Category Archives: Tourism

Beach Life in September

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I am constantly amazed by the hordes of people on Mallorca’s beaches. One would have thought that now, after the end of the Summer holidays, beaches might be a bit emptier. But, far from it. If you had been to the beaches of Cala Pi, Es Trenc or Cala d’Or during the first ten days of September, as I had, you would have found it difficult to put your beach towel down without any physical contact to some unbeknown person next to you.

Statistical figures for PMI airport and the month of August 2012 were at a slight plus over the previous year (3,494,008 passengers; plus 0.8 %), the highest monthly figure in Mallorca, ever. The figures for July 2012 had been 3,435,936, an increase of 1 % over the same month in 2011. Figures for the time between January 2012 and the end of August suggest that there were 16,141,592 pasajeros (remember, each person gets counted as two, one for arriving and one for departing).

People in the hotel business are complaining that, even though this year’s tourist season is seen as a good one, income and profit are not good enough to make up for a relatively dead Winter season. Some people are never quite satisfied, aren’t they?

The photo (top) was taken in Cala d’Or, Mallorca, Baleares, Spain. The date: September 6th, 2012. The time was 12:56:15. The photo (bottom) was taken near Palma, Mallorca, Baleares, Spain. The date: August 24th, 2012. The time was 18:53:08.

The Shoemakers’ Monument

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Mallorca has a long tradition of shoemaking. We would normally think of Inca as the island’s major leather and show town, but Llucmajor also had an important shoe industry, right up to the 1970s. The town commemorates the brave shoemakers and cobblers of Llucmajor with a large monument in honour of the Sabaters (shoemakers). The sculpture was crafted in Piedra de Santanyí (sandstone) by Tomás Vila in 1963.

The shoe industry in Llucmajor has since almost completely vanished. Where once the majority of working people in Llucmajor were employed by the shoe industry, now tourism is the biggest employer.

Let’s see if one day the waiters, bellhops and room maids of Llucmajor will get their own monument as well. Somehow I doubt it.

The photo was chosen from my archive. It was taken in Llucmajor, Mallorca, Baleares, Spain. The date: November 17th, 2011. The time was 12:54:34.

Cala Deià

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Cala Deià is a very picturesque, tiny pebbled beach near Deià. The beach is famous for its association with Robert Graves who came here for his daily swim during the Fifties and Sixties. The Cala was further immortalized by Anaïs Nin in an erotic short story called Mallorca. The cove is a beautiful sea inlet, surrounded by rocky cliffs, giving it a feeling of a hidden paradise; a torrent flows into the sea during the rainy season and there are some fantastic terraces. The views are truly stunning. Two bars serve refreshments and some food, including some fish which can be excellent. The water is crystal clear. The walk down the winding path to the Cala is well worth it, especially in mild weather. I went there just after Easter when the cove was absolutely deserted and peaceful; of course, then, the water was too cold for a swim. When I went there last week, the sun was too hot for a long walk and the small beach was too crowded for my liking. In the Summer, the beach is teeming with local visitors, some rich and famous, and the obligatory tourists. I may give it another try in September.

The photo (top) was taken near Deià, Mallorca, Baleares, Spain. The date: July 4th, 2012. The time was 14:40:16. The photo (bottom) was borrowed from the Internet, courtesy of platgesdebalears.com.

Muchas gracias.

Street Miming

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There are dozens of Living Sculptures in Palma’s streets and squares, ready for donations from the passers-by and in the main, from tourists. You may have seen some of these street mime artists yourself; there is a Charley Chaplin, a Flamenco dancer, a Zorro swordsman, a levitating China man, a Dracula figure and there are lots, lots more. Some of the mime artists are incredibly clever in their presentation, some are simply funny, in a good way, some are ever so intricate in their act. The best living sculpture I’ve seen in a long time is one I came across last Saturday (see photo). The act resembled a sculpture set in stone which came to life to play the stone lyre. The act included a fountain with running water and recorded lyre music activated only for the duration of the coming-to-life. Incredible. It was like a dance without any movement.

