C   a   n   a   r   y   F   o   r   u   m

Gran Canaria Beaches

Playa Montaña la Arena

My favourite beach; thanks to the not-so-easy access the beach itself is very laid back, the dark sand is soft and plentiful and the water crystal clear. It's also a dog-friendly beach as long as your dog is well-behaved and social of course, like everyone else who goes down there ;)

arena1

 

To clarify dogs are officially not allowed on this beach but as you'll see from my photos there's always a few well-bahved ones down there. Pretty much anything goes as long as you're not disturbing anyone. At one end there's usually a football game going on, often there's a few campers there for the week-end with their tents and BBQ, groups of 20 somethings, 30 somethings, 40... 50 .... the beach has a very mixed crowd. It's not a requirement but this is also a nudist beach. The path down is a bit tricky so that and the nudists often deters families with kids.

The beach as you can see is darker volcanis sand but very sandy and no pebbles. The water is often calm and suprisingly clean. Everyone respects the beach and even the campers take all their rubbiush away with them.

arena2

During the week for most of the year you'll find a couple of dozen people on the beach but at week-ends it fills up. During July and especially August the beach is busy every day.

The beach is part of the Bahia Santa Agueda which is on the old GC500 road that goes from Maspalomas to Arguineguin. Look for the Montaña La Arena sign on your right but DON'T take that exit, you want to go left so continue along to the next layby, pull off the main road so you can turn round and come back the way you came for about 50 meters taking the first exit. You'll no doubt see plenty of cars parked down there. Don't do a u-turn in the middle of the road, the turn-off is too tricky unless you come at it from the opposite direction. Park where everyone else did then head to the shoreline and you'll see a path that takes you up to the cliff-top (it's not so high).

arena3

There are no facilities either down on the beach or anywhere near so take everything you need with you. Take a parasol as there's no shade down there either. Sorry the photos have dogs in them but a) you're not supposed to take photos down there because of the nudism but snapping your dogs is OK and b) I love dogs

Recap - No to everything (no facilities, shops, loos....) other than it's a nudist beach.