Arrecife

The 07:30 ferry from Gran Canaria noses into Arrecife's harbour and the first people off are not tourists but electricians, delivery drivers and civil servants clutching takeaway coffees. They stride past the cruise-ship gangway, turn left at the green-domed church and disappear into the low white blocks that keep the island's government ticking. In that moment you realise Arrecife refuses to dress up as anything other than what it is: a port city whose 65,000 residents earn their living within earshot of surf.

Low-rise capital, Atlantic doorstep

Ten metres above sea level is generous; parts of the centre sit barely three metres higher than the spring tide. The benefit for visitors is that nothing is uphill. You can walk from the airport bus stop to the lagoon, past the 18th-century fortress and onto the city beach in twenty flat minutes – a blessing if you've spent the previous day puffing around Timanfaya's lava fields.

Begin at Charco de San Ginés, the seawater lagoon that nineteenth-century fishermen used as a natural marina. The boats are gone but the whitewashed cottages remain, their ground-floor garages now bars serving grilled wreckfish and 1.80€ cañas of Dorada. Cross any of the six little bridges at random; you'll emerge onto a different plaza where elderly men play dominoes under Indian-bean trees and the cathedral bell marks quarter hours with a tone so soft it could be a mistake.

Carry on east until the pavement ends at a causeway of black volcanic blocks: the Puente de las Bolas, built 1772. Cross it – mind the gap where the Atlantic sloshes through – and you reach Castillo de San Gabriel, a squat star fort that once stored gunpowder against pirates. Today its rooms hold muskets, maps and a single-sheet English leaflet that explains why the cannons face Morocco rather than Madrid. Climb the battlements and the city arranges itself neatly: cruise terminal to the left, fish market straight ahead, Reducto beach curling away to the right like a comma.

Salt on the paperwork

Back on the mainland the promenade unfurls for three kilometres, wide enough for prams, wheelchairs and the evening parade of joggers. Morning is best if you want silence; by 17:00 the sea wall becomes a moving catwalk of grandparents, toddlers and office workers still wearing lanyards. The surface is so even that a woman in high heels power-walked past me last Tuesday, phone on speaker, negotiating container shipments without breaking stride.

Halfway along you hit Playa del Reducto, the capital's city beach. It is neither huge nor dramatic – 400 m of pale sand, a single row of palm trees, lifeguards who whistle at the first hint of rip. What makes it useful is location: ten minutes from the post office, five from the bus station, thirty seconds from a Mercadona that stocks Cathedral City cheddar when the supply boat arrives. On weekdays you'll share the water with local kids still in school uniform; at weekends German sunbathers lay towels like colour-coded data points and Spanish families occupy the shade until the beer runs out.

If you prefer your coastline jagged, keep walking north to Playa de la Madera where lava tongues create rock pools warm as bath water. The swell crashes in, retreats with a rattle of pebbles, and the whole scene smells of iodine and diesel – an honest Atlantic perfume no candle company would dare bottle.

Lunch where the receipts say "Arrecife"

Follow any side street that smells of garlic and you'll find a bar serving what the port eats. At Tasca la Raspa they bring cherne (wreckfish) simply grilled, skin crisp, flesh that flakes into chunks the size of marshmallows. A plate for two costs €18 and arrives with a warning: bones. Lapas – limpets – arrive sizzling on their own volcanic plate, butter and parsley pooling in the shell. Eat them with a safety pin if you've forgotten a toothpick; the regulars do.

Wine lists are short and local. Order a glass of malvasía seca and the barman will ask which bodega; reply "whichever's open" and you'll get a look halfway between approval and pity. If you're self-catering, the covered market on Calle León y Castillo sells parrotfish heads for soup and tiny pink prawns that still jump. Close your eyes when they tip them into the bag; empathy is easier once they're cooked.

When the working day ends

By 20:00 the temperature drops to something bearable and the city remembers it is also allowed to play. Office workers change into flip-flops and reclaim the lagoon; violinists sometimes set up outside the ice-cream parlour, case open for coins, repertoire veering from Vivaldi to Verónica Castro. The bars stay low-key – no karaoke, no foam parties, no fishbowl cocktails. Instead you get craft gin from a former stable, or Estrella on draft served in a glass frozen so solid the first sip sticks to your lip.

Couples who've come for winter sun sit happily among civil servants arguing about football salaries. Everyone is gone by midnight; Arrecife needs its sleep because the first fishing boats leave at 05:00.

If you only have a morning

Buy a Bono bus card at the station (€1.20 a ride instead of €1.80) then:

• Walk the Charco circuit before the tour groups arrive – twenty minutes is enough for photos and coffee.
• Cross the Puente de las Bolas; the castle opens at 10:00, free, English leaflet on request.
• Swim at Reducto or stroll the promenade as far as the big hotels; taxis back to the bus station are plentiful and cheap.

Total distance: 2 km. Flip-flops acceptable.

What the guidebooks don't say

Sunday shuts the city tighter than a cruise-ship safe. Only the Deiland shopping mall on the outskirts bothers to lift its shutters, and reaching it involves a bus ride through industrial estates that smell of warm tarmac. Plan a beach day or hire a car and head north; Arrecife itself needs a weekday to breathe properly.

Wind matters. When the levante blows, sand blasts across the promenade and the red flag stays up even though the sea looks calm. Check the harbour office noticeboard before booking a snorkel trip; a cancelled sail is disappointing, but seasickness on a catamaran full of hung-over twenty-somethings is worse.

Finally, don't expect postcard perfection. The architecture is functional, paint peels, and the odd plastic bag floats in the lagoon. Yet that is precisely why the city feels alive: it has not been varnished for inspection. Arrecife offers instead the small pleasure of watching a place work, fish, argue and flirt within sight of the Atlantic – and then letting you join the queue for an ice-cream like anyone else who clocks off when the sun goes down.