MALLORCA TODAY - Weather Alcúdia and Pollensa 11 February 2015

Stefanos

Morning high (6.45am): 6.5C
Forecast high: 16C; UV: 2
Three-day forecast: 12 February - Cloud, 16C; 13 February - Sun, shower, 13C; 14 February - Sun, cloud, 15C.

Sea conditions (northern Mallorca; Alcúdia and Pollensa bays to 20.00): Southeast 2 to 3.

Some cloud passing across the moon on a quite chilly morning. Warm later and plenty of sun. A rather more mixed bag over the next couple of days with cloud set to dominate tomorrow.

Evening update (20.30): Decent. Some good sun. A high of 16.6C.

No Frills Excursions

The House That Eugenio Built

They sent the bulldozers in during the second week of November 2010. The wrecking and tidying-up crews worked efficiently and effectively. Where a chalet had stood became once more a plot of land in an area of special countryside protection: pastoral equilibrium was re-established. The chalet, over seventy square metres in size, should not have been built. The only licence for building had been for the renovation of a farm shed.

Who is to say that had the chalet not been demolished that it would not now be subject to "regularisation"? Many a property on Mallorca's rural land was granted an amnesty last year under the regional government's Ley de Suelo. The futures of some of these buildings would have been documented and stored in the pending trays of town halls or other authorities, some stamped in red with a threatening "denuncia", awaiting transmission to the courts. Their executions had been stayed at their death rows among bucolic greenery until one day came the pardon. Pay a suitable retribution and all will be forgiven. The bulldozers sighed. There was no work for them.

But the chalet I mention never had a chance. It had to be removed and to be levelled. It had to be restored as a place of natural habitat. There is no X to mark the spot of where it was. You wouldn't know it had ever been there. This was ground-zero chalet. There were strong political as well as legal reasons why all physical memory of it should have been expunged. This had been the chalet that Eugenio had built. 

Eugenio Hidalgo, the one-time and now disgraced and imprisoned mayor of Andratx, was one of the unlucky ones. Unlucky because, though he engaged in widespread planning abuses and got sent to prison as a result, he might well have believed that, abuse or not, the chalet would eventually be given official reprieve or become sufficiently well established in terms of the years it had been built that it would no longer be the target for the bulldozers. After all, wasn't this how such things worked in Mallorca?

Had the chalet been anyone else's, it might well have been reprieved. But it wasn't anyone else's. It was Eugenio's. A further pound of flesh was required in addition to the jail sentence. It became ground-zero chalet in a revenge attack. The demolition was symbolic restitution for the destruction of public confidence through the chain reaction of what Eugenio hadn't bargained for: the actions of anti-corruption prosecutors newly emboldened and supported by the national attorney-general. Matas, Munar, Ordinas, Nadal, Buils, many more have been burned by the firestorm that the prosecutors unleashed. And it was one whose source can be localised to protected land in Andratx. Ground zero.

Llorenç Suau is a mayoral descendant of Eugenio's. The current mayor of Andratx, he won't be re-standing. In October last year, Llorenç and two former mayors, Isabel Alemany and Francesc Femenias, were indicted to declare "in quality" by a Palma court looking into supposed irregularities surrounding the licence for developing car parking in Sant Elm, which just so happens to be the property of the Alemany family. Though not accused, Suau has opted against re-election as he supports the stance of his party, the PP, on not having candidates caught up in legal proceedings. He reckons, though, that whereas the presumption of innocence is a right for all citizens, it doesn't apply to politicians. There is now a presumption of guilt. And, sadly and generally speaking, he is right; sadly because it shouldn't be so and generally speaking because, notwithstanding attempts to clean up local politics, the public wants to believe in political crookedness.

For Llorenç, the problem is that there is someone whose guilt was proven. Eugenio's. Hidalgo is the cross that Andratx mayors have to bear. Llorenç knows this. Innocent or not innocent, the public smell urban planning indiscretions - real or not real - as acutely as they detect the burning of forest land. Their senses have been heightened by the Hidalgo-fallout and Tramuntana firestorms.

Elsewhere, and even with rules laid down by the PP regarding candidates, mayors are not as prepared as Llorenç to sacrifice themselves. Tomeu Cifre in Pollensa is one. Local rather than general party rules appear to apply to him. He has not been charged with any criminal offence, thus he can re-stand and, it should be noted, court documentation in respect of one accusation against him appears not to have been forthcoming from his accuser.

But perhaps mud sticks, regardless. Eugenio didn't build a house of corruption for mayors; it was there before him. What he did build, though, was an enduring edifice of perception, proven in and reinforced by the courts, that will not shift from public sight. Innocence, guilt. Who would be a mayor?

MALLORCA TODAY - Weather Alcúdia and Pollensa 10 February 2015

Stefanos

Morning high (7.45am): 5C
Forecast high: 14C; UV: 2
Three-day forecast: 11 February - Sun, 16C; 12 February - Cloud, 13C; 13 February - Cloud, 13C.

Sea conditions (northern Mallorca; Alcúdia and Pollensa bays to 20.00): West 2 to 3 veering East by the evening.

Very cold in parts this morning. Just above freezing in areas with clear skies and minimal breezes. A good sunny day on the cards and staying sunny tomorrow. On Thursday turning cloudy.

Evening update (21.45): Nice. High of 17.6C.

