As I mentioned in my initial post about Canary Islands, there was this special place where we spent 3 days and that deserved a post of its own. Just because it was so special and just because it made us feel so perfect. So here it is, the small village of Tasarte with its lovely tinny black sand beach.

Tasarte is a small village situated somewhere in the west part of the Gran Canaria Island, between Agaete and Puerto de Mogan. It’s reachable by car, but take your time, as the road goes up the mountain and then down in the valley of Tasarte and it’s not at all straight. But once you get there, you understand a bit why it’s not that easy to reach it.

We got to Tasarte late in the night, so we didn’t get a chance to see anything around us until the next morning. Actually, we were driving and seeing that there isn’t to much civilization around scared us a bit in the beginning. But when we woke up the next morning, things changed.

The hostel we stayed in had a great roof terrace with the perfect view. It became our favorite place for having a glass of wine in the evening and enjoying the sunset. The Tasarte beach was just 10 minutes walk from the hostel, on a bumpy country road. Although very small, the beach was more than enough considering that it was basically just the two of us using it. On Sunday, our first day there, there were some locals also coming for a swim and enjoying a drink at the nearby bar, but otherwise it was just the two of us and the fishermen who took care of their boats.

The small beach has black sand and but also some rocks. In the afternoon the ocean retracts and the beach becomes bigger and bigger, so there is enough room to enjoy a warm sunny day. This is also a very good opportunity to explore a bit the area. Especially going on a nice walk to see the small water creatures that get stuck in the rocks. We had the chance to see all sorts of snails, shells, crabs and sea stars. For us it was quite a nice experience, trying to find all sorts of small fish and crabs, hidden behind the rocks, spying them to see what they are up to.

What we enjoyed most was watching the sunset, with no one around, just us and the ocean and the sun going down behind Tenerife. Far away we could also see the Teide Peak (in the right side).

Right next to the beach, there is a very nice locals restaurant, where we could get cold beer (for under 1€) for the beach and where we had the best paella ever (around 7€ for 2 persons). I will tell you more about the Canarian cuisine in a future post. It’s only open until around 6 PM, so if you want to get something to eat, you should take that into consideration. Being a small village, there aren’t any restaurants, only a supermarket, but you have to drive to get to it.

The hostel we stayed in, Bla Bla Bla Hostel is a very nice guest house, recently opened in a new location, closer to the beach.

As we were the only tourists  for that period, we had the whole house at our disposal and we enjoyed a very quiet and relaxing vacation. Besides the beautiful roof terrace, in the back yard there was a banana trees plantation. The neighbour had mango trees and we finally got the chance to taste a mature mango fruit, that actually tasted delicious.

manga plantation

We found out that actually there are also bigger mango fruits, called by the locals manga. The bananas were not quite yet mature, so we only got the chance to look at them and not eat them.

Our host, Sabrina, made sure we had everything we needed. We did exaggerate a bit with the wine, but she didn’t complain. She also prepared breakfast and dinner and made sure we had everything we needed for a perfect stay.

Tasarte is a place for people who want to get a true flavor of the Gran Canaria Island and its people. It’s not a touristic place, you will not find hotels, stores or fancy restaurants. You will be away from cars, pollution, noise and people, but close to nature, to the ocean and to yourself.

Tasarte is also a good starting point if you want to go to Gui Gui beach which is said to be the most beautiful beach of Gran Canaria. There are locals with boats who can take you there, as the beach is only reachable by boat, or via a 2 hour hiking trail.