Mallorca

We needed a few day get-away and Mallorca was the answer! Julie had just returned from a couple of days in Barcelona where she saw Sharon off to the airport. Unfortunately, Sharon was returning to Rochester and wouldn’t be sharing our remaining adventures. We had a week to kill before moving on to Munich and our Globus tour of Eastern Europe and we were wondering what we were going to do. We’d seen so much of the Valencia area during the month and so we were looking for something different to do.

At some point, Mallorca came up; heck, it’s just across the water, so we decided to give it a shot. We always thought of Mallorca as a small island, but it’s really not. It’s actually a pretty good size, over 1400 square miles. We flew from Valencia to Palma, Mallorca – the flight took less than an hour.

Mallorca is warm and sunny in May. We decided to stay in the old city, away from the beaches. That was a great decision since we really enjoyed exploring the city and the architecture. We got in late Saturday afternoon and started exploring – Palma is a wonderful city for walking. We walked through the shopping area and down to the marina. There was a small sidewalk market to explore and then, before you knew it, I was ready for dinner. Nearby is Caballito De Mar, a fantastic restaurant with a great seafood menu. Julie had “Suquet”, a stew with monkfish and shrimps with Mallorcan potato and seaweed in tempura while I had baked codfish with a spicy honey sauce. (Whoa – I’m sounding like a food critic – gotta stop that….)

One interesting thing we ran into on Saturday night was a large crowd filling the town square. There was a huge TV set up at one end showing a soccer match. People were cheering, waving banners, chanting and dancing. It was exciting. We hung out there for a while soaking in the energy and excitement but then had to head off to dinner.

Sunday we planned a trip to Sóller. That was a good idea because the majority of the town shuts down on Sunday except for some of the more hardcore tourist shops. We caught the historic Ferrocarril de Sóller (rough translation – the train to Sóller). This is an old wooden train that runs between Palma and Sóller. Once we were outside of Palma the countryside and mountains were beautiful. There were over a dozen tunnels, one nearly 3km long, and plenty of tight turns. However, the trip was a great deal of fun and arriving in the Sóller train station was like walking into a different time.

The train station sits, literally, at the edge of the town. The tracks end there and you can either walk down the cobbled streets or take an equally interesting tram to the Port of Sóller. We walked through the town exploring and stopped for coffee at a small café in the town square. Then we took the tram to the port. The port is picturesque with a good sized marina and modest beach. The hills rising around the port give it a classic Mediterranean appeal.

We were feeling adventurous and walked up the hill heading out of town to a traffic circle with a bus stop sign. Bus 210 and 211 go to Palma. We jumped on 211, paid less than E10 and ‘enjoyed’ the ride along twisting roads through the hills back to Palma.

Monday morning saw the town alive and active. There were a couple of cruise ships in the port and the place had a lively feel. Again, we went exploring. Walking through a different part of the town, we ended up along the water and headed back towards the huge cathedral that dominates the hillside above the port. Julie toured the cathedral, which gave me time to explore the streets, alleys, and shops in the area. We spent the remainder of the day soaking in the city before heading back to Valencia on Tuesday.