Culture, Anger And Tourist Tax: Top Stories From 2016

Google very kindly make available statistics of the number of individual page views that each blog post receives. These are direct views in that they are to the specific URL of the post rather than having been read by regular followers of the blog. They are an indication of popularity, although I wouldn't say they were the best; my personal opinion of the diversity of subjects that appear on the blog would give a different result.

This caveat aside, the story that proved to be the most popular was that of 17 September, Promoting Culture: Where's The Strategy? This was about an agreement between the tourism and culture ministries - a "protocol", as they liked to call it - to promote cultural tourism. This required an investment of 600,000 euros to internationalise the islands' culture via a "tourism strategy". I was scathing of the whole thing, not least because an aspect of this strategy is supposedly to push filming on the islands. The relevant ministers, Biel Barceló and Ruth Mateu, admitted that there aren't the necessary tax incentives to do this, as there are in other parts of Spain. So they were going ahead with a "strategy" without having the wherewithal to implement it. Moreover, the "protocol" only lasts until the end of 2017. Could anyone make any sense of it, I asked. PR nonsense was my conclusion, and we haven't heard anything about it since September.

Number two was from 21 July - A Camel To Design A Camel: Tourist Tax. The introduction read: "How many government departments, local authorities, business associations, unions and others does it take to change the cash collected from the tourist tax into meaningful projects?" One camel was therefore the Commission for the Promotion of Sustainable Tourism, the body which decides how revenue is to be spent. The other was the tax itself with its ill-defined multi-purposes. As things were to turn out, the government used the drought as the justification (not unreasonably) to place emphasis on water projects. We are still waiting, though, to hear what these (and other) projects actually are. When there's a commission with such camel-like ingredients, should this come as any surprise?

In third place was the article about Balearic hotel interests in Cuba - Keep Taking Us To Havana, 1 December - while just behind in fourth spot was the post of 2 May, When Anger Takes Over: Mallorca And Cycling. This was prompted by the general chaos caused by the Mallorca 312 cycle event, which isn't a race as such but a trial. As I noted, it was a trial that "tested the over 4,000 cyclists and tested the patience of many people on the island". The event brought to a head the simmering (and not so simmering) conflict created by cycling. The value and benefit of cycling to Mallorca seems irreconcilable with attitudes of residents. Whether these attitudes are shared by a majority, one doesn't know. Perhaps they should undertake a survey rather than rely on social-media hysteria.

Chaos of a different sort came in at number five - More On Vueling And The Chaotic Spanish Air Industry, 16 July. At six was a subject that crept ever higher up the agenda in 2016. The Pariah Status Of Airbnb from 11 November noted that Airbnb didn't exhibit at London's World Travel Market, despite it being "arguably the most important business in the travel market right at the moment". This was the context for a discussion of the need for the regional government "to take tough and effective action against Airbnb and other such sites". Just how tough will be revealed when the holiday rentals' legislation is approved. Whether it will be effective is a totally different matter.

There was further anger on 23 April. Getting Angry In Puerto Pollensa (number seven) said that "emotions have been allowed to run high; rather too high". They were to do with the pedestrianisation fiasco and the Gelats Valls ice-cream kiosk. There was of course to be even more anger because of the separate fiasco of the sun loungers.

At eight was a tribute to a web-based business which doesn't attract the concerns surrounding Airbnb. Hotelbeds: The Best Of Mallorca from 14 July looked at this successful business, sold by Tui for a fortune, which is headquartered on Palma's Paseo Marítimo. There was a coincidence with this article. Although not the same type of business, Hotelbeds does have some similarity with Low Cost Holidays, which went belly up a few days later.

In ninth spot was The Mess Of Regulating Holiday Rentals, 21 May. "The regional government is getting itself into a right old pickle over holiday rentals' regulation" was the introduction to an article on the difficulties regarding legislation. The pickle has become increasingly pickled, what with the idea to zone Mallorca and the intention to allocate places for holiday rentals that don't coincide with areas of high residential need. The government's problems are such that it ignored the fact, as stated in the May article, that the sustainable tourism tax law mandated it to have regulation in place within six months of that law having been approved: it should have been at the end of September therefore.

