My uncle (UT) and cousin (CK) are spending 15 days in Spain. I was with them for the first 3 days in Barcelona, before they drove up into rural Catalonia to spend a few days in peace and quiet. They spent the next leg of their vacation with me on Mallorca, and they are currently exploring the cultural delights of Valencia.
When they were on Mallorca, as well as showing them the usual bits around where I live (the beaches, the market, my favorite café), we explored large swathes of the island that I had never seen before.
Saturday afternoon saw us driving into the interior to explore wonderful little towns: picnicking in Sineu, checking out a 1000-year-old Moorish well in Pina, and looking for a 3000-year-old settlement near Montuïri. I say looking for, because we probably drove around Montuïri (and drove through, and by, and over—it’s a town on a hill) for about an hour, first looking for the historical museum that was going to tell us about this ancient settlement, and then looking for the settlement itself. When we finally found the place, it was late afternoon and we had it all to ourselves. We explored all around the ancient structures, and went inside one of the tall, round talaiots. There are about 400 talaiotic sites on Mallorca, left from a prehistoric civilization that suddenly started building these things about 3000 years ago. According to the museum dedicated to this talaiot (Son Fornés), about 550 BC, there was “a period of conflict and crisis,” and people stopped building talaiots, although they continued to live around them. The Carthaginians had set up camp on the nearby islands of Ibiza and Formentera, and they used Balearic warriors who were handy with a slingshot as mercenaries in a lot of their wars. After the Romans thoroughly kicked Carthage’s ass in the Third Punic War (149 to 146 BC), they invaded the Balearic Islands in 123 BC (easy date to remember, right?). The arrival of the Romans put a pretty big damper on the talaiotic culture, and by the time the islands fell under the power of the Caliphate of Córdoba (the Muslim rulers—sometimes called the Moors—who controlled a large part of Spain until 1492) sometime between the eighth, ninth, & tenth centuries, the talaiots were completely abandoned.
One thing we missed during our solitary amblings: in July there was a night-time chamber orchestra concert inside the settlement: the orchestra played Vivaldi, Boccherini, and Gardel, with the lit-up talaiots as a backdrop. Anachronistic? Or just really cool staging?
Another thing we missed while we were in Barcelona: being naked. Apparently, it used to be perfectly fine and legal to walk around in your birthday suit because it’s an “artistic expression,” but now, due to half-naked tourists wearing too-skimpy clothes inside real artistic places (such as wearing bikinis in museums and churches), the city is looking to fine on any “improperly dressed” people, including nudists, who wander the streets. I guess we missed our chance.
ANYWAYS, MOVING ON. On Sunday, we set off on a grand adventure to reach the northernmost tip of the island: the Cap de Formentor. We stopped in the picturesque town of Artà and wandered around the restored wall + turrets on the top of a hill, and then we chose a road that looked as though it was bordered by the ocean on the right and a large, freshwater lagoon on the left.
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| see? |
As soon as we got the hell out of Itchy Port, we jumped onto the much more scenic road out to the end of the point…
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| this point |
…which involved several stops to take in the scenery and to have a picnic. Since we were up there on a beautiful sunny Sunday, the tourists were out in hordes, and UT showed off his mad driving skillz by dodging manadas de ciclistas. Man, if only I had some of UT’s pictures to share! I could show you about a hundred spandexed behinds that we zoomed around on the way to the end of the road. Also, I could show you pictures of our picture-perfect picnic spot, which was only marred by the fact that it was basically in a parking lot. Besides the view, we had a wonderful picnic: jamón serrano (serrano ham), queso curado (extra-cured cheese), mostasa de higos (fig mustard), Mateus wine (an amazing rosé that my mom says is rotgut, but I respectfully disagree), and a bit of horchata, just to shake things up a bit (horchata is a Mexican milky-ish drink that my uncle declared tasted like old furniture. Again, I disagree.)
On Sunday night, we went over to a house of some friends for a barbecue. UT got to discuss the origins of the conflicting philosophies in corporate culture with a philosophy teacher, CK talked about her experience living in China and the importance of making good friends abroad, my good friends here said that they had been so impressed by American hospitality when they visited the US that they wanted to show the same attitude towards me, and all in all we had a wonderful time and stayed up way past everyone’s bedtime.
Early(ish) the next morning, UT and CK packed their bags and headed off for Valencia. I had a WONDERFUL time with both of them, and I can’t wait to see them more often back in the US.
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