this island - a TREE!

(I parked the car under it for the shade).

As we left, we saw this lovely sign to Pozo Negro. Again, such attention to detail for such a small place - we love it!

We found the dirt track to the 14th century settlement of La Atalayita. You can read more about it HERE
It was deserted when we visited, the new visitors centre closed, for some reason? We went to investigate the site anyway.

There were lots of small structures, almost igloo-like, but constructed of the volcanic roack. There was certainly no shortage of building material, but the stuff is just SO sharp, if you caught any exposed skin, it would shred a layer off. Not the best sort of stuff to build a pokey dwelling out of!

We marvelled at mans ingenuity to survive. There didn't seem to be any water here, it was a good half an hour (at LEAST) walk from the sea, and we were sure nothing would grow in these arid conditions. So, the question is - how did the land support so many people??

It wasn't like there were one or two of these dwellings, there must have been thirty or forty!

We obviously crawled inside one or two and, believe me, I don't think anyone was claustrophobic in those days!!

That hill looks inviting and, even though we had no water with us, and were wearing our sandals (albeit 'proper' walking sandals') we headed towards it.

We got a much better perspective of the size of the settlement from up here. You can see how big it is by the perimeter wall that surrounds it.

One guy that didn't mind the hot sun was this lizard that popped up.

We made our way over to the sunken visitors centre to have a look around it, even though it was closed. This has been constructed in this sunken fashion deliberately, so it can not be seen. It blends in very well with the place.

We set off back towards Caleta, but had a quick stop to look around Tarajalejo. Again, just a relaxing break, but half of the town looked almost derelict, while half was brand new. This lone parasol on the beach made for an atmospheric shot.

We walked over to and along the little pier that reaches out into the bay. We sat on a bench, and Sue dozed on my shoulder in the warm, late afternoon. There was a sort of mist on the sea, so again, it made for a nice shot.

Tomorrow, we become 'Caleta-locked' again, as it was time to return the car. We felt we had done the island justice though while we'd had it, and seen a lot in the time we had. Of course, there is MUCH more to see, but for now - we intended to hit the beach for a couple of days before going home.