And in tenth place was The Environmental Crisis Coming Our Way of 17 May. This quoted a spokesperson from the environmentalists GOB who said that this will be "a crazy year, the infrastructure will not cope". Was it all environmentalist hot air? The prognosis was for: "airport stretched beyond its limit; Palma crowded out by ships and passengers; roads chockful of hire cars; ever more thousands of apartments being rented out; the hotels full; limits needing to be placed on the numbers on unspoiled beaches; supermarket supplies questionable; water supplies threatened; outdated sewage-treatment plants incapable of taking the pressure. Too many planes, too many ships, too many cars, too many people." 2017 will be no different.

There was in fact an eleventh post. It had the second highest number of page views but it wasn't a story, just a very short and simple post. It was the one to say that, after a few days of downtime when the Blogger system changed and I couldn't post, I was back. Heartening, I guess.

When Anger Takes Over: Mallorca and cycling

Saturday was the Mallorca 312 cycle race, so-called because it involved covering a course of 312 kilometres in length. On an island that is nowhere near this length in any one direction, that meant a fair old amount of road needed to be covered. Covered and closed. In fact, it wasn't a race as such. The term "prueba" explained much: a trial. One that tested the over 4,000 cyclists and tested the patience of many people on the island.

Some municipalities which were affected were more upset than others. Mayors and the Council of Mallorca are now said to be going to get together in order to try and limit the inconvenience caused by various sporting events. They will identify ones of major importance, thus implying that those of lesser importance might have to be ditched.

The argument goes, and it's reasonable, that it is only one day. A problem with this argument, however, is that isn't only one day. Not if another event follows hot on the heels. While Mallorca 312 affected a wider area of the island than this coming weekend's Ironman, there are parts of the island affected by both. Playa de Muro was more or less closed on Saturday. It will be again on Saturday. Access to Alcudia was virtually impossible for some hours on Saturday. Alcudia will be shut next Saturday.

So, one day only for each event, but two days in the course of a seven-day period, to which can be added the inconvenience of the closure of the road into Alcudia's port from Magic all next week. It is understandable if some people get rather hacked off.

Both 312 and Ironman bring in good business. I am well aware of the fact that there are certain businesses which suffer because of Ironman (a Saturday's trading is in effect lost because clients cannot get in to the port area), but in general there is an economic advantage. This shouldn't be under-estimated and nor should the benefit to Alcudia as a sports tourism destination be under-played. There is a lot of good that comes from such events.

But try telling some people this when they will perceive legitimate reasons for being annoyed by the inconvenience, loss of trade and inability to move around freely. There is also, one cannot help but get the sense, an increasing resentment of cycling - one element of Ironman, the reason for Mallorca 312 and the source of so much early-season tourism.

This resentment comes from different sources, one of which is other tourists, such as those who were left with luggage searching for their hotels at the weekend. But most of all it comes from residents. Looking at comments on Spanish newspapers, it was very clear that those defending the Saturday event were in a minority.

Perhaps it is a reflection of social media and the ease with which people can vent their frustrations, but the level of resentment shown towards cyclists in general (the regular tourist type as well as those taking part in the events) has not been like it is now. Saturday may have represented a turning-point. Or it should do. The island's authorities (and many businesses) are treading a thin line between reaping the benefits of cycling and the attitudes of the island residents. Cyclists are increasingly characterised as some form of foreign invasion force. Why should the island shut down just to let foreigners ride their bikes?

How can there be a reconciliation? It's difficult to know. But one fears that the resentment is going to boil over at some point. There is a great deal of irrationality voiced by cycling opponents, just as there is a great deal of obnoxious behaviour by cyclists. The passive actions of the Council of Mallorca and others in issuing advice and recommendations are insufficient. The local authorities have to be aware of this irrationality and this behaviour and take measures to prevent there being ugly incidents and matters getting out of hand.

There is a great deal of good from cycling and from cycling events and others. But there is a downside, a significant one. In a word, it is anger. And anger does no one any good.

Riding Around In Circles: Mallorca's velodromes

One hundred years ago, on 18 October, 1914, a velodrome was opened in Llucmajor; not just opened, it was also blessed. It was a track from another forgotten part of the island's history. Like bullrings which long ago disappeared, so there were also cycling circuits and they reflected a wider history, that of cycling itself.