No Frills Excursions

The Felanitx Theory: Columbus

At the end of 2011, I offered an annual award for the "historian of the year". To this day, I would imagine that Gabriel Verd remains blissfully unaware of this accolade but four years later he may be placing himself on the shortlist to pick up a far more celebrated prize. The citation in 2011 went along the lines of perseverance in the face of almost overwhelming evidence to the contrary. Verd is the Mallorcan historian who insists that Christopher Columbus was from Felanitx. His life's work has pretty much been devoted to proving this. In 2011 he was convinced. Now, he is on the point of producing evidence which will demonstrate definitively that Columbus was from Felanitx and not from Genoa or any other place which has laid a claim on him.

At the weekend at a restaurant (Son Colom) in Felanitx which doubles as an exhibition centre for Columbus, Verd was able to explain his theories to visitors who included the president of the Council of Mallorca, Maria Salom. He asserted that the "Felanitx theory is the most coherent that there is". The competing theories include Ibiza, Galicia and, of course, Genoa, which is the city that history scholars over the centuries have accepted that Columbus came from.

Having Maria Salom along for the day was understandable, as the Council is one of the keepers of Mallorcan culture and heritage and as it was the Council, in 2004, which forwarded a grant of over 50,000 euros for research into Columbus's origins and genetics; one of the biggest supporters of this research was Gabriel Verd. There have, subsequently, been DNA tests carried out which have sought to establish links between local populations and Columbus (certainly with his younger brother, Bartholomew). These don't, however, seem to have proved anything - definitively.

The research has been and is valid. Though it is the accepted version of history that Columbus came from Genoa, there have always been certain questions, e.g. why he himself made little reference to Genoa and, more importantly, why he spoke in the strange way he did. Linguistic research has held much of the key to resolving the arguments regarding Columbus's origins. It is this linguistic element, along with Mallorca's culture and heritage, which was what interested a former president of the Council, Maria Antonia Munar, who held this office when the 2004 grant was made. She admitted at the time that she had "a patent interest in Columbus being from Mallorca", and one suspects that this interest would have been partly kindled by nationalism. Munar's party, the Unió Mallorquina, was Mallorcan nationalist. Columbus a Mallorcan? The discoverer of America was Mallorcan all along and not an Italian and definitely not a Spaniard? It's the stuff of nationalist dreams and one, moreover, that features some version of Catalan as the mother tongue.

A further linguistic element is the name Porto Colom in Felanitx. Colom means pigeon in Catalan. In Italian the word is "colombo". In the Genoa region of the fifteenth century it was "corombo". There were people called Pigeon all over the western Med. Porto Colom, as in "colunbi", was noted on an Italian map of Mallorca from the thirteenth century, so it is perfectly logical that people might have adopted Colom as a surname because of the place name. Or alternatively, they were just named after a pigeon. Either way, as far as Columbus was concerned, Verd has maintained that his name came from his mother, Margarita Colom, who gave birth to the illegitimate son of Carlos, an Aragonese nobleman who was the brother of Ferdinand, later the husband of Isabel and so one half of the Catholic Kings. And the precise location of the birth was the Felanitx finca of s'Alqueria Roja.

Gabriel Verd believes that this year he will add to the celebrations of notable Mallorcans (Ramon Llull, 700th anniversary of his death, and Fray Junipero, his canonisation) by proclaiming that Columbus was definitively a Mallorcan. There is a part of me which really wants him to be right, for him to turn historical orthodoxy on its head and for history to therefore have to be rewritten. But despite his confidence that he will prove Columbus's Mallorcan birth definitively, unless it is in such a powerful way with new, previously unseen, original source documents that can substantiate the Felanitx theory and be scrutinised by peers who might be convinced of the arguments, the overwhelming evidence in favour of Genoa will remain.

Even if he were to provide definitive proof, would all Mallorcans be happy? History is less kind to Columbus than it once was. He is now accused of genocide and so of the extinguishing of Taino Indian culture in Hispaniola. The fact that smallpox and other diseases were largely responsible for the Tainos being all but wiped out doesn't stop contemporary views which portray a barbarous Columbus. Would Mallorca really want that legacy?

MALLORCA TODAY - Weather Alcúdia and Pollensa 9 February 2015

Stefanos

Morning high (7.00am): 9.5C
Forecast high: 12C; UV: 2
Three-day forecast: 10 February - Sun, 14C; 11 February - Sun, 14C; 12 February - Cloud, 13C.

Sea conditions (northern Mallorca; Alcúdia and Pollensa bays to 20.00): North 6 to 7 veering and easing Northeast 4 to 5 by the afternoon. Waves to three metres through the morning, decreasing later.

A moonlit morning, though the forecast is for cloud and possible rain with some sun in the afternoon. Quite windy again with a warning for the coasts in place. The next couple of days look really quite promising with good amounts of sun and breezes shifting southerly.

Evening update (18.30): Shaped up pretty well. Fair amount of sun and a high of 14.1C.

No Frills Excursions

Heroes And Villains: Mallorca's hoteliers

The regional tourism minister, Jaime Martínez, remarked the other day that, though Mallorca's main hotelier groups were investing heavily in overseas markets, they were still also investing in Mallorca. If one were being cynical, one could consider this final clause to be a defence against a widely levelled accusation: that these main hoteliers are far more interested in developments in foreign lands than in ones in their own small land.

Quite clearly the hoteliers are investing in Mallorca. Meliá we know all about, but of others? Well, Iberostar has been spending a pretty centimo or two in Cala Millor and Playa de Palma, where Riu is likewise engaged in putting up investment cash. There are plenty of other examples. But for any one or two investments on the island, greater investment activity abroad can be pointed to. To take Riu as an example, between 2014 and 2016 it will have invested in, had built or acquired hotels in Aruba, Mauritius, Morocco, Tunisia, Sri Lanka and New York, to say nothing of developments in Bulgaria and Tenerife. Though Riu has decided to abandon Cuba, its large fellow Mallorcan players are quite happy to take a deeper plunge in the scramble for the Castro-lite Cuba, now undergoing a relationship normalisation with the White House.

