Mallorca

I really fell in love with Mallorca. I woke up in not the best mood due to Ryanair and Mike and I had breakfast and went to the train station to see if we could take the old school train to Soller. It's supposed to be a beautiful ride. We got there only to find out that the next ride is in over an hour and Mike suggested that maybe we should rent a scooter. This way we would be on our own schedule and not tied down to the bus and train lines which leave Soller no later than 6pm. It was a brilliant idea. The ride was so beautiful that I'm not sure that I can do it justice. We made a little loop going from Palma de Mallorca to Villdemosa, Deia and port de Soller and then back to Palma. The ride is pretty uneventful and then suddenly a view opens up of an old town - Villdemosa. It's mountainous and very terraced. There are buildings made of stone that are hundreds of years old, there are terraced olive tree farms, and wild flowers. It takes your breath away. We stopped and took pictures and also did a little exploring on one of the hills. I'm pretty sure we were tresspassing, but we happened on some rock climbers so I'm sure we are not the only ones.

After Villdemosa we continued riding to the ocean looking at the amazing view. I felt bad for Mike as he couldn't look around as much as I did. There are coves and cliffs going into the sea and beautiful mountains with really old small towns dotted through. The ride through the mountains was a bit scary. As Yan would say "ochko igralo".Deia has the ocean views and the terraced mountains. We stopped off and tried to get to the water but a lot of it is private property so we couldn't really do it. We did see a bunch of hiking trails, but as I wanted to be back in Palma before dark, we couldn't do too much exploring. We got to Port de Soller happy and tired. It looks like a cute little beach town with a lot of tourists. We went to a very delicious restaurant called Nunu and had some of the best seafood I have ever had. Their fish menu changes daily depending on what is bought by them each day, so I can't really make recommendations, but if you are ever there you should go to NuNu. We ate and watched the sun start setting over the mountains and it was a lovely lovely time.

We got back just as it was getting dusky and went to have drinks at a bar. Mike was playing with his wedding band and it fell between the floorboards. Somehow we ere able to see it in between the two boards and Mike used a straw to hook and retrieve it while I shined a light from my phone. Free entertainment was provided by us for the whole bar. All's well than ends well :) We walked around the city for a little while and then went to bed since our plan was to get up at 9am and drive across the whole island to the Caves of Drach.

Somehow we did manage to get up at 9 and were on the road by 10:30. There is a highway that goes to Porto Cristo (where the caves are) but we obviously couldn't really take it on a scooter. Thankfully there is frontage road that was available for scooters and cyclists. We got a little lost several times but it was a beautiful road. There were mountains in the distance, and we drove through farms and the small of grass, hay and wild flowers. Sometimes also through the smell of cows and sheep, but that was OK too. It smelled like being at a dacha on a hot summer day. We stopped a couple of times to take pictures. It was a great ride, but very tiring for me. 2 hours each way makes the back ache. We got to the caves 15 minutes before our tour and had drinks and a bocadillo - sandwich.

The tour itself was non-existent. You walk through a beautiful cave with a lake, stalagtites and stalagmites, but no one tells you anything. Still worth a visit if you research on your own first. The walk ends at an underground lake with seats set up like an auditorium. Everyone sits down, and we see lit up boats glide in with classical musicians. They played 2-3 numbers and then glided out again. It felt kind of charmed and ethereal. I enjoyed it a lot. On the way out we had a choice of getting into the boats or walking, but we were already running late for returning the scooter so we walked and rode back to Palma admiring the scenery and looking at the flowers that were all around ranging from white, to deep red, to fusia. I was dead tired by the time we got back to Mallorca, and we had to get violated by Ryan air again so that was not the best.

We did manage to get our car in Barcelona and drive towards Valencia. We stopped off about 45 minutes north of Valencia and slept in the car till morning. I wanted a beach day, so we just stayed where we were, and read on the beach in the shade for 6 hours periodically going for a dip in the sea and napping. It would have been perfect if I didn't burn very badly. I thought shade was safe, but apparently not. Our ride to Grenada was uneventful and we are staying at a cute "shabby chic" hostel called Casa Don Federico in the center of town. Time to explore Grenada. Will write again later.