Palma de Mallorca Day 3

Palma de Mallorca is both the capital city of Majorca and the capital of the Balearic Islands in Spain.  Almost half the population of Majorca live in Palma making it the twelfth largest urban area in Spain.

Palma was founded as a Roman camp on the remains of a Talaiotic settlement.  Talaiots are Bronze age megaliths on the islands of Minorca and Majorca that look a bit like a castle turret.

Again, Antoni Gaudi was drafted onto the island for some of the architecture, in particular, the restoration of the cathedral La Seu which was originally build on a previous mosque site.  The old city (behind the cathedral) is a fascinating maze of streets clearly hinting towards its Arab past.

When we went to dinner, we both had wine every time it was offered but I poured mine into Claire’s glass while she poured her water into mine.  I really like dinner as we have our usual table with our usual waiter that looks after us and we have a different view every day.  No 5 star hotel can offer you that.

As I was ill last night we had a cabin night and we looked for a movie.  We have quite a few channels but as far as I can see only two in English other than the ones telling you about the trips etc or the ship webcams.  However, they do have a pay as you go movie channel.  The first one I looked at was Argo which we had missed at the cinema so it was great to catch up when I felt ill.  Before we went for our meal we had a quick water and wine in our local where they had a couple of guys playing music; very sophisticated.  Every day we get a small newspaper delivered to our cabin, just like we did in the QM2 but without the news.  This one only tells you of the days activities onboard and off board excursions without the world news.  But still nice and we look forward to it as there is nothing negative.

 

We had quite a rough crossing from Barcelona to Majorca.  We were pitching, yawing and ‘rocking and a rollin’.  This made everything quite noisy.  The structure was creaking under the strain, it sounded like a door kept opening and closing but worst of all, it sounded like we had a football under our bed.  It kept hitting the 4 sides making a slightly different tone on each side.  Sometimes it would be quite rhythmic but mostly quite chaotic.  It felt like we needed a rim around our bed to stop us sliding off.  Claire slept quite well until about 3.30am when she put the light on and started looking where all the noises were coming from.  Too late, I already tried that while she was asleep.  She then couldn’t sleep so started reading her Kindle under the covers.  The whole quilt seemed to light up like a light bulb.  Its odd that when we went on the QM2 we never had a rocky journey like that and it was the same time of year but in the Atlantic ocean.  I guess being on the back corner of the boat, amplifies your movements as the boat will rock from its center of gravity near the middle.

 

We arrived into port before breakfast today.  It started out looking like a lovely day but clouds have started to gather over the city.  Again, it doesn’t look like we are far away from the city but we know from yesterday that looks can be deceiving.

By the time we had docked, the clouds had started to gather around the city and it felt cooler.  I still decided to walk in my shorts and sandals.  I had no choice really as my feet were buggered from my new shoes the day before.

 

The shuttle worked well for us at €7 each as we were there in no time and could see the sights immediately rather than walking for an hour or more to even get there.  By this time the sun seemed to have burned off the clouds that formed earlier.

  

As both of us suddenly needed the toilet, we almost came back very early to go back in our room.  Luckily Claire is an expert at finding a toilet.  We hit the equivalent of their Harrods, but I can’t remember what its called now.

 

Once we felt relieved we were much happier wandering and I felt that the old town was to our left so that’s the way we went.

 

In no time flat we discovered the old walls surrounding the city and an advertisement for Miro and Picasso at the Modern Art Museum.  To start with I thought that it was just an advert and the museum would be miles away.  It wasn’t, it was right in front of us, so I talked Claire into going inside to see.  It was €4.50 each but the downstairs was closed.  I asked it they had Picasso and Miro upstairs before I paid her the money.

They only had a few Miro paintings but lots of drawings.  I think he was from the Catalan area of Spain but lived in Majorca for a short time, but not too certain.

 

However, when we got to the Picasso floor, it was pathetic; all they had was a few painted plates.  I couldn’t care less.  I guess that he painted them for a present for a friend or something; what a con.

Never mind, Claire didn’t want to spend all day in there anyway.  We headed outside and they have plenty of sculptures.  Most of them are going rusty but in some way I thought this added something.

 

The actual museum is fabulous, a modern glass building built right into the old city walls; I love it.  I guess that it was more important to them to get the building and location right to tempt people in rather than their contents.  Never mind, I’m really glad we found it.

There are some amazing sculptures around town, far to many to include them all in this short blog; maybe I will get space for a few more in my end of month report.  I liked this one; the upside down building but it made me think that they are in a cyclone zone.

Not quite sure what this building was but it looked so perfect framed by the palm trees and the sun had really come back with a vengeance by this time.  This is my sort of shot, I love it.