Everything you need to know about El Cotillo Fuerteventura
On 17th August, during the fiesta, a music evening will take place that includes young musicians from Tenerife, Gran Canaria, Lanzarote as well as from Fuerteventura.
This takes place from 21:00 on Muellito del Cotillo (the quay of the old harbour).
It is the 25th anniversary of this event taking place so the program is particularly special. I went to watch this a few years ago and it was definitely one of the nicer events of the fiesta.
The Tiadhe Bus Company are running extra buses over the fiesta period.
They will run on 16th, 17th , the 21st, 23rd and 24th August on both the 07 El Cotillo – Puerto del Rosario route and the 08 Cotillo – Corralejo routes.
See the added bus timetable below:
There is another new place to eat and relax with a drink in El Cotillo. The Cohiba Café has just opened and is located under the Marfolin apartments on the lagoon side of the village.
Ideal for eating lunch on the way to the beach or a drink when you come off the beach.
Their Facebook page is Cohiba Café Facebook Page
The El Cotillo Fiesta 2019 (Las Fiestas del Buen Viaje) provisional program is now available (see below).
The full and final program with timings is below.
I will post the full El Cotillo Fiesta 2019 program as soon as it is available. Now above.
Kite flyers from all over the world will again be attending the annual festival of kites which will take place from November 7th to 10th.
On the 7th November this normally takes place on Playa de la Concha in El Cotillo. This started off as an unofficial day but in recent years has become part of the festival. It then moves to the Dunes beach, just south of the two hotels, outside Corralejo.
The festival of kites is without doubt the most colourful event that takes place in Fuerteventura each year. I have been to it every year and each year there is something different to see.
The kite festival began in 1987 by a group of enthusiasts and has become more popular each year. This will be its 32nd year.
Extra buses are again being put on to ferry those going to and from the music festival this weekend.
Both the No 7 (Puerto del Rosario) and No 8 (Corralejo) services have additional buses running. They will be running up to 4:30am on both nights.
See the timetable below:
With just over 3 weeks to go I have just seen the first indication that the music festival is planned to go ahead this year. There is still no mention of it on the Ayuntamiento website (no surprise there though) but it has been announced in the Noticias Fuerteventura website – here.
It states that it will take place on 5th and 6th July – but don’t forget it was cancelled just before it was due to take place last year.
Additional bus timetable for the music festival
The Cotillo Beach Hotel has been sold and is now owned by the Coral Hotels chain.
It plans to upgrade the hotel from its current 3 star rating to 4 star.
Coral Hotels, which was formed in 1986, has ten other hotels, all located in Tenerife, but is now looking to expand to other islands. All of its hotels have Travelife Gold certification which is awarded to hotels that look to sustain and protect the local environment.
A new shop has just opened in El Cotillo which sells second hand goods.
It is located just down the side of the Dragon China shop opposite the main Superdino supermarket in Avda Hermanas del Castillo.
You can take your unwanted items into the shop which will sell them for you and take a commission on the sale price.
It is open Monday to Saturday from 10:00 until 19:00.
There will be a meeting in the Cultural Centre in El Cotillo on Tuesday 14th May to discuss this year’s Fiesta in honour of our Lady of the Safe Voyage.
It will take place from 18:30 and everyone is welcome. So if you want to get involved in the celebrations this year then go along and offer your services.
I am sure the locals would be happy to have more involvement from the ex-pat community in El Cotillo.
The program for the Easter weekend festivities has been made available.
It all kicks off on Friday 19th April in the evening at 20:30 in the Plaza vieja. The acts on Friday include the headliners, So Co (IV Sonido Costero) who I believe are a reggae group (but I may be wrong).
Other performers are:
On Sunday 20th there will be inflatables and a foam canon in the Old Harbour and activities for children.
The music will include:
Have fun everyone!
The location for a proposed new school in El Cotillo has been approved by the Ayuntamiento.
It will be located behind the football ground and next to what many people call “The Orange Block” of apartments.
It is believed it will be an infant and primary school. No date has been given as to when the building work will commence.
Although I had heard of the Labyrinth just outside El Cotillo before, incredibly after 12 years or more of visiting (and living in) El Cotillo I had never been to it.
A few weeks ago I went with a friend who knew where it was. It was an overcast and windy day, but that didn’t matter.
To find it head to the windmill near El Roque and take the road near it towards the hills. Keep going straight until you come to a halt by La Maxada (Brian’s stone wall place) and then take the path next to it until you get to the labyrinth.
The Labyrinth was built by a German musician, Wolf Patton, in 1999. It took him two months to complete on his own. Following the labyrinth path to the centre is 3 km apparently.
