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It’s 1988 and a small container has been placed at Flag Beach filled with Alpha boards
and Neil Pryde sails. We just need to find some customers. The beach is deserted, there
are no sun loungers, no bar; just miles of white sand, clear blue water and a steady
breeze. Silence. The odd roaming goat munching thorny bushes and lost nudist Germans
lapping up the sunshine. The odd Suzuki Jeep with billowing tarp and loaded with kit
cruises right up to the water’s edge for a wind check and chat.
Downtown Corralejo is a quiet, sleepy place filled with locals and fishing boats pulled up
on the beach, just a smattering of German tourists (again!) and some windsurfers
searching for wind. Most streets are dust tracks, there’re only two food shops: a pizza
place and a couple of local restaurants, a couple of night time watering holes and a
dodgy disco called Freddies. 7There is just the old Hotel Corralejo on the sea front and
some newly built apartments for rent by the name of Hoplaco. Out of town and past Flag
Beach there are two large modern hotels.
No Work Team have opened a surf shop on the main square and filled it with windsurfing
paraphernalia, including clothes and a big sofa for hanging out. The Sol y Mar hostel
houses most of the hardcore riders seeing winter out while chilling and training; Farrel
O’Shea, Gary Gibson, Alex Williams and Julian Kendal who founded the Sotavento
competition in 1986. It’s all very different to 2018.
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