Gran Canaria: Gay sunshine mecca in The Canary Islands of Spain

I go every year to Gran Canaria in March (this year in May was my 7th trip). So when asked to give some advice about flights or accommodations there I wrote the following:

The pics show me naked out in the Maspalomas Dunes, which can be reached on foot from the Playa del Ingles beach or by walking back from the shoreline toward central Playa del Ingles (town).  The major gay nightlife is usually found in and around the Yumbo Center, a large 4-story shopping complex, with numerous restaurants, souvenirs shops, fashion stores, etc. It becomes the local gay mecca sometimes after 11pm each night and is active until 3-4am. There are also sex clubs located within the Yumbo, mostly on the ground floor level, mixed in with the gay bars, several which have drag shows and strip shows.  
You can sometimes find good bargains for flights and hotels to Gran Canaria on the major travel booking sites, but not always the most popular ones, like Orbitz, Yahoo Travel, or Expedia. 



Instead take at look at:
http://www.alpharooms.com
http://www.booking.com

 

Alpharooms also has flights with hotel stay plans that can be quite cheap, although I have found it usually cheaper to book them separately. But it is worth checking out if you are coming from a major European city. 

Koka: The place that has been fairly nice (a small studio apt with kitchen and balcony or direct access to the pool), it's cheap (in March usually $30-$40 a night) and also not too far from the beach or to the Yumbo (gay nightlife) is:

Apartamentos Koka,
Avenida de Tenerife, 17 35100 Playa del Inglés, Gran Canaria, Las Palmas, Palmas, Spain Tel 928 76 16 17

(I just checked these sites for possible booking for next March, the Koka is already fully booked. So you may find the same is true for your stay). 

However, there are dozens of similar apartamentos hotels, like the Koka, some with room and board plans. In fact, some may be closer to where you want to be. I suggest staying with walking distance of the Yumbo Center since you'll inevitably end of there late at night (there are taxis, of course) to more outlying areas (which are nicer and more expensive). 

It all depends on what you want or need out your vacation. 
I prefer to stay cheaply since I am usually not in the room at all except to sleep and sometimes cook my own meals. There are plenty of restaurants, of course. But the typical place in Gran Canaria has only the basic food (rather unhealthy too). So I prefer to save my money for splurging on gourmet meals in other larger cities in Spain and elsewhere in Europe. 

Note too that there is a city bus from the airport (LPA) that runs through Playa del Ingles and onward to the Lighthouse tower near the beach in the actual town of Maspalomas. 
In the two cities blend together and even the locals confuse the two locales. It's better to know the street names and have a map or the address of the hotel before you arrive. 
I got off at the wrong place once and had a long walk with a suitcase before I found it (or a taxi). 

P.S. There are a few exclusively gay hotels, but I prefer the 'straight' ones -- just because the services are the same but the clientele is not. Gay men can be snobby and even act condescending (especially some gay couples on vacation). At least the straight people will either be friendly or just plain ignore you. Besides, you have to pay premium prices for gay hotel (clothing optional or not). You're just as well off to be naked on the beach and in the dunes all day and then stay clothed at your place of accommodation. 

The Basement Studios is a gay hotel, but they also allow day and evening guest from outside, especially for their Wed night sex party. The Cellar (gay nude bar) is open nightly from 10:30 ish until late.

Maspalomas (Lighthouse Beach), Gran Canaria, Spain

 

The article below is a retrospective on Maspalomas, the sand dunes beach, located on the southern tip of Gran Canaria, one of the Spain's Canary Islands off the coast of Morocco.

Beside being probably one of the world's largest clothing-optional beaches (especially if you include the large sand dunes area behind it), it is also a naturally scenic desert-type chain of volcanic islands (none are active now).  It's has an arid climate with little rainfall. The sand accumulates over the centuries from what is blown to the islands from Morroco's eastern shores of the Sahara.   Some of the sand dudes are in huge drifts upwards of 30-50 meters high.

  I (Kelly) have traveled there for each March for the past five years. There are great opportunities for some casual CMNM situations, and there is hardly any place like it as far as wild outdoor and even public sex (mostly between men), but also a lot of hetero couple and partner-swapping fantasies are being lived out for real.

I also share David's (atitlan) enthusiastic memories of the Island of Gran Canaria described below. However, mine are much more recent because I have visited it every March since 2005 (except for last year).

So it was refreshing to return to the the island and its dunes this March to find it basically unchanged and just as cruisy. I also saw many cases of exactly what he describes below. There are straight (seemingly... at least) guys who go out singly or in pairs or more into the dunes away from the crowds of either clothed or nude sunbathers along the beach to take a few private naked photos. It was interesting to watch them do so - although I hesitated to take any photos of two straights taking candid nude pics of each other. Besides, there were plenty of other 'distracting' activities going on in the dunes and among the bushy stands of tree found in the low areas between them.

Atitlan's post:
These are almost certainly the dunes between the resorts of Maspalomas and Playa del Ingles on the south coast of Gran Canaria in the Spanish Canary Islands off the African coast.
We have posted many Maspalomas images here previously, nowadays a big gay destination with a vibrant
nightlife and a crowded male-only nudist section on the beach.
When I visited first aged 24, the resort area was about a tenth of the size it is now and not gay at all. The 3-mile beach other than around the hotels of Playa and the lighthouse at Maspalomas was virtually deserted.

However the dunes proved to be something of a magnet for certain young men from the city of Las Palmas to the north. Not many of them, maybe half a dozen at any one time across the huge expanse of dunes, unlike the hundred and more tourists to be found among the bushes
these days. Back then I was the only tourist in the dunes. The men I would see tended to look and act like the guy in the attached photo, average age 21, dressed in shorts, speedos or nothing at all and with obvious intentions. I don't know how the image here came to be taken but
it certainly brings back happy memories!

atitlan

--------This post and the above photo were forwarded in a group email message
from atitlan (david) on his [ymna] Google group [ymna2] Yahoo group. ----------

You can receive his messages if you are subscribed to the Google Groups "ymna" group.
For more info and options, visit the group at http://groups.google.com/group/ymna?hl=en-GB.

Atitlan wrote:
        On my first visit to Maspalomas in the Canary Islands,off the African coast, this part of the beach was practically deserted. There was one hotel by the lighthouse but almost nothing else. Further along, past what is now the gay beach and around the corner towards Playa de Ingles, I could put my clothes in my backpack and walk naked for ages without seeing a single soul, as people hid in craters with stone walls to protect themselves from the wind.

      Now the whole 3 miles(?) of beach from the lighthouse to Playa del Ingles is crowded. What it does mean is that there are many hundreds of naked men to be seen on the beach and in the dunes. And there's a busy nightlife too in this all-year-round resort area. After Playa started to become a gay destination in the mid 80s, several clothing-optional gay hotels opened up. Few now offer this facility, the result I imagine of overlooking buildings that went up in the property boom. Here's one I've found that still is clothing optional:

http://www.villasblancas.com/
There may be others. Info from readers and other members or visitors will be most welcome.
atitlan

This retrospective on Maspalomas (and Playa del Ingles), along with a current photograph, was forwarded in a group message ---------- From: atitlan in his own [ymna2] Yahoo group.