Whale watching tours in Lanzarote

Lanzarote whale watching: crossing the Bocaina strait toward Isla de Lobos

Lanzarote whale watching centers on one specific piece of water: La Bocaina, the roughly 7-mile channel that separates this island from Fuerteventura, with the low, uninhabited shape of Isla de Lobos sitting at its southern edge, just off Fuerteventura. Picture a speedboat lifting onto the plane as it clears the harbor wall when three or four bottlenose dolphins peel in from open water to ride the bow wave, keeping pace before breaking off toward Lobos. Most Lanzarote trips are sold that way, as a route to somewhere (a nature reserve, a sunset, a snorkel stop), with dolphins met along the way.

Below are the two harbor towns boats sail from, how the Bocaina crossing compares with a dedicated whale-watching cruise, the volcanic coastline you pass on the way out, and what a speedboat, a sailing cruise or a half-day Lobos Island trip costs. For the wider archipelago picture, see the Canary Islands whale watching hub; if your trip also touches Tenerife, that island's cetacean waters work differently, as covered in our Tenerife whale watching guide.

Best time for whale watching in Lanzarote

The Bocaina crossing runs on the same steady pattern as the rest of the archipelago, so the month you pick changes little. What changes through the year is the wind. The channel toward Fuerteventura is more open than a sheltered bay, and an afternoon breeze off the Atlantic builds a chop across it on more days than not, especially in spring and summer. Boats that leave Puerto del Carmen or Marina Rubicon before mid-morning tend to get a flatter run out to Lobos and back.

Summer and the school-holiday stretches around Christmas and Easter bring the closest thing to a busy season, driven by visitor numbers rather than any change in dolphin activity. Late spring is when a fin whale is most likely to pass through the strait, though one turns up too rarely to build a trip around. If you are weighing Lanzarote against a more seasonal destination, our best time to go whale watching guide lines up every region side by side.

What whales you'll see in Lanzarote

Four cetaceans turn up on a typical Bocaina crossing, though only one of them is common enough to expect on most sailings.

Bottlenose dolphin

The animal behind most of Lanzarote's sighting numbers, working the strait in small, loose groups rather than one fixed colony tied to a single bay. NOAA Fisheries notes that bottlenose dolphins hunt cooperatively, using echolocation clicks to locate fish and sometimes herding a school into open water where several animals feed at once, a strategy well suited to a channel like the Bocaina. They are also the species most likely to ride the pressure wave off the bow before peeling off toward Lobos.

Atlantic spotted dolphin

Less predictable than the bottlenose but a highlight whenever a pod turns up, usually from late spring into early autumn when this warmer-water species ranges closer to the islands. Calves are born plain gray and only gain their namesake spotting with age, so one pod can show every stage at once, clean-sided youngsters mixed in with heavily mottled adults, all leaping together off the bow.

Short-finned pilot whale

An occasional visitor to the Bocaina, which sets Lanzarote apart from Tenerife, where a catalogued pod stays inside its strait year-round. Pilot whales are among the deepest-diving dolphins on record, some tracked well past 1,000 feet chasing squid, so an encounter here usually means a small group resting near the surface, dark backs and a low, curved fin rolling slowly through the water.

Fin whale

The rarest sighting on this page and by far the largest, passing through on a wider spring migration without stopping to feed near the island. At up to 85 feet and built for speed, fin whales can sprint faster than most other great whales, so a sighting is usually a tall blow on the horizon and a long, dark back rolling under before the animal moves on.

Where to go: Lanzarote whale watching departure points

Two harbor towns on Lanzarote's south and southeast coast handle nearly all of the island's whale watching departures, both within a short run of the Bocaina crossing.

Puerto del Carmen

• Best for: Isla de Lobos trips
• From $41
• Main resort harbor, southeast coast

Lanzarote's largest resort town has its own working harbor, and it is the departure point for the island's longest whale-watching-adjacent outing: the half-day run south across the Bocaina to Isla de Lobos, a protected nature reserve with a single beach and no permanent population. Speedboats also leave from here for shorter crossings that skip the stop ashore for a quicker, cheaper trip. Puerto del Carmen sits closer to the airport and to most of Lanzarote's hotels than Playa Blanca does, the easier base if you are not staying in the far south.

Marina Rubicon, Playa Blanca

• Best for: Sunset sailings, small groups
• From $60
• Southernmost harbor, closest to Fuerteventura

Playa Blanca's marina looks straight across open water at Fuerteventura and Lobos, and it has the shortest crossing on the island, part of why sunset sailing cruises are based here: a boat can reach the channel, find dolphins and still be back at the dock as the light turns gold over the volcanic cliffs behind the marina. Rubicon is smaller and quieter than Puerto del Carmen's harbor, with a handful of independent operators, so trips from here tend to run in smaller boats carrying fewer passengers.

Tenerife's whales live in one strait and stay there. Lanzarote's cross a channel to somewhere else, and a Bocaina trip takes you along for that ride.

What a Lanzarote whale watching tour is like

A Lanzarote trip is closer to a boat day with a wildlife stop built in than to a dedicated whale-watching cruise. Whichever harbor you leave from, the crew heads out into the Bocaina with someone watching the water, and most cut the engine once dolphins are found so the animals set the pace. The scenery is volcanic the entire way out: the cliffs above Playa Blanca and along the Papagayo coast were shaped by the same 1730s eruptions that built Timanfaya further north, so the coastline framing the crossing to Lobos is lava rock from the harbor wall to the open channel. Your choice of boat shapes the day more than your choice of harbor.

Outside the private option, Lanzarote's crossings run about $41 to $87, a tighter band than Tenerife's, mostly because the island's fleet is smaller. The one private booking on this page climbs to about $872 for four hours on a boat to yourselves, priced for exclusivity rather than for better odds of finding dolphins.

How to choose the right Lanzarote whale watching tour

With the odds holding steady across the calendar, what is left to decide on Lanzarote is the harbor, the boat and how much of the day you want to spend on the water.

• Start from the harbor nearest your hotel.Puerto del Carmen and the main hotel strip favor the speedboat and Isla de Lobos departures; Playa Blanca and the far south favor Marina Rubicon's sunset sailings. Both reach the same channel.
• Decide whether you want to set foot on Lobos.Only the half-day trip out of Puerto del Carmen goes ashore on the island itself. The shorter speedboat and sailing options stay on the boat the entire time.
• Sail in the morning for a calmer crossing.The Bocaina picks up wind through the day, so an early departure from either harbor usually means a flatter, more comfortable run out and back.
• Book ahead during busy resort weeks.Lanzarote's fleet is smaller than Tenerife's, so sailings around Christmas, Easter and midsummer fill up fast relative to the number of boats. Most listings cancel without penalty, so reserving early costs nothing.
• Weigh review history, not just the price.A few Lanzarote tours are new enough to carry little or no review record yet. A similarly priced option with dozens of reviews and a strong rating is the safer bet.

Tips for whale watching in Lanzarote