Adventures in Mallorca

Its vacation time! Joa and I went on our second vacation together and it was amazing! We went to the island of Mallorca which is located on the eastern coast of Spain, near Ibiza. It was my first time there and I loved it. We stayed at the Hotel Zhero outside of Palma. the hotel looked like something out of Vogue; white walls, white lounges, hanging candles in the main lobby and a restaurant/lounge where the tables and couches surrounded the pool. The whole place was decorated in large prints that I am assuming were from fashion magazines, and in fact there the lowest level of the hotel was a “fashion consulting firm” – whatever that means.

Cas Catala (the town we stayed in) is an adorable little beach town. The main road runs along the beach and there are endless resorts with beach accesses – even though they all say “private” no one seems to care which was kind of cool as we had so many beach options. Speaking of beaches, some had white sand, some had small rocks covered in beautiful coral reefs and others were just cliffs to jump off of. It was so cool to be able to experience so many different vistas.

My favourite beach was a little cove nestled between two hotels. It was made of mostly rock and stone but as a result had a pretty abundant reef along the left edge. There were some small boats anchored in the middle of the cove which only added to the atmosphere as they slowly swayed back and fourth with the small waves. Almost nobody knew of this beach and so there were no more than 3 groups of people there at a time. Joa doesnt like to swim very much but he came with me one day. We played in the water together, looking at the fish and seeing how deep we could go. It was a beautiful, fun day until Joa cut his foot open on a rock! It was gushing blood from two places and even had some algea stuck inside – so we immeditaly headed to the nearest hotel to get a first aid kit.

One day Joa had an amazing idea to rent bikes and ride into Palma and visit the Aquarium. I say it was a great idea – if you are in shape. The biking trail ran along the seaside but there were constant hills throughout, and I was in so much pain by the end! Nonetheless we toured through the old city of Palma where there were castles and cathedrals. We stopped to walk through the gardens and explore the winding city streets before setting off further around the island. The rest of the trip was basically a straight ride from the old city to the Aquarium – we rode through the many different neighbourhoods and beaches that were often reffered to by the nationalities who populated them (German area, English area). We finally made it to the Aquarium where we hung out with some sharks but other than that it was actually kind of disappointing, as far as aquariums go.

At night we would get dressed up and find a place to eat that evening. Most of the restaurants were seaside with an amazing ocean breeze. With our glasses of wine we would sit in the quiet and soak that vacation in. On our last night we ventured out the the city centre of Palma, which actually looked very similar to downtown Lisbon. We ate at an amazing tapas restaurant where they are famous for their sea food. We did not hold back in the slightest – deep fried squid, roasted peppers, steamed mussels, sauteed mushrooms, and freshly baked bread. It was a perfect goodbye dinner – but I really didn’t want to say goodbye!

I felt very lucky on this trip – to be able to spend such amazing time with the man I love. I hope to go back to Mallorca one day, and to explore more of the island. But, more importantly, to make it back to that little cove.

– Leahxx