El Cotillo is the beach that runs south from the village of the same name, under low cliffs on the west coast of Fuerteventura. Sand, lefts and rights, any tide, on a westerly swell, and a beach that turns its back to the north wind blowing across the rest of the island's north.
January is its month: sixteen clean days out of thirty, five blown out, nine too small, which is four good days in a week. Summer does not blow it out, it shrinks it: in July and August most days are too small for anyone but a beginner, and beginners are who you find in the water.
The bottom hides nothing, and the beach is long enough for a school to spread out. A big winter swell puts real size on it, and those are the days to watch from the cliff. For a first week, or a second, this is the beach.
Spot sheet
- Level
- Beginner, Intermediate
- Wave
- Left and right
- Bottom
- Sand
- Water
- 18 – 23 °C
- Wetsuit
- 4/3 mm → Shorty
- Swell window
- WSW – WNW
- Ideal wind
- E
- How often it works
- Consistent
- Danger
- ●○○○○
Swell window, tide, level and hazards: surf-forecast and Surf Atlas.
Conditions by month
| January | February | March | April | May | June | July | August | September | October | November | December | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| El Cotillo | January : Very good | February : Very good | March : Very good | April : Very good | May : Good | June : Very good | July : Good | August : Good | September : Very good | October : Very good | November : Very good | December : Very good |
- Good
- Very good
- Excellent
A month in figures
In January, the month the forecast guides single out for this coast:
Shares of the month, from the published forecast statistics. The model reads a grid, so neighbouring breaks share a figure: this describes a stretch of coast, not this wave on its own. The other eleven months are not published.
Other spots in Fuerteventura
See all spotsWhen this stops being enough, the step up is El Hierro, in the same village.