All of this overseas activity is, therefore, picked up on and used as evidence for the prosecution in damning the large hoteliers for seeking ever greater riches on foreign shores and leaving poor Mallorca to a slow death of comparative lack of quality and investment. How can these companies, these Mallorcans do such a thing?

It's all nonsense of course. Mallorca's "Big Four" (Meliá, Riu, Iberostar, Barceló) and some of the smaller pretenders to this quartet are global businesses. The clue to their interest in foreign investment lies with the adjective. Global businesses don't become global businesses by channelling all their wealth into markets with limited (very limited) scope for growth; and Mallorca offers very limited scope, especially for new developments. They act in accordance with principles of growth that are relevant to any industry: if you have built a strong home market with limited further opportunity, then you look elsewhere, especially when the industry you serve - tourism - is as avaricious for new destinations as it is.

Do Mallorcans (and indeed foreign residents living in Mallorca) love the Big Four and the other large hoteliers? Those who are employed by them or who have businesses that supply them would probably say yes. But as for everyone else?

The people who criticise the apparent neglect of Mallorca in favour of global development are probably among the ones who also harangue the hoteliers for their opposition to the private holiday accommodation sector. The hoteliers are, therefore, damned whatever they do. Invest much more heavily in Mallorca, and they'll get slammed for their attempts to further dominate the island's accommodation market and for being the sole beneficiaries of Delgado-Martínez Law, i.e. the 2012 tourism bill. Plough millions upon millions into some desert island, and they are branded traitors on account of their imperialist ambitions at the expense of little old Mallorca. And, to compound the apparent felony of imperialism, it is these very hotel groups which have exported know-how that has enabled other destinations to grow. Treachery.

The Big Four and others should be businesses of which Mallorcans can be proud. They are Mallorca internationally. But the pride seems reserved, while often there is little or no pride; only antagonism. It is a pity. These are businesses which haven't got where they are by luck. They are pretty damn good at what they do, and when puerile remarks are made along the lines of the "Mallorcans don't know what they're doing" (in terms of tourism), then perhaps those who make such remarks should spend a bit of time studying the histories of the leading hotel chains.

All this overseas activity casts the hoteliers in a type of ambassadorial role. Meliá's Gabriel Escarrer, for one, believes that the hotel chain's presence in some forty countries helps to enhance Spain's brand internationally. Consequently, global growth over some three decades has led to a reciprocal benefit for Spain in drawing visitors attracted by values of service, culture and lifestyle inherent to the Meliá brand.

But then, perhaps this is, for some Mallorcans, a different problem. Globalisation has assisted the Spanish brand, not that of Mallorca. The hoteliers are thus cast in a different role, that of being "españolistas" and not "nationalistas" (Mallorcan ones, that is).

Maybe the lack of love boils down to a simple dislike of big business - and the hoteliers are Mallorca's big business - and to a more fundamentalist disapproval of the changes that have been wrought by tourism business. Or perhaps it's simpler still. Plain jealousy. There are a few seriously wealthy families in Mallorca, and it doesn't take much to figure out which ones they are.

MALLORCA TODAY - Weather Alcúdia and Pollensa 8 February 2015

Stefanos

Morning high (8.00am): 8.5C
Forecast high: 12C; UV: 2
Three-day forecast: 9 February - Rain, sun, wind, 13C; 10 February - Sun, 12C; 11 February - Sun, cloud, 14C.

Sea conditions (northern Mallorca; Alcúdia and Pollensa bays to 20.00): North 4 to 5 backing Northwest during the morning.

Cloudy start though it's meant to be going to be pretty sunny this morning and through the day. Quite windy at times, with the breezes shifting northerly later in the day and bringing stronger winds tomorrow and more poor coastal conditions. The general outlook is for a gradual warming-up over the week.

Evening update (19.00): Nice and sunny it became. A high of 14.6C.

No Frills Excursions

Have You Got A Moment?

I recall that when Francina Armengol was given the keys to the presidential suite at the Council of Mallorca in 2007, she was going to usher in a new way of doing things. Her door, she said, would always be open, by which she didn't mean that the general public could just wander in off the street and have a good old nosey around. Rather, Francina was all for doing things differently; she was an open and communicative president and not the one from whom she had taken over (now residing at his majesty's pleasure). Eight years later, we find Francina in pole position (if not actually first in the polls) to become Bauzá's successor, and so she has been reflecting on ... the need for a new way of doing things. These new ways come in eight-year cycles, it would appear. "Another way of doing politics is possible," she informed a gathering of PSOE-ites in Valencia. "Through dialogue rather than imposition." "Through participation and ..." At this point, lights will have gone on in the minds of the fellow PSOE-ites. Participation. Now, where have we been hearing about this?

Suddenly, everyone's talking about participation, and they have to thank (and/or fear) Pablo Iglesias for doing so. Yes, there is a new and participative way of doing things, and someone had beaten Francina to the idea by several months. Her version, whatever it might in fact be, is political catch-up blended with ample dollops of opportunism. What are Podemos good at? Participation. Right, we'll have some of that for ourselves. And, blow me, only a few days later, PSOE in Calvia were unveiling their own participative re-invention. Under the slogan - "have you got a moment" - they've come up with a mobile app through which residents can answer three questions, such as "what is it that most concerns you about Calvia?" A multiple choice gives various options for answering - corruption, safety, taxes, tourism, etc. More than this, they are planning on having "participative budgets", so that the folk of Calvia can decide where money goes for certain things.

