Lanzarote cycling

will be off there soon! Staying in Costa Teguise. Not specifically a cycling holiday, but hope to get out most mornings (maybe 1 or 2 longer rides). Anyone got any good road/gravel routes, places to visit, good cafes etc?

I always head north then ride up the Tabayesco climb. Really nice quiet rural road with zero traffic. From there through Haria and to Mirador del Rio and then down to Orzola. Stop at Punta Mujeres and the natural swimming pools and the Arrieta on way back. A couple of bars on the water at Arrieta which are very pleasant. Also a couple of cafes in Haria.

There aren’t a multitude of routes but enough to keep you amused if you do the loop the opposite way too.

The Cezar Manrique places are worth a visit as are the wineries to the south. I love the local wine, dry and crisp and very drinkable.

Good bike rental place in Costa; Evolution. Worth popping in as they’ll have route suggestions too. Really nice friendly British couple.

Enjoy!

We had a week riding out from Teguise – all very pleasant and navigationally simple, as above, there aren’t that many roads to choose from! Fewer cafe options than Mallorca though I think, but it isn’t that big an island.

If you want to follow me on Strava you can nick our routes?

Did two longish loops in Lanzarote, one to the north (similar to the above) and one heading south through Timanfaya and back to PdC from Playa Blanca via Femes.

Last I heard Femes was closed to cyclists, that was a while ago though so double check for access.

It didn’t feel there was a lot there tbh, certainly enough for a few days though and way better weather than we’ll be having here. Enjoy!

Great, thanks all, will check out those options! Has anyone taken/hired a gravel bike for off-road routes? I understand there are numerous gravel trails there? There’s a hire place near our hotel that has them as an option. Or is it just best to hire a carbon road bike and stick to the roads?!

We have recently stayed in Costa Teguise & hired bikes from Vulcan Bike Rental – they couldn’t’ve been more helpful.

We popped into see them the day before the hire & went through their route book with them, they have all the routes saved as GPX files so emailed us the route to pop into my Garmin.

Be warned tho – the headwind was something else – the first 20 miles of our route was uphill into a headwind – that was not a great deal of fun.

The gravel routes we saw when walking looked like they’d be well suited to a gravel bike, but didn’t really see anyone there.

Slightly off topic but a guy from the gym I go to was assaulted and robbed in Costa Teguise a few months back. He was persuaded to go to a Casino by someone he met at the hotel bar and was driven out to the middle of nowhere.

I went there a few times on family holidats in the 90’s and it must have changed a lot.

We did some good gravel trails in the South, there’s an excellent single track descemt from Femes down to Playa Blanca…

Lanzarote Gravel by Ben Freeman[/url], on Flickr

Out of interest @footflaps, what’s the deal with Femes climb now…no go or tacitly ignored?

edit: apologies, ignore…read your post wrong and thought you were living that way!

We were staying on Futuerventura and just had a day drip, wife found the route on Kermoot.

Not a roadie but a regular visitor with my mtb to Playa Blanca , Lanzarote . There is a cycling ban from Femes to the roundabout on the Playa Blanca side. The local Police often sit by that roundabout, not sure how strongly they enforce it but it seems that it’s obeyed by the roadie lot.

There is a cycling ban from Femes to the roundabout on the Playa Blanca side.

on or off road?

Not that I’m likely to ever go back there…

Don’t recall seeing any signs saying no cycling.

+1 on Evolution in Teguise. Rented from them a couple of times now, and they have some nice routes on their page (+ in Strav / Garmin I think).

There’s some roads classed as specific bike routes, so you get a bit of room from the locals. Hire car drivers, not always so much…

Tabayesco climb is type 2 fun in hot weather, but worth it. Along the windmill road and up through the vineyards is a nice route too.

Take a camera.

I’m back there for 6 weeks in Jan/Feb/March. We got ‘stuck’ (ahem) in Costa Teguise for nearly 4 months during the first Covid winter and went exploring a lot. It wasn’t awful 😉

For discovering gravel stuff on the island, I strongly recommend the ‘Lanzarote Tour and Trail’ Map by David Brawn (1:40K) map (if you can find it in stock – seems to be limited at the moment). It’s pretty good (i.e. if it’s on the map its usually on the ground) and you’ll work out what is likely to be rideable (almost everything marked as a track rather than as a footpath). There’s also loads of nice, mostly mellow (and OK on gravel bikes)  singletrack made by the local off-road motorbikes and MTB riders. Seems to be new stuff appearing all the time, but it moves. Follow your nose once you’ve spotted a track end.

From Costa Teguise there is a single track that parallels (first one side, then the other) the LZ14 up to the main road. It starts at the junction of LZ14 and C. la Atalaya on the NW edge of the town.

Loads of stuff in the strip between the LZ1 and the LZ10 – go explore!

Seek out the old LZ403 between Teguise (town) and Famara bay. Good climb/descent.

I strongly recommend the ‘Lanzarote Tour and Trail’ Map by David Brawn (1:40K) map (if you can find it in stock – seems to be limited at the moment)

a copy of the new revised edition is winging its way to me now courtesy of Jeff 🙂

did some road cycling a couple of years ago, staying in La Santa. The highlight was the roads through the lava fields from Mancha Blanca towards Uga and Yaiza and looping back to Mancha on the edge of Timanfaya – moonscapes. Also a hilly day up to Haria was good fun. Prevailing wind seems to come from the NNW so you might want to bear that in mind when you are route planning.

Footflaps, the cycling ban is on the road, there are signs at the roundabout and in Femes. They’ve been there for at least 5 or 6 years.