I am sorry to have to say that I was so busy snapping away that I completely forgot to offer my pennies. I’ll catch up with him sometime this week and pay my dues, promise.

The photo was taken in Palma, Mallorca, Baleares, Spain. The date: June 16th, 2012. The time was 13:27:13.

Save Our Souls

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Whenever we have friends staying with us here in Mallorca, they inevitably ask, are there any nice, uncrowded beaches, and do we perhaps know somewhere that other people don’t know about? We can help, sometimes, but there are not many beaches left or Calas (bays or coves) that would be easily accessible but free from any hoi polloi.

Most of the beaches in Mallorca are in or near built-up zones. There are hardly any beaches or bays left in a virgin state of nature any longer. Promoters and the hotel lobby have seen to that.

There are a few exceptions, and they seem to have maintained their exceptional condition thanks to some legal protection. A planning law was introduced some 20 years ago, giving special ANEI protection to certain areas of nature deemed of special interest to the Balearic society (Área natural d’especial interès). In 1991, there were 47 ANEI areas designated in Mallorca, 19 in Menorca, 10 in Ibiza and 8 in Formentera.

Cala Blanca between Port d’Andratx and Camp de Mar is one such unspoilt bay. This area was not initially part of the ANEI protected zoning scheme, but was included four years ago, much to the delight of some local conservationists who had formed Salvem Cala Blanca, a lobby group raising awareness of some areas of Mallorca that needed to be maintained free of cement and wild urbanisation.

Alas, things seem to have changed. A new conservative government is now in charge in Palma, the Island council is now also run by conservative powers and so is the local municipal council in Andratx. The Partido Popular conservatives are seen as hotel-industry friendly; never mind any legal restrictions. A planning application has been presented by a hotel chain to build a large hotel complex in the vicinity of the ANEI protected area near Cala Blanca. A protest demonstration was staged in Cala Blanca last Sunday (see photo below); protesters voiced their concern about a complete and utter hotelification of this island now that La Crisis would seem to allow for any old excuse to shift the goal posts. Never mind the environment; bankers have the say now and politicians are relegated to puppets on the string. Shame on you, Sera. (Sera is the nickname of José Ramon Bauzá, the president of the Govern de les Illes Balears).

May I remind you that Cala Blanca lies on the edge of the Sierra de Tramuntana mountain range, recently awarded Patrimonio de la Humanidad World Heritage Status by UNESCO as an area of great natural and cultural significance.

Save our souls. Will somebody please come to the rescue? We are drowning.

Both photos were borrowed from the Internet, the top one courtesy of zingarate.com, and the bottom one, courtesy of andratxnews.com.

Grazie tanto, and

muchas gracias.

The Baronia de Banyalbufar

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During the Catalan conquest of 1229 the pueblo of Banyalbufar was granted to two noblemen, Gilabert de Cruïlles and Ramon Sa Clusa. A feudal Barony was established, the Baronia de Banyalbufar. Up until the 15th century, the Lord of the manor ran a practically absolutist government, the Barony of Banyalbufar. The baron maintained the civil and criminal jurisdiction over the entire population, stretching to and, at that time, including Esporles. Nowadays, the Baronia de Banyalbufar (see photo) is offering guest accommodation in nine rooms, affording splendid sea views. Rates for half-board are priced at around 96 € per room.

The Baronial tower dates from the 17th century even though I can’t help but detect a striking resemblance to other Mallorcan torres which are said to date back to the Arab period.

The photos were taken in Banyalbufar, Mallorca, Baleares, Spain. The date: May 18th, 2012. The time was 16:45:40 and 16:47:35, respectively.

