Playa Los Patos
Los Patos, also known as playa de Martínez Alonso, is a 900-metre strip of black sand at the foot of a protected cliff, between El Bollullo and El Ancón. Nothing breaks the swell here: the tides shift the sand and build a bank that breaks hard. You walk down from the end of the TF-176, there are no services and no lifeguards, and the town hall has closed the access for repair works.
Los Patos runs about 900 metres long and 45 wide, lying between El Bollullo and El Ancón at the foot of a protected cliff with farm plots hanging above it. The sand is volcanic, almost jet black, and the water comes in clean. There is no breakwater and no building of any kind: the tides drag the sand from one end to the other and raise a sandbank that breaks hard, which is why bodyboarders and surfers know the spot. The swell runs from moderate to strong, much of the beach works as a nudist area, and at high tide the strip along the water narrows.
Getting down is the serious part. The road to aim for is the TF-176. There is no parking at the beach, so cars stop where the asphalt ends, next to the stop for bus line 376, and from there a path drops down the cliff in about twenty minutes. Below you will find no services and no lifeguards, so any problem has to be solved by climbing back up. La Orotava town hall has closed the access to the public for conditioning works and the paths are being rebuilt, so check the official notice and the signs on site before you set off.
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