This isn't as revolutionary as it might sound, as they already do this in little old Algaida, where the council is PSOE-controlled and which is the home town of Francina's predecessor as leader of PSOE, her good chum and former president of the Balearics, Francesc Antich. So, it's been Algaida which has been the source of inspiration for Francina; has it? Possibly, but new ways of doing things haven't simply shifted towards citizen decisions as to how 300 grand are spent; new ways have emerged because things have been turned on their head. And Francina knows full well by whom and why she has to get the participation craze as well. As Little Eva might have sung (but didn't): "Everybody's doing a brand new political dance now. Come on, baby, do The Participation".

MALLORCA TODAY - Weather Alcúdia and Pollensa 7 February 2015

Stefanos

Morning high (8.00am): 2.5C
Forecast high: 11C; UV: 2
Three-day forecast: 8 February - Sun, 12C; 9 February - Rain, sun, wind, 11C; 10 February - Sun, cloud, 13C.

Sea conditions (northern Mallorca; Alcúdia and Pollensa bays to 20.00): Northwest 3 to 4.

Afternoon report (15.15): Technical probs; couldn't do the morning report. So, here is one for the day. Pretty good amounts of sun and certainly much calmer - quite a contrast to yesterday and the cold and "snow" (such as it was). The morning lows were pretty low; just a touch under freezing in areas. A daytime high of 12.2C.

No Frills Excursions

The Alcúdia Anti-All Inclusive Party

A new party in Alcúdia unveiled its programme of priorities at the Casa de Cultura earlier this week. One says new, but Ciudadanos Islas Baleares has basically added the Islas Baleares to the citizens it was in 2011 when its abbreviation was C's. It is now C'sib. A lot of people will know Francisco Baeza, its candidate for mayor; he was also the candidate in 2011. He is well-known in the bar world in around The Mile, having once run the Don Pedro in the Siestas, which is where I got to know him. 

In the summer of 2011, I got involved with a BBC investigation of all-inclusives in Majorca. The programme looked specifically at the situation on the bay of Alcudia. Among some other assistance being sought, the presenter, Rajan Datar, wanted to interview a bar owner who was affected by all-inclusives. Immediately, I thought of Paco. The Don Pedro may be in the Siestas but it is of course right next to Bellevue as well. What Rajan got from Paco was some pretty emotional footage. Essentially, it was to do with how the rapid increase of all-inclusive at Bellevue, which didn't offer any until 2006, had devastated the business. Within the space of five years, all-inclusive had gone from nothing to approximately 80% of the complex's business.

One can of course seek to assign other reasons as to why a bar might fail, but let's be generous and accept that the assault from all-inclusive was the biggest. And this assault, in its human terms, was something that shocked even an experienced and greatly travelled journalist like Rajan. When I took him for a tour of Bellevue one evening, ending up at the Show Garden, he was pretty much gobsmacked. There was this vast amount of humanity, much of it waiting in never-ending queues for beer in plastic glasses at the all-inclusive bars. The one that wasn't for all-inclusive, the one we used, was pleasant: quick service (there were no other customers), a proper glass and, doubtless, a superior grade of beer.

That's some of the past which is needed in order to inform us of the present. Paco had run for mayor on the C's ticket three months before the BBC turned up. He didn't, in all truth, do terribly well, but the party was hardly known about at the time of the election. It also faced, as did any other party, the force that was with Coloma Terrasa and the Partido Popular in May 2011. No, he didn't poll particularly well, but he had encouragement, as he still does, from a number of other bar owners in the area. And a key reason why is one of the priorities that is in the 2015 C'sib programme. You've guessed it - all-inclusives.

The problem, though, for any party in a municipality is what it can actually do. A town hall does not have competence for regulation of hotel accommodation; the regional government does. The most that could be done is to express opposition to all-inclusives in given resorts, offer some proposals for making the situation fairer and hope that the government listens. Which, right now, it almost certainly wouldn't.

But there is a breeze blowing which suggests a wind of change might yet gust in. It is a purely political breeze, one that has sprung up in Greece and might become the north-easterly "gregal" that habitually freshens the beaches of the bay of Alcudia on a summer's afternoon and bring with it more than just some cooling for sunbathers. It all seems remote and unlikely that anything comparable to Syriza's policies on all-inclusives would be adopted either in Mallorca or in Spain, but you never know.

There was also the business of the tourism decree issued before Christmas which referred to "analyses of each tourist area" in respect of the "incidence" of all-inclusive. What the purpose of these analyses is no one really knows, and whether they would be accurate might be questionable. In Alcúdia, it is now easier to identify hotels which definitely do not offer all-inclusive rather than all the ones which do in some form or another. In addition to the obvious hotels, like Lagomonte and Club Mac, there are all those which offer the AI option, and it is one found increasingly at the up-market hotels. The three Viva hotels all do (the Vanity Golf doesn't). The Iberostar has the option, the Club Pollentia Resort has the option, so does the Estrella-Coral de Mar Resort, and one could go on. If the incidence of actual AI occupancy was less than a minimum 75% of all hotel places in Alcúdia, I would be amazed.