1869 is the year when, it might be said, cycling started in Mallorca. A banker named Ernesto Canut bought a bike in France, brought it over to the island and from that year on the sight of bikes on the roads of Palma became increasingly common. As far as sport was concerned, associations were being formed from the end of the 1880s. In 1892 the first race took place in Felanitx. The following year, the first Balearics cycling championship took place, but it is 1903 which stands out as a year of major importance in the history of Mallorcan cycling, for it was in that year that the El Tirador velodrome was opened. It had been the ambition of a cycling club called Veloç Sport Balear. The first stone had been laid at the end of 1898 and on 10 August, 1903, it was finally inaugurated during Palma's annual fiestas.

El Tirador is, or rather was, the most celebrated velodrome in Mallorca, but it wasn't the first. Veloç Sport Balear had considered sharing a velodrome operated by the appropriately named Cercle Ciclista. This was Son Espanyolet, and it had been inaugurated in 1893, though Felanitx, where that 1892 race had taken place, was the first of all. The year after El Tirador opened it staged the Spanish championship, and there was talk of trying to attract the world championship, but that failed to materialise. Out on the roads cycling was becoming ever more popular, and 1913 was to be another landmark year for cycling as a sport; the first Volta a Mallorca (Tour of Mallorca) was held.

El Tirador is considered to be Spain's oldest velodrome still in existence. One says in existence, but it actually closed in 1973. It's difficult to identify quite how many velodromes there ever were on Mallorca. In 1975 a new one opened in Algaida. Reporting this inauguration, "El Mundo Deportivo" noted the famous velodromes which had gone - Felanitx, Son Espanyolet and El Tirador - but it also referred to former tracks in Arta and Manacor. In addition to the new velodrome in Algaida, the report went on, were tracks in "Pollensa, Sineu, Vilafranca, Santa Maria, etc.".

Cycling and velodromes have of course moved on since then. Veloç Sport Balear, a club which is still going, harbours ambitions of reviving El Tirador. Or did. In 2007 along came the Palma Arena velodrome, the grandest of them all. As for Llucmajor's velodrome, it had only a relatively short life. In the 1930s the land was sold off.

Photo: El Tirador on the day it opened. From http://www.arabalears.cat/opinio/blogs/

The Solution For Mallorca: Driving Tourism

For many a long year Mallorca's tourism industry has searched for a solution to the problem posed by seasonality; how to attract tourists during the winter and low seasons. Many ideas have been advanced but not one has adequately addressed the need for Mallorca to receive more than a handful of hardy souls who will happily strap on a backpack and go a-wandering in the Tramuntana mountains and be blown into the Mediterranean by the force of a gale.

These ideas have been little more than piecemeal. A piece of tourism here, a piece of tourism there. Finally, though, an aspect of tourism that has been a feature of attempts to increase off-season tourism since at least the 1980s is really starting to break through. It is, of course, driving tourism.

The regional government tourism ministry's efforts to engage with leading hoteliers on the island and with tour operators are bearing fruit, and it could be fruit for more than just the off-season. Driving cars could be big in summer as well.

It is hard to understand why there hasn't been a stronger focus on driving tourism in the past. As is being pointed out, Mallorca has an excellent and extensive network of wide cycle lanes which connect the whole island and extend into the mountains. Though the government will take the plaudits, really it has required foreign tour operators to give the regional government the push to make driving tourism more of a reality. Among these tour operators is Car Holidays. It is said to be guaranteeing to bring whole plane loads of tourists from Germany, Britain and elsewhere to Mallorca during the low season.

"Mallorca is ideal for driving," a spokesperson has said. "There are whole stretches of flat terrain for the novice and recreational driver and more challenging mountainous terrain for the professional driver. Combine this with the magnificent landscape and the normally good climate in winter, and we think that driving tourism has enormous potential."

Key to the whole driving tourism movement are what are now being referred to as "roads". They would in fact be part of the existing cycle lanes. Indeed, they would occupy rather more of the cycle lanes than the lanes themselves. "To be honest, the cycle lanes have always been wider than necessary. There is plenty of room to accommodate different users, such as drivers," the island's transport ministry has admitted. This ministry has been working closely with a burgeoning new sector on the island - rent-a-car. Agencies who hire cars out to tourists (who therefore don't need to bring their own cars to the island, which has been and still is a problem with airlines) will happily give these tourists maps of the island to show them special routes (the new "roads" will be given numbers).

But not everyone is happy with this potential explosion in driving tourism. Cyclists complain bitterly about drivers who go the wrong way, who don't put lights on when it's dark and who drive two or three abreast and along pavements or pedestrianised promenades, sometimes stopping their cars right outside a bar or on its terrace. Some bar and restaurant businesses argue that driving tourists do not spend. Instead, these tourists head for supermarkets and fill the boots of their "hire cars" with bananas, bottles of water and pasta ready-meals.

