Plane Spotting In Lanzarote

Our visitors often enjoy watching the planes come in to land and take off at Arrecife airport in Lanzarote, I walked along the promenade between Matagorda and Playa Honda this week for a touch of plane spotting.

There aren’t many places in the world where you can get as close to a busy, live runway.

It was a Thursday morning so the start of one of the busiest days for the ACE airport. All along this end of the promenade people stopped walking and cycling to watch the planes as they were coming and going.

The best spot is right at the end of the runway, the airplanes actually come in right over your head if you’re brave enough to stand in line with the runway. Take off is exhilarating too, bystanders get blasted with a hot sandy wind as the engines power up for take off, I would stand on the corner or part way down the long stretch of runway for this as you can see the plane leave the ground and rise above the hills of Güime.

Occasionally you can spot little water devils on the surface of the sea after the plane has passed over land, they’re off shore and look like little tornados / waterspouts. If you’re not staying in Puerto del Carmen but want to watch the planes drive towards this resort and take the first exit for Matagorda, go straight on at the roundabout, further along on your left there is a well work dirt track which leads to the airport perimeter fence, you can park here to watch the planes landing. Or continue along that road and park in the car park next to the promenade, it’s only a few minutes walk to the runway.

The busiest days at the airport are currently Saturday and Thursday.

I really enjoyed plane spotting and people watching along here for an hour, as you can see from the photos it was a glorious day to be in Lanzarote in mid December!

You can see Live Airport Arrivals Information for Lanzarote.

And you watch a landing from the cockpit here: Tricky landing at Lanzarote.

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