It is modelled on the labyrinth patterns in Chartres Cathedral in France.
It seems labyrinth’s have all sorts of “spiritual” properties – but anyone that knows me knows what I think of that kind of thing. But it is an interesting feature with some great views so definitely worth going to see.
You can watch my video about it:
The Umami Fruit and veg shop in Avenue Los Lagos (the main road to the lagoons) is offering fruit and veg packages which seem good value.
All fresh local organic produce and they will even deliver locally.
Orders should be made 24 hours in advance by phone or Whatsapp – 600645076. Their Facebook page is https://www.facebook.com/umami.cotillo
The Town Hall has announced that there will be a meeting held in the Cultural Centre in El Cotillo on Monday 14th January at 18:00 (6pm).
The objective of the meeting is to allow residents to make their views known about the future of bus transportation to and from El Cotillo.
Amazingly they have actually given 4 days notice of this, which is an improvement!
I didn’t go the meeting but this is the result on the town hall Facebook page. Rough translation below.
Rough translation:
The City Council yesterday pledged to mediate with the Cabildo so that the insular transport company reactivates the bus stop in the lower area of El Cotillo, in addition to “helping with measures within our competences, such as installing pivots in the corners of the streets where they can not double the buses, signal the active stops, or expedite the Tamaragua highway to reduce the time of the route “.
The municipal government group supports the neighborhood demands, which include options such as extending schedules and creating a direct line El Cotillo-Corralejo through Lajares. In the meeting yesterday were the mayor Isaí Blanco, the councilor for Transport, Sandra González, and the councilor for Economy, Juan José Rodríguez.
Isaí Blanco today transferred the demands to the Councilor for Transport of the Cabildo, who undertook to seek solutions in the coming days.
With the usual amount of massive notice – this was just released today (when will they ever learn) – tomorrow’s craft market (7th December) will take place from 18:00 to 21:00 as usual but will also have live music from Manu, with his one man show.
The craft market has handicrafts made in Fuerteventura, paintings and other creative stuff you can buy. Ideal with Christmas just around the corner.
This free cultural event is being funded by the artisans, so you can help by buying some original gifts for your family and friends.
El Cotillo will have almost 40 international artists with all kinds of shows. Culture and artistic expression for all tastes in this festival that doesn’t stop growing.
It will be Saturday 13 and Sunday 14 October, and we will have circus, acrobatic, musical shows, craft shows, dance and hip hop, clown acrobatics, and also new locations to surprise the public (whatever that means?).
The program for Cotilleando:
At 8pm on Saturday 8th September a dunes road closure protest will be held in Plaza Patricio Calera (behind the little Shell petrol station) in Corralejo. This is to protest against the closure of the dunes road (FV1) until 6th October because of the filming of Wonder Woman 2.
This is a video of the road:
It isn’t very often that protests like this happen here in Fuerteventura. It just goes to show how much the residents are against it.
If you are against it and will be here why not go along to show your support.
It was always a possibility that once the new road is completed then through traffic may be stopped. Personally I am not against the road being closed then as having lorries etc driving through the dunes is not good ecologically.
However, I am against it being closed to allow these arrogant film makers to make their pathetic film. And we all know why this has been allowed don’t we! They would say it is because it brings in money to the island. But the truth is it puts money in the pockets of certain people. It does little good, if any, to the average person on the island.
Only a few months now until this year’s 2018 International Kite Festival. It will be held from 8th to 11th November. We believe the first day, the 8th, will be on Playa de la Concha in El Cotillo.
This is without a doubt the most colourful event of the year in Fuerteventura so well worth seeing.
At least the dunes road will have reopened by then. The arrogant Wonder Woman film makers will have gone back where they belong, never to return hopefully. And who knows, perhaps the local politicians may have just about finished counting their bung for closing the road by then too!
As a preview, here is last year’s video of the 2017 kite festival –
I answered some El Cotillo Q&A (questions and answers about living in Fuerteventura) in this video and also took a walk around to show what is happening in the village and also any new shops, restaurants that have opened since my “El Cotillo video: What’s it like video” – https://youtu.be/6kbCz9BMuuE
There are a number of new shops that have opened, particularly under the Cotillo Beach Hotel and the odd restaurant too. Probably the best new restaurant is the Olivo Corso near the new harbour. There was bad news regarding the El Cotillo bars as Ferrets bar closed recently.
I then sat at a cafe for a coffee and answered a few questions about living in Fuerteventura and the cost of living in Fuerteventura that I had received recently. These include buying a property in Fuerteventura, buying a car in Fuerteventura, the internet in Fuerteventura and also long term lets here.