Betancuria

Jean de Béthencourt founded Betancuria in 1404, and the choice of site was pure defence. Corsairs raided the Canarian coasts for centuries, so the Normans put their capital in a valley several kilometres inland, screened by mountains and invisible from the sea. It worked for a while, and then it did not: raiders reached the town in 1593 and destroyed the church. Betancuria remained the island's capital until 1834, when the seat moved to Antigua and the village quietly emptied.

What survived is a small, extremely well-kept place of whitewashed walls, dark stone and palm trees, protected as a heritage site since 1979. Fewer than a thousand people live in the whole municipality, the smallest population in the Canaries, so most of the daytime crowd is visitors. Betancuria turns up regularly on lists of Spain's prettiest villages, and unlike many places carrying that label it earns it without effort — there is no manufactured old town here, just what was left standing.

The Iglesia de Santa María de la Concepción is the anchor. First built around 1410, sacked in the 1593 raid and rebuilt in the following century, it carries Gothic bones under baroque and Renaissance additions, and its painted wooden ceiling and carved choir are the finest church interior on the island. Next door, the Museum of Sacred Art holds the silverware and statuary that go with it. Both are small: half an hour each is plenty.

A few streets away, the Museo Arqueológico de Fuerteventura covers the Mahos, the island's pre-Hispanic inhabitants, through tools, pottery and burial finds. Entry is only a couple of euros and it usually opens Tuesday to Saturday during the day. On the northern edge of the village stand the roofless ruins of the San Buenaventura convent, free to wander at any hour. Add lunch on the main street and you have a comfortable half day.