Other businesses are more open to this new style of tourism. They say that facilities must be created to allow driving tourists to stop near to restaurants. Some are therefore planning on setting aside land for parks for cars. These parks would be used to leave cars so that tourists can take short walks to restaurants. Indeed, such parks have started to appear and they are commonly being called "car parks". 

As part of the drive (sic) towards driving tourism, particular effort will be given to special events on Mallorca, such as rallies and races. Sporting achievements by Britons such as Louis Hamilton and Germans like Sebastian Vettel are making driving tourism very much more popular than before and are spawning a whole fashion among Mallorca's driving tourists, who are to be seen wearing flame-proof overalls covered in stickers for Vodafone. Again, though, cyclists are complaining about all these events, ones which mean that the "roads" are blocked off for hours on end while cyclists have to wait for the long trains of cars to pass, while the sight of these drivers swaggering around in their overalls has become the subject of jokes.

You can't please everyone, but driving tourism, whether we like it or not, is going to be here to stay.


Any comments to andrew@thealcudiaguide.com please.

The Seasonality Code: Muro's cycling

Anyone trying to move around Playa de Muro by motor vehicle yesterday would have been inconvenienced. There was yet another cycling event. The Mallorca Masters. It was the final day of the event. As Playa de Muro is at the epicentre of cycling tourism in the north of Mallorca, it falls to the resort to host the climax of the week.

The groups of cyclists, the Trafico outriders, the cars with bikes on their roofs, the queues of traffic were all the obvious signs of what went into the Masters, but hidden away in a Playa de Muro hotel was a different event. It was in the form of a kind of speed-dating networking exercise for companies engaged in activities with winter tourism in mind; cycling obviously, but not exclusively.

This networking exercise, aka workshop, was indicative of what we are told is the "secret" of cracking the seasonality code in the north of Mallorca; indeed, the impression is given that the code has been cracked. A report of the workshop may well have been written by PR people. Given my intimate knowledge of Playa de Muro, it didn't paint a picture with which I am terribly familiar.

There has undoubtedly been some progress in cutting into the barren winter months, primarily because of cycling, but the report would have us believe that progress has been far greater than it has in fact been. "Some hotels" are now open for ten months of the year. Some? Or should that be one? Ten months? Only if you're stretching things a tad.

The secret of the seasonality code has been no more cracked in Playa de Muro than in other parts of the island where there are concentrations of cycling tourists. In fact, it has probably been cracked to less an extent in Playa de Muro. If it really had been cracked, then there would be more than the handful (and it pretty much is a handful) of businesses outside of the hotels (hotel) that are open in February; and this handful is greater than the number open in, say, December.

The head of the hoteliers association in the resort says that hotel profitability cannot be sustained by summer business alone. Well, no you wouldn't have thought that it could be, but there are plenty of hotels in Playa de Muro (32 of them in all) that have maintained the appearance of having been able to sustain profitability through summer business alone for years. In all these years, not one has actually stayed open right through the winter, and even now there is only the one that comes close to that ten months mark.

But things have caught up with some of the hotels. Those operated by the wealthy chains (and Iberostar is the chain which has the hotel open for the ten months) have the wealthy chains to support them. Not all are operated by wealthy chains, though. Hence the sale of two Eden hotels, one in Playa de Muro and one just by the boundary, to Alltours.

The resort is pinning its hopes on cycling and other winter activities, such as hiking. It's the same old offer. It's nothing new. The workshop apparently attracted 20 businesses from eight countries that were seeking to sell themselves (cycling, hiking tours, it would seem) as well as 20 local businesses, mainly hotels, seeking to sell themselves. Such representation was something but it hardly equates to a great leap forward in cracking the seasonality code.

Even if there were some movement forward, it would surely never be more than a small step as opposed to a leap. 32 hotels, many of them substantial both in terms of the amount of land they occupy and the number of places they offer; but how many would it ever be viable to open out of season? The long hoped-for golf course, about which nothing is being said at present, wouldn't make a huge difference, and it would make even less of a difference it were to now go ahead with a dedicated hotel of its own (as has been hinted that it might).