Even armed with accurate information as to incidence, what then? The tourism ministry has spoken about tighter quality regulations, but they haven't been introduced. The ministry delayed them because it wanted to do its analyses. Nevertheless, the information would presumably be available to a new government and perhaps even to the public. Whether it's believable is a different matter, though. But, that slight breeze wafting over from Greece might signal something and so, for Paco and C'sib, the time to capture the moment may have arrived.

MALLORCA TODAY - Weather Alcúdia and Pollensa 6 February 2015

Stefanos

Morning high (7.30am): 5C
Forecast high: 10C; UV: 2
Three-day forecast: 7 February - Rain, 10C; 8 February - Rain, sun, 11C; 9 February - Rain, 10C.

Sea conditions (northern Mallorca; Alcúdia and Pollensa bays to 20.00): North 4 to 7 easing and backing West 4 during the morning. Swells reducing to two metres.

Cloudy, cold morning with a warning for snow; it's most likely during the morning. Warnings also for low temperatures and rough coastal conditions.

Evening update (20.45): So, snow at sea level there was but very little. Up higher, significant snowfalls, the road to Formentor was closed and will remain so because of some rock and tree fall. There was some sun after a damp morning and the temperatures rose but only to a high of 7.1C from lows of one or two degrees.

No Frills Excursions

All The Fun Of The Tourism Fair

The Fitur tourism fair in Madrid was deemed a great success on account of a record turnout of 225,000 visitors. But its success can be measured in other ways, such as the massive following the fair attracted on social networks. While much of this will have been related to Fitur-specific events, not all of it will have been. There will have been exposure for destinations like Mallorca as well. The travel trade fair has always been the place for networking, contact-making and deal-making but now it isn't necessary to actually be there; it's all available through social media. Of course, it still does help to be able to do things face-to-face rather than via "Facetime", and for those who have wondered whether the regional tourism ministry ever talks to airlines and tour operators (which it does in any event), Fitur and other travel fairs provide the evidence: all the big players and not so big players gather.

The ministry does, with some justification, get criticised for its emphasis on travel fairs to the virtual exclusion of all other promotional means; its promotion budget is heavily geared towards fairs. If all that was happening was that some potential tourist was wandering onto the stand, then the criticism would be even more valid. But this, the public's participation in fairs, is only a part of what is happening. There is now a vast public which is being spoken to because of the innovations that fairs have introduced in recent years. One of these is the presence of bloggers. There were over 400 accredited bloggers from 20 countries at Fitur, and what they do is blog not only about the fair but also about what exhibitors are offering. The Balearics tourism ministry devotes part of its promotion budget to just these social media intermediaries. Their role may seem somewhat obscure, while social media, as a means of promotion, may seem to lack excitement when compared with the pizzazz of an expensive television advert, but they are representative of ways in which promotion has altered. They channel opinion, reviews and recommendations to the contemporary social media-savvy tourist, and it is acknowledged and understood that communication that is far more intimate than any advert (be it film or print) and which is review and recommendation-based is now the prime source of tourist decision-making.


All the news coming out of Fitur was positive for Mallorca and for the Balearics, even if the actual level of good news seemed to vary. On domestic Spanish tourism, for example, at one point there was talk of an increase between 10% and 15% this summer. Then it went up to 25%. It's difficult to understand how a forecast can fluctuate so significantly in the space of two days, but whoever said that such forecasting was an exact science?

The domestic market is one of the three main tourist markets, along with the British and the German, that Mallorca depends upon, and it has, fairly obviously, been in the doldrums for a few years. There was some recovery last year, but this is expected to be very much more significant in 2015. The forecast comes with a cautionary word or two, though. Spaniards have acquired sufficient confidence to throw off the shackles which were stopping them travelling on holiday, but they aren't necessarily going to be spending any more. This confidence, however, would be dented were there to be some return to economic uncertainty this year.

An interesting point about the domestic market is that less than a third of it stays in hotels. This isn't a recent phenomenon brought about by the increased availability of private accommodation. It's how it has tended to be.

The other two main markets are both expected to show strong growth in 2015. Sales campaigns in both Britain and Germany are said to be surpassing expectations. And to add to this positive news is the belief that the season will be longer this year with more hotels opening in March (and so in time for Easter in early April). For the British market, Jet2 is to begin operations by the end of March.

While this is all very positive, we will find out just how well-founded the optimism really is. Last year, there was at one time talk of an exceptional spring, only for this talk to turn to despair; May was a poor month, certainly for the hoteliers.

MALLORCA TODAY - Weather Alcúdia and Pollensa 5 February 2015

Stefanos

Morning high (5.30am): 4C
Forecast high: 12C; UV: 1
Three-day forecast: 6 February - Sun, snow, 6C; 7 February - Rain, sun, 9C; 8 February - Sun, rain, 11C.

Sea conditions (northern Mallorca; Alcúdia and Pollensa bays to 20.00): Northwest 5, waves easing but still risks of storms.

Rain at present and due to continue for much of the day, falling as snow to 200 metres. Rough coastal conditions should ease during the morning. Low temperatures over the next two days, i.e. down towards freezing overnight. Snow forecast at sea level for tomorrow.

Evening update (20.15): High of 8.7C but temperatures generally down at the threes or fours. A fair amount of rain plus wind plus some snow on nearby peaks. Generally horrible.

No Frills Excursions

Don't Go Near The Balearics Stand

Who would be King Felipe and Queen Letizia when you innocently get caught up in a political spat? Following the gathering of the great and good at the Fitur travel/tourism fair in Madrid, the media enjoy offering various Fitur perspectives - expectations for the coming season as revealed at the fair, general tendencies in the tourism industry, this type of thing. And there are also perspectives on who did what or who didn't do what, which is where the royals come in. Felipe and Letizia, regular holidaymakers in Mallorca, didn't drop by the Balearics stand at Fitur. This had never happened before: the Balearics pavilion is always graced with the presence of royalty. Cue, talk of some type of conspiracy.

