Fuerteventura, a spanish island, is one of the Canary Islands, in the Atlantic Ocean off the coast of Africa.
The elongated island has an area of 1660 km². The island is 100 km long and 31 km wide. Located just 100 kilometres off the coast of North Africa, it is the second biggest of the islands, after Tenerife, and has the longest beaches in the archipelago. The island is on the same latitude as Florida and Mexico and temperatures here rarely fall below 18 °C or rise above 24 °C.
Fuerteventura is the oldest island in the Canary Islands dating back 20 million years to a volcanic eruption from the Canary hotspot. The majority of the island was created about 5 million years ago and since then eroded by wind and weather.
The main economy on Fuerteventura is based on tourism; other main industries are fishing and agriculture.
The first settlers are believed to have arrived here from North Africa. Several Spanish and Portuguese expeditions occurred in about 1340. In 1405, the French conqueror Jean de Bethencourt took the island. The name of the island itself is believed to have come from Bethencourt’s exclamation « Que forte aventure! » (« What a grand adventure »). A less romantic explanation is that the name simply means « strong wind ».
The Canary Islands obtained the right to self-govern in 1912. In 1927, Fuerteventura and Lanzarote became part of the province of Gran Canaria. Tourism arrived in the mid-1960s.
And we arrived in December 2007!
Just arrived!
A lava beach
Between the lips of a sandstone cliff
At the hotel garden
At last on the moon! (in Lanzarote)
Our landing site…
Testing the local wine
Growing the local wine…
A vineyard…
A pool down a volcano crater!
The fisherman and the lobster…
Enjoying the fine sand brought here from Africa by the wind…
Walking along the west coast…
and dancing!
Fighting the wind…
I found a dinosaur skull!
Jump or dive?
Shipwrecked people waving at a distant ship…
Have you noticed how the tip of the rock is split? (I found out much later while watching the picture!)
A frozen wave crash!
Where does the power come from? As the sand, from the wind!
A painter’s dream lava…
Through the porthole!
Through the porthole!
Riding a sand horse…
Dramatic sunset!
OVERSEAS 
WOW— I love your new blog! Thanks for telling me about it, it’s so much fun to look at all of your adventures–
I show Ava the pictures often now… she points, claps and then tries to punch a hole through my computer screen (we’re working on that last one!)
Love you both!
J’aimeJ’aime