Cycling does offer some business in winter and Playa de Muro's share of the cycling market has grown. But business for whom exactly? Playa de Muro was built as a summer resort. The beach is its main purpose. The name itself is a giveaway. There will never be more than a handful of businesses, other than the odd hotel, that can justify opening in the winter.


Any comments to andrew@thealcudiaguide.com please.

Irrational: Cyclophobia in Mallorca

As is tradition at this time of the year, arguments about cyclists are starting. One says arguments; they are little more than someone going off on one, citing a particular incident and then condemning all cycle-kind as a consequence (or in reverse, i.e. the whole of car/taxi/van/lorry/bus-driver-kind being branded as devils incarnate or even devils in cars).

I was once a cyclophobe. Or rather, I was once only too glad to take the rise out of cyclists, as with a description that dates back to January 2007 of supermarkets being alive with the sound of cyclists' foot furniture - a horse-hoof, coconut-shell karaoke heading for the bananas. But since then, I have had a cycling epiphany. The ghosts of cycling past, present and future visited me in a dream, and I awoke with a broad smile and went in search of cyclists in order to bestow upon them gifts of goodwill.

And so there should be goodwill. Cyclists mean money. To all the naysayers who would have it that cyclists do only buy bananas and rarely patronise hostelries, I say you are quite wrong. I have witnessed with my own eyes entire platoons of cyclists demolishing pannier-loads of charcoaled meat at one sitting, washed down with helmet-fulls of foaming German lager.

Cyclophobia can attach itself to the seemingly most unexpected of people. Matthew Parris's infamous piano-wire stretched across roads to decapitate cyclists was strange not just because of its murderous desire but also because Parris is the sort of chap you would believe not to be a cyclophobe. Enthusiasms that he has, such as for Catalonia and the Conservative Party, mark him out as being slightly eccentric, rather like Boris Johnson, a Tory two-wheeling advocate. But sorry, sorry, there I go, forgetting my epiphany and implying that cyclists are eccentric, when of course they aren't. Well, not all of them anyway.

Another Conservative eccentric, the British Prime Minister, wants there to be greater safety for cyclists, and it was this that provoked a phone-in to Nicky Campbell on Five Live, one which proved that cyclophobia is more of a disorder in the UK than it is among users of Mallorcan roads who are other than cyclists (or skaters or runners or lunatics on those trike things or even pedestrians).

To the ranks of the celebrity cyclophobe and thus joining Matthew Parris can be added that all-Australian ocker Shane Warne. The leg-spinner fired off a flipper on Twitter, having flipped when a cyclist punched his car, and called for cyclists to ride in single file, have number plates and pay road tax. He didn't say anything about banning cyclists for taking diuretics or having had a hair transplant, but Warney may have had a point.

Put plates on a bike and if a cyclist goes through a red light ... . Hang on, not if a cyclist goes through a red light, but when a cyclist goes through a red light, and the nearest driver could take a photo with a Smartphone and upload it to a dedicated Tráfico website. Except of course the driver would then be penalised for having used a mobile.

Number plates probably aren't much of a solution. Bikes are bikes, they don't have wide bumpers onto which clearly visible plates can be mounted. Nevertheless, revengeful cyclophobes would doubtless favour some form of identification or tracking. Perhaps this is it. All cyclists should be electronically tagged. Jump a red, veer into the centre of the road, go the wrong way down a road and a vast GPS system floating in space over Mallorca would immediately clock them.

Should anything like this be necessary, though? Why can't drivers and cyclists live side by side together in perfect road-use harmony? The reasons why not, one supposes, are an irrational primeval territorialism and another instinctive human trait passed down from cavemen, that of objecting when someone seems to be taking the piss.

This is what it all boils down to, but it doesn't matter. Or only occasionally does it matter, if there is real danger involved. So, a cyclist jumps a red and a driver doesn't. Who cares? I don't, that's for sure. Though I was finally convinced there was a God when a cyclist went through a red and Tráfico were at the very junction and pulled her over.

The cyclophobia season is back with us, as it will always be with us. Hopefully, no cyclist feels inclined to punch a car, but to be honest if it were Shane Warne driving, it might be understandable. Even this, though, would be irrational.


Any comments to andrew@thealcudiaguide.com please.

MALLORCA TODAY - Fenn's second conquest in Mallorca Challenge

British rider Andrew Fenn (Omega Pharma-Quick Step) won the second race in the four-race Mallorca Challenge yesterday. Fenn's win in the 170 kilometre race between Llucmajor and Campos followed