As it turns out, there was another stand which the royals didn't go to, that for the Canary Islands. Two and two have been put together and the sum of four is that the royals had received orders from the ministry for industry, energy and tourism, José Manuel Soria, for them to not go to either of the stands. Orders!? A minister ordering the royals? Far-fetched though this might seem, a breaking with royal tradition had to be explained somehow. Hence, the Soria theory. And why would he be issuing "orders" to the royals? Because he wanted to punish both the Balearics and the Canaries owing to their opposition to oil prospecting. Remember that Soria does head a vast ministry with occasionally competing interests, such as oil and energy on the one hand and tourism where the waters are crystal clear and the horizons should never be sullied with the sights of oil platforms on the other.

In the Balearic parliament they were engaging in their own post-Fitur debrief (aka slanging match). Spokespeople from Més were convinced that there was no other explanation for the royals' apparent snub of the Balearics stand than the lousy relations between President Bauzá and Soria (indeed it had been reported that Bauzá was "furious" about the alleged veto of the Balearics stand). Clashes over oil prospecting aside, it was being suggested a year or so ago that Bauzá was after Soria's job, and they have studiously managed to avoid being photographed together ever since or even having to meet, as was the case at the large Berlin travel fair in March last year. Both managed to succumb at the same time to a dose of the flu which prevented their travelling.

Does it really matter if the royals give the stand a miss once in a while? Does it even mean a great deal for them to go to the stand? It probably does matter, especially for Balearics' promotion to the domestic tourist market, which is more likely to see photographic evidence of the visit than the international one. These little things might seem just that - little - but they do all add up. Moreover, it needs stressing that the Balearics and the Canaries combine with Catalonia in contributing 60% of all Spain's tourism. This is something which is deserving of royal acknowledgement and should indeed be deserving of political praise, but at present there is a tourism minister, Soria, who has fallen out with the Balearics and with his home islands of the Canaries, while there is a region - Catalonia - about which we are fully aware of governmental tensions. It isn't a terribly healthy state of tourism affairs.

Given that soundings off the Canaries, if not the Balearics as yet, have led Repsol to decide to discontinue exploration - the oil and gas is of insufficient quality to warrant actual drilling - it seems churlish that Soria might still harbour a grudge against the Canaries, one strong enough to issue instructions to the King as regards which stands he should visit or shouldn't. But then, who knows how far petty political vendettas might extend? Certainly not as far as the Canaries' largest hotel chain, Lopesan, which did receive the royals at its stand. And it was the large hotel chains in Mallorca to which Més also turned its parliamentary attention. These large groups dictate government policy on tourism, it was claimed, and so there needs to be a new "tourism model" for the islands. It is hard to disagree with the claim regarding hotelier power, but as for a new model of tourism, was this Més seeking to claim bragging rights on a change in direction after the next election?

They are lining up on the left of centre to be the initiators of such a change, whatever this might be. Should the large hoteliers be concerned? Not really, given the amount they invest in other parts of the globe. By Fitur 2016, will any change have been effected? Doubtful. But by 2017, you never know, Podemos might have scrapped the monarchy. Then no one could argue about which stands are being visited or not.

MALLORCA TODAY - Weather Alcúdia and Pollensa 4 February 2015

Stefanos

Morning high (7.30am): 6.5C
Forecast high: 10C; UV: 1
Three-day forecast: 5 February - Rain, occasional sun, 11C; 6 February - Sun, snow, 6C; 7 February - Rain, 7C.

Sea conditions (northern Mallorca; Alcúdia and Pollensa bays to 20.00): North and Northeast 6 to 7, occasionally 8. Waves at intervals to four or five metres on the east of the bay, otherwise up to three. Hail at times.

A poor day in prospect with strong winds, very rough coastal conditions and rain or hail. The coldest weather is set to be on Friday and Saturday with snow at sea level forecast for Friday.

Evening update (17.45): Really horrid. 7.9C the high.

No Frills Excursions

Flu Collapses The Health Service

In the middle of January, the nursing union in the Balearics was complaining about the saturation of the emergencies unit at Son Espases hospital. Thirty patients were said to be waiting to be admitted to the hospital at a time when cold weather led to increased pressures being placed on the health service. The minister for health, Martí Sansaloni, insisted that all beds in all hospitals were open and that fifty additional medical staff had been drafted in to help tackle what was described as a temporary peak in demand.

There is now, three weeks later, another peak. It is one caused by flu. At the time when the nursing union was complaining about the overload in emergencies, flu entered the Balearics, specifically during the week from 15 January to 22 January. It was later than usual, but now it is here, the peak in flu cases in Mallorca will be from now until 12 February. And this peak is much greater than is normal. Between 22 and 29 January, it was already three times more. There is something of a flu epidemic, though it will be a few days before the number of cases is being revealed, and with the cold weather for this week an additional factor, hospital emergency services will be even more hard stretched.

According to records, the year 2001-2002 was when the Balearics registered the greatest incidence of flu - 322 cases per 100,000 people: approximately 3,500 in all. By no means all flu sufferers need emergency treatment and there are doubtless some who clog up the emergencies unnecessarily; it is predominantly the elderly who do require this treatment and with the flu peak only just starting, emergencies already can't cope.

