Hotel Fariones

Hotel Fariones was the first hotel built on Lanzarote outside Arrecife, and the first on its beaches: its first guest signed in on 12 October 1966, at a 77-room building on the rocky point at the western end of Playa Grande in Puerto del Carmen. It closed at the end of 2016, its fiftieth year, for a complete renovation of almost four years and more than €30 million, and reopened in late summer 2020 as a five-star with 213 rooms instead of 242. The Canarian designer Rafael del Castillo did the interiors, and the tropical garden of palms around the pools is more than forty years old.

All 213 rooms are sold as sea-view rooms, each with a terrace. The entry Double Superior Sea View is 32 to 35 m² with an 8 m² terrace, a rain shower, an espresso machine and a free minibar; the same room on the upper floors is sold as its own category. The Junior Suite Sea View adds a sofa and a 10 to 12 m² terrace in 38 to 40 m². From the Junior Suite Relax upwards, with its private jacuzzi on the terrace, guests get the rooftop terrace and an à la carte breakfast in the room. Above them come suites of 55 to 80 m², the two-bedroom Grand Suite Fariones and a single Royal Suite of 150 m².

It is chosen for the sand. Playa Grande's golden beach starts a minute from the door and runs east for about a kilometre, a small cove of golden sand sits below the gardens, and Playa Chica is five minutes' walk west. Between swims there is the infinity pool among the palms, with La Barra's terrace in front of it serving lunch, dinner and cocktails, and the suites' rooftop pool looking across to Fuerteventura and Lobos. Fariones Wellness has a two-hour circuit of saunas, a steam bath and an outdoor jacuzzi for €65, and the hotel's sports centre, three minutes away, has a 25-metre pool, tennis and padel, with the gym and classes free to guests. For dinner in, Kaori serves Víctor Planas's pan-Asian cooking.

The trade is flexibility and price. Outside July and August, minimum stays apply: from January to June most rooms sell only for four nights or more, and in May and June the entry room for seven. Rooms below the Grand Suite are made up with two 110 cm single beds, and the rooftop is kept for suite guests. Book it as a couple or two friends for a week of winter sun, when January afternoons at the island's airport average about 21°C, with the beach below your terrace and the bars of Puerto del Carmen on foot.