A Thousand Roads to Sóller

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I reckon that one does not really know Mallorca in all its beauty until one has been to Sóller and Port de Sóller. There are a thousand ways (well, not quite) of getting to that part of the island, a task that not all that long ago proved quite a daunting and challenging one.

Those of us who have children or even grandchildren, have probably already enjoyed the experience of boarding the Palma to Sóller train, leaving from Palma’s Plaça d’Espanya seven times every day and coming back again, five times (see photo centre). Now would seem like a good time to embark on this journey, as the Tren de Sóller has just completed its first centennial. This trip on the old train and its wooden carriages is like a magic journey to the past. There are no longer any excuses for not boarding the train, even though charges have recently gone up, again, to 19.50 €  for adults (14 € for Balearic residents) for the round trip. Up to 1,000,000 tourists take the one hour train ride to Sóller every year, but that should not deter you from enjoying the landscape on the way, especially now when most of the tourists have not arrived on the island yet for this year’s holiday and when temperatures are not hot and scorching.

Of course, you could always take the car to Sóller via the tunnel. The Sóllerics more than welcomed the new Sóller tunnel when it was inaugurated fifteen years ago. This new connection cut their travelling time to Palma down from some 60 minutes to less than twenty; not a mean feat when you are going about your daily business instead of, like most of us, going about our leisurely ways. These days, taking the car to Sóller through the tunnel, which starts not far from the splendid Alfàbia gardens, would cost you a fare of 4.80 € (one way). The Sóllerics are not so enthusiastic at the moment at all as they were promised to have their fares subsidised by the Consell de Mallorca, with tolls being paid in full upfront and subsidies being reimbursed at a later stage. However, these subsidies have not been paid for the last 15 months or so. Thus, the tunnel was recently blocked for hours on end in protest against the high charges and broken promises. Be warned that the Sóller tunnel has one of the worst test results on safety standards, according to the British AA, with 39 points out of 100, even though no accidents have ever occurred.

If you want to see Mallorca and one of its most beautiful landscapes, I would like to suggest that you take the road from Palma to Sóller by car, and up into the mountains along that almost alpine road full of serpentine bends at a length of some 14 km. When I went with some friends up to the Coll de Sóller and down again last week (see photo top), there were plenty of cyclists tackling the challenge. Of course, they wouldn’t be allowed through the tunnel, and the mountain climb is a welcome physical endurance test for them as it is.

You could also get to Sóller from Port de Sóller by tram. Fares have gone up to the ridiculous amount of 5 € (one way) for the ten minute ride, but still worthwhile at least once in a blue moon (see photo bottom).

And you might want to sail from Palma to Port de Sóller, a bit like Junípero Serra in 1749 when he set off from Port de Sóller to Mexico to set up numerous monasteries in Baja California as well as in what is now California, USA.

The photos were taken in Sóller, Mallorca, Baleares, Spain. The date: May 14th, 2012. The time was 14:15:14, 17:08:36 and 18:29:37, respectively.

The Platja d’es Caragol

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With the Summer-like temperatures of the last few days it seems as though the beach season has almost started in earnest even though the water temperatures are still quite icy. Still, it might be time for sharing a secret, mightn’t it?

I don’t like going to the beaches in the Summer. They are too crowded, too noisy, too perfectly equipped, for my liking, and, in general, less attractive to me the more popular they are to others. Whilst I agree that you won’t find a nicer beach on the island than Platja d’es Trenc, one must admit that in June, July, August and September, all the plastic sunbeds, the melon vendors, the yachts anchoring off-shore, the thousands of people and their hectic beach-life activities just put one off. I either go there early in the morning before the masses get out of bed, or late in the afternoon when the hordes pack up and return for their half-board supper in their hotels. Or else, I go to a beach where there is none of the above and enjoy the peace and quiet and primarily, the unspoilt landscape and virgin nature. You can still find virgin beaches here on the island. I’ve been to three of them in the last fortnight and there were but a handful of visitors on either of them. Even in the Summer, you won’t find more than three dozen people there on a stretch of 500 metres. I can live with that.