The incidence of flu in Mallorca is typically lower than elsewhere in Spain. This, so it is argued, should mean that demand can be adequately met, but, and despite Son Espases being one of Spain's most modern hospitals, the health service seems to be caught out every year by the peaks. Of the public hospitals on the island, they are all struggling, with the exception of Manacor. Regardless of the comparative number of cases across different regions of Spain, the Balearics is a region identified in a report by local ombudsmen which points to an impairment of patients' dignity because of the "repeated examples of saturation" and so to the unacceptable situation whereby patients are kept in corridors on stretchers and are also subject to potential violations of rights to privacy and to health information confidentiality.

Of solutions to this regular crisis, one that is being considered is to transfer patients to private hospitals and to convert the old hospital of Son Dureta into some form of residence for elderly patients. The problem with both of these is finance, and as was seen towards the end of 2014, it was a lack of finance which caused local health centres to suspend appointments. The health ministry blamed a computing failure, but very few people bought that argument, including many health professionals who were not brought in to cover for sick leave or holidays, which was the real cause of the appointments suspension.

Using Son Dureta would clearly be advantageous, but getting any agreement on what to do with the former hospital is proving to be stubbornly difficult. Sansaloni raised the idea of a commission to look into its future last November, which was strange as you might have thought that there already was a commission and some idea as to what function Son Dureta would have, if any. Sadly, when Son Dureta was closed there was no plan in place. It has pretty much just been abandoned.

With the new Son Espases and the other public hospitals, it was felt that there would be adequate supply and generally speaking there is. There have been rumblings about lengthening waiting times for operations and other treatments, but by and large the health service does cope, except when there are the peaks as at present. A further solution to the current situation is that operations should be postponed, so freeing up beds, but the unions maintain that this will not happen because of the imminence of the elections. Yes, but then saturation in emergencies doesn't do much electoral good for the government either.

If it all boils down to financing, then the regional government can argue, with some justification, that its overall funding from Madrid is inadequate. It is inadequate, but  the specific budget for health in the Balearics is the biggest of the lot (1,181 million euros in 2015, a 10% increase) and, surprisingly enough, it is bigger than regions with higher populations - Andalusia, Catalonia, Valencia, Galicia, Madrid all have lower health budgets. So, maybe financing isn't the issue. Instead, perhaps it is just one of better management. In Manacor, they cope by working longer hours and also by adopting rigorous procedures for admission and discharging.

MALLORCA TODAY - Weather Alcúdia and Pollensa 3 February 2015

Stefanos

Morning high (9.00am): 10C
Forecast high: 12C; UV: 2
Three-day forecast: 4 February - Rain, 8C; 5 February - Rain, cloud, 10C; 6 February - Rain, sun, 7C.

Sea conditions (northern Mallorca; Alcúdia and Pollensa bays to 20.00): Southwest 4 increasing and veering West and Northwest 6 to 7 around midday.

Mainly cloudy. Quite windy again today and getting colder. Tomorrow looks like being a particularly poor day with lows below zero, strong winds and snow possible at low levels.

Evening update (19.45): A high of 13.2C on a day of occasional sun, occasional shower and wind.

No Frills Excursions

Podemos Power Struggles

When you are a new political entity, you can probably expect to encounter the odd teething trouble, and so it is with Podemos in Mallorca. First there was the resignation of one of the steering committee (or citizens' council to give it its proper name) in Palma. This was attributed to "personal reasons" but it has been suggested that it was all to do with some form of power struggle within a body that is barely a month old and also with notions of "traditional political practices". It is hard not to feel that these traditional practices have been quickly discovered by Podemos in Palma. A power struggle and citing personal reasons; it all sounds very familiar. It could just as easily be the Partido Popular.

Following the local difficulty in Palma, we move onto Pollensa, a town bedevilled by its proliferation of political parties and factions, and to which we now have to add the Podemos element. Its ten-person citizens' assembly, considerably smaller than the 34 who make up Palma's council, had voted Martí Cifre to be its secretary-general, though the vote was not overwhelming: five in favour, five abstained. Only a short while later and the assembly decided unanimously that Cifre's post should be revoked. He is far from happy and has said he will take the matter to court. It doesn't appear that there were personal reasons in Pollensa but instead a fear that Cifre had already started to use the Podemos name and connection for personal interest and for interests of certain businesspeople. Yes, all very familiar, if this indeed was what had been happening. It is rather depressing that a Podemos-ite should see fit to go to court. It is there, in court, where so much of Spain's politics end up. Alternatively though, it is reassuring to learn that a Podemos-ite has confidence in the legal system.

Are these two examples symptomatic of understandable teething troubles for a political entity which is fluid in its nature and in its policies? In Palma, the problem does seem to have been due in part to differences in perspective, but both of them highlight what is almost an inevitable consequence for a new political formation - the battle for power. Cifre in Pollensa has said that the Podemos assembly "wants to have power without going to the ballot box". It's not clear what he means by this, but the mere mention of the power word gives the game away.

A point that needs to be made about these councils or assemblies or whatever they call them is that members ("the politicians") cannot have previously been a member of another established party. One of those who supposedly has been involved in the power struggle in Palma has ceased to go to the Podemos national assembly (he is the only Balearic member of this assembly) because he was once included on the list for candidates of the old Unió Mallorquina in Banyalbufar. He had also been a councillor, which was ok in that he had been an independent: it was the one-time inclusion on the UM list, although he wasn't actually a member, that is the issue.

Not being tainted by and not having been involved in established politics is central to the Podemos narrative, but it does give rise to suspicions that some will view Podemos as a springboard for ambition. Power, personal power that is, is a contradiction to the Podemos philosophy, and yet it is bound to be an influence, and power, as the maxim has it, "tends to corrupt".

