You Don't Have To Wear That Dress Tonight

How many golfing tourists come to Mallorca do you reckon? The tourism ministry has kindly presented the answer. 112,752 - in 2008. No round figures here. Quite how they arrive at the figure who can say, but as it is so exact one has to suppose it's right. The 2008 number was up by just under two per cent on 2007. The ministry also reveals that the golfer stays on average for just under ten days and spends per day 211 euros. Given that the average spend per person per stay is 993 euros (the figure for June this year anyway), that 211 per day is quite a lot of spend, though what it entails is not clear - perhaps it includes green fees and so on. Nevertheless, it is a tourism market that is worth cultivating, and so the ministry has come to an agreement with the association of golf courses to spend 180,000 euros promoting golf tourism in the Balearics, presumably in addition to that which is currently spent in attempting to attract this sector of "alternative" tourism.


I was told something quite startling yesterday. Had it come from bloke in bar as opposed to a hotel director (which was the source), I would have been inclined to have dismissed it. It was in the context of pickpockets, but it could apply in other situations. If the pickpocket pockets less than four hundred euros, there is nothing the police can or maybe will do. You get your wallet liberated with a mere 399 euros in it, and go and make a "denuncia", and it won't get you very far. It's as though there is a sort of threshold, like with insurance policies: you accept liability for the first 400 in this instance. If you are, therefore, the unlucky victim, might be as well you make it a round 500, just to be on the safe side.


Kroxan - you don't have to wear that dress tonight. Sorry, I've never been able to hear the name of this café without thinking of ... (as you see, it's today's title quiz). The only thing is that it has a name change, a slight name change - to Croasan. Why? Asked I of Pedro. A new company. Kroxan is a franchise, but the café is no longer a franchise. Pedro is now the proud owner in his own right. Hence the slight name change. For those who don't know, Kroxan or Croasan is by the Magic roundabout on the Tucan road going towards Hidropark in Puerto Alcúdia. It's one of those fine meeting-places, patronised by Mallorcans and expats alike, whatever the name.


Bulletin Watch - one of my correspondents sends me this observation: "The Bulletin's beach of the day today is Cala Mitjana which is a rather remote cala I know from my Cala d'Or days. Very interesting except that the accompanying map locates it on the bay of Palma even though the text describes it as just 2km from Cala d'Or. Even better ... on closer inspection the map shows Artà just south east of Palma airport on the way to Llucmajor." Oh dear. At least one trusts that the text and the photos are correct. Not having checked this particular one, I can't be sure but put it this way, when these beaches of the day first started appearing I thought there was something a bit odd about them. They come from the illesbalears tourism website.


QUIZ
Yesterday's title - Smokey Robinson & The Miracles, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sWt4Hz1KGcQ. Today's title - well, who is it then?

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