Lanzarote - The Trip I Barely Prepared For

A quiet note from Lanzarote: a trip booked with almost no planning, and an island of lava, wind, sea, and white houses slowly opening itself.

Author: FlamaBloom
Published: July 21, 2026
Updated: July 21, 2026
Reading time: 6 min read

A black volcanic landscape in Lanzarote with low mountains under a bright sky.

For the first post in this new travel section, I had many places in mind.

Japan, a country that has always kept a very special corner in my heart.

Or Iceland, where every mountain and every stream of lava makes me feel as if I am stepping into another world.

Or the Dead Sea, where I once floated lazily on the water and wondered how nature could create something so strange.

There are so many places worth telling stories about.

But in the end, I wanted to give this first post to the place where I am sitting as I write these lines.

Lanzarote.

A small island in Spain's Canary Islands.

This time, I did not want to travel.

At least... not in the way I used to travel.

I did not want to spend weeks looking for the prettiest hotel.

I did not want to read hundreds of reviews.

I did not want to plan every hour and decide where we would go today, what we would eat, where to buy tickets, and whether we needed to book in advance.

I only wanted...

to rest.

A proper holiday.

So I opened Check24 and looked for a place where the whole family had never been, with sun, sea, and pleasant weather.

I saw the Canary Islands. There was Tenerife, there was Gran Canaria, and there was Lanzarote.

I knew that many people in Germany usually choose Tenerife or Gran Canaria for their summer holidays.

So then...

we would go to Lanzarote.

What made it more interesting was that I barely researched the island at all.

I wanted everything to feel like an unopened gift.

A completely new place.

I chose just one hotel.

Right by the sea.

Child-friendly.

All-inclusive.

That was enough.

I booked about two weeks in advance.

The price had not become as high as I had imagined.

The whole trip included train tickets to the airport, flights, the transfer to the hotel, food, and eight days and seven nights of rest.

I hardly had to think about anything else.

A breakfast table with coffee, orange juice, and a view of the sea in Lanzarote. — Some mornings, the most important thing is simply to sit down and slow down a little.

The hotel was very nice.

During the day, there were also several programs just for children.

There were several swimming pools.

There was a show every evening.

There were activities the whole family could join if we wanted to.

But...

from the moment the plane began to land, I already knew I would not spend much time inside the hotel.

Through the window, the whole island appeared like another planet.

The black of volcanic rock.

The white of the houses.

The blue of the sea.

All of it made me more curious than any entertainment program.

White houses sit among black volcanic ground in Lanzarote. — The white of the houses and the black of the volcanic ground seem to walk together across the island.

On the first day, the whole family decided to walk to Papagayo beach.

Only later did I find out...

it was a nudist beach.

At first, I felt a little shy.

But after sitting there for a while, that feeling slowly disappeared.

What I saw was not people without clothes.

It was people who seemed completely unconcerned with what others thought of them.

They walked.

They lay there reading.

They swam.

They laughed.

They talked.

Everything was very ordinary.

No one looked at anyone strangely.

No one was trying to prove anything.

They simply seemed at ease with their own bodies, and with nature.

I did not go nude, because I still felt more comfortable with clothes on.

But I really liked the feeling of lying on that beach.

There was a kind of freedom that is hard to describe.

A blue and yellow wind shelter stands on a sandy beach near the sea in Lanzarote. — A sunny, windy corner of the beach on our first day in Lanzarote.

The next day, my family rented a small car.

The rental price here was much lower than I expected.

The goal was very simple.

Just drive around the island.

No plan.

No need to hurry.

Wherever we arrived, we would stop there.

The first place that impressed me was César Manrique's house.

He is the most famous architect of Lanzarote.

And almost the whole island carries his mark.

As we drove around, I noticed something very interesting.

Almost all the houses were white.

At first, I thought maybe it was only the area where we were staying.

But after driving a few dozen more kilometers...

I began to suspect that white was the "national costume" of the houses on the island.

Everywhere, there were giant cactuses.

Some were taller than a person.

There were even dragon fruit fields.

That was something I had not expected to see here at all.

Rows of dragon fruit plants grow on black volcanic soil with mountains in the distance. — I did not expect to find green rows of dragon fruit growing in the middle of volcanic soil.

Lanzarote is very windy.

So windy that people use black volcanic stones to build low walls around the crops.

As we passed those fields, I kept looking at them.

Everything seemed to be made from stone.

And yet life still grew.

Low walls made of black volcanic stones surround crops in Lanzarote. — The low stone walls give the plants a small pocket of calm inside the wind.

When we passed through Timanfaya National Park, I finally understood why people call Lanzarote a volcanic island.

Everywhere, there were streams of lava that had hardened long ago.

The ground was black.

Uneven.

Completely different from anywhere I had been before.

What surprised me most was...

people still grow grapes here.

The grapevines are very low.

I did not see any vine higher than my knee.

The whole ground is made of black volcanic rock.

And yet they still grow and become the famous vineyards of the island.

Nature really does have a way of surprising me.

In the afternoon, we stopped at Famara beach.

If Papagayo was very peaceful, Famara was the complete opposite.

The wind was strong.

The waves were big.

Everywhere, there were surfers and kitesurfers.

I think this place suits young people who enjoy more intense feelings.

As for me...

I just like standing there and watching the sea.

On the way back, we stopped in a town about fifteen kilometers from the hotel.

The reason was quite funny.

My sandal had broken.

I opened the map and searched for the familiar supermarket Mercadona, hoping to buy a new pair.

In the end...

I did not find sandals.

But I found a very beautiful town.

It was busy, lively, and reminded me of Nha Trang.

The place where our hotel was, on the other hand, was much quieter, a little like the resort areas in Cam Ranh.

That is only my own personal feeling.

But because of it, I saw that this island had more colors than I had imagined.

After a day of wandering around Lanzarote, I returned to the hotel when the sun was almost setting.

Dinner with my family.

Sitting and listening to the waves.

A shore of round stones near the sea in Lanzarote in the evening light. — An evening near the sea, with only the sound of waves and the day slowing down.

No need to think about what to do tomorrow.

No need to chase a schedule.

Maybe that was exactly what I had wanted when I decided to come here.

A holiday not for "going to as many places as possible".

But for slowing down a little.

Tomorrow...

maybe I will go back to the sea.

And who knows, this island may tell me another story.