Other cases, like those in Palma and Pollensa, seem almost unavoidable as members of the local organisations jockey for position. In one sense, it is no bad thing if differences are aired, but when these differences lead someone to consider going to court, then you wonder what sort of beast has been unleashed. The very nature of Podemos is that there isn't a central discipline and in its absence there is the potential for a chaotic thrashing-around of ideologies, interpretations and personal interests at local levels.

Pablo Iglesias had once intimated that Podemos wouldn't participate in municipal elections. The growing force that it has become has persuaded him otherwise, but the technologically switched-on, online democracy of citizen participation that it represents might not be quite so achievable right at local levels where personal interests, even among those signed up to the Podemos philosophy, have an unfortunate habit of coming into play. This said, they can be avoided, and Pollensa gives an example of this. The Alternativa per Pollença is a party of transparency and of an endless seeking after the truth and of the possibly irregular. In a way, you wonder why Pollensa needs Podemos. The Alternativa has been doing its work for them. But this is the nature of politics, even for new political entities. Power.

MALLORCA TODAY - Weather Alcúdia and Pollensa 2 February 2015

Stefanos

Morning high (8.45am): 9.5C
Forecast high: 13C; UV: 1
Three-day forecast: 3 February - Cloud, sun, 13C; 4 February - Rain, 8C; 5 February - Cloud, sun, 9C.

Sea conditions (northern Mallorca; Alcúdia and Pollensa bays to 20.00): Northwest 4 to 5 backing West by the afternoon.

Grey start though there should be sun during the day. Wind has eased off at present but is due to be quite strong again tomorrow. The general outlook for the week remains one of getting quite cold.

Evening update (19.45): A high of 14.3C. Some reasonable sun along with the occasional light shower.

No Frills Excursions

Yes, We Have No Plan

Look at any website for a town hall in Mallorca and you will find that they all have a councillor who is responsible for fiestas. This is not a sole responsibility, but responsibility there nevertheless is. Fiestas (and indeed fairs) represent one of the strongest statements as to what a town (or parts of towns) is all about. It is local culture in the form of a party. It would be odd were there not a councillor who was charged with looking after this culture.

The demands placed on such a councillor will vary enormously depending on the size of any given municipality, but even in the smaller towns there is more to it than simply ensuring that the pipers turn up at the appointed time (preferably with their pipes) and that DJ Deejay has remembered his USB sticks that will whisk the partygoers back to the good old days of the 1980s. The fiesta needs organising. It needs planning. The plan may not vary greatly from year to year, but that doesn't mean it can be neglected.

Palma town hall has admitted that it doesn't have a plan for fiestas. It is an extraordinary admission. If there is one municipality on Mallorca you would think would most definitely have a plan - and a pretty detailed one, too - then Palma would be that municipality. Alas, it does not.

The confession that there is no plan has come in the aftermath of what, by general consensus, was the worst Sant Sebastià fiesta since it was given its current-day look at the end of the 1970s. Even the town hall seems to accept that the 2015 edition was a bit of a washout. It wasn't only attributable to the weather; the music events for the "revetla", the grand party for the eve of Sant Sebastià, reached an all-time low.

Perhaps even more extraordinary is that Esperanza Crespí, the councillor for citizen participation, has not only admitted that there is no plan she has also accepted, amidst apologies for this year's fiesta, that a proposal from the PSOE opposition last year for there to be a plan was not followed up. She has said that she didn't know what PSOE was suggesting but would have liked to have done. Maybe she should have asked them for more detail then.

That Esperanza even has responsibility for fiestas might seem a little surprising. She heads an area within the council that combines citizen participation with commerce, work and youth. Fiestas fall somewhere within this lot. Forget what I was saying about fiestas and local culture. Palma has a councillor for culture and sport who doesn't have responsibility for fiestas.

It is possible, therefore, that this is part of the problem. Fiestas, in the grand scheme of things in a city which has as much on its plate as Palma does, are far from being a number-one priority and so may fall down some black hole of organisational structure. Or they may be assigned wrongly; if not the councillor for culture and sports, then maybe the one for tourism and what is called municipal co-ordination should take care of fiestas.

Wearing her participation hat, Esperanza has said that the time may have come for the town hall to sit down with residents, business associations and others and discuss fiestas. Yes, it probably is time and probably should have been happening anyway: principles of participation appear to be developed slowly in Palma.

To make matters worse, the Més grouping at the town hall has been calling for Esperanza's head because other fiesta activities have been prohibited - three demons' fire-runs, for instance, one of them in Son Sardina. And then there was all the fuss over the town hall's apparent indifference to this year's alternative Sant Sebastià fiesta, Sant Kanut. Despite the fact that Kanut is not an official fiesta, the town hall now seems to accept that they got things terribly wrong. Citizens participating in staging their own fiestas has rapidly become an accepted wisdom at the council; Kanut will happen next year and do so over three days. Sounds like a plan.

The sadness is of course that Sant Sebastià should be a major event in the Mallorcan calendar and should be promoted more strongly. The need for promotion  on an international level was accepted some years ago at the time when a version of ELO and Echo and the Bunnymen were coming to Palma. Crisis took over, but critics of the town hall say that it is no longer enough to just blame a cut to financing for the fiesta having gone into decline. Meanwhile, one wonders what all the sponsors of Palma 365 make of the situation. In terms of winter promotion of the city, it doesn't get much better than a dazzling fiesta in January. Time to get planning.