If you are curious about such beach treasures, try Es Canons, near Colònia de Sant Pere, or the Platja d’es Caragol (see photo), near the Cap Ses Salines lighthouse, or the Platja d’es Pregons Petits, not far from Colònia de Sant Jordi. You will have to walk for twenty minutes in each case, which is good for your exercise and it also keeps the hordes away, and you will have to bring your own refreshments but you will be rewarded with a vista and a feeling of Mallorca as it would have been found fifty years ago, unspoilt and full of character.

I have mentioned an excellent website for beaches before and I don’t mind repeating myself. They give accurate descriptions of 208 Mallorcan beaches, in Catalan, Castellano, French, English, German and Italian, complete with photos and detailed descriptions as to how to get to each one of them.

The photo was taken near Ses Salines, Mallorca, Baleares, Spain. The date: May 9th, 2012. The time was 17:14:55.

The Goose and the Golden Egg

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Last Sunday, April 29th, between 5,000 and 10,000 protesters congregated on the beach of Es Trenc in opposition to a change in the planning law that now would allow the construction of a new hotel complex with 1,200 beds right on the boundaries of the protected Nature Reserve of Es Trenc-Salobrar de Campos. The change had come into law only two weeks earlier, on April 12th, when before that date no such construction would have been allowed anywhere near Mallorca’s coastline. The change of heart was legally made possible by the conservative PP party now having a majority mandate in the Consell de Mallorca, in the Balearic government as well as in the central government in Madrid.

We are reminded a bit of Aesop’s fable of the Goose that laid the golden eggs where we got wise to the fact that greed, foolishness and avarice may well kill off the source of one’s good fortune.

The battle for Es Trenc began in 1978 when a similar citizen protest had sparked off a motion which ultimately, in 1984, lead to the current protection of this virgin dune landscape as an Àrea Natural d’Especial Interès.

In 1977, similar citizens’ action was needed to help declare the island of Sa Dragonera a protected Nature Reserve. There, some investors had proposed to build a massive hotel, a casino and a yacht club. The protesters took the battle to court and succeeded in having the developers’ plans declared illegal. Dragonera island was subsequently bought by the Consell de Mallorca in 1988, and later, in 1994, declared Parque Natural de Dragonera.

Perhaps the matter of Es Trenc will also have to go to court. Whether justice is actually blind in Spain will have to be seen to be believed. Some people doubt it, not least after the recent Baltasar Garzón debacle.

Both photos were borrowed from the Internet, the top one courtesy of diariodemallorca.es, GOB and the photographer, B. Perelló. The photo (bottom) was borrowed courtesy of estelnegre.balearweb.net, showing a historic protest gathering in Palma’s Plaça d’Espanya in 1979.

Muchas gracias, and

moltes gràcies.

The Centenary Railway to Sóller

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April 16th, 1912 was the date of the first ever train journey between Palma and Sóller. Today marks the one hundredth anniversary of that inaugural trip (see photo bottom).

When the railway line was built, the always clever Mallorcans were listo (smart) enough to resort to a trick. The length of the line from Palma to Sóller was only 27.3 kilometers but should have been a minimum of 30 km to qualify for some state subsidies. Hence, the construction of an additional 4.9 kilometer track was begun at the same time, linking Sóller to Port de Sóller.

A trip on the old carriages through beautiful Mallorcan landscape including 13 tunnels is recommended, even if a bit pricey. You could consider a one-way trip to Sóller on the Centenary train and come back on the bus.

A commemorative act will be celebrated tonight at 19h00 in Sóller’s Estació de tren.

The photo (top) was chosen from my archive. It was taken in Palma, Mallorca, Baleares, Spain. The date: April 11th, 2008. The time was 16:59:43. The photo (bottom) was borrowed from the Internet, courtesy of canprunera.com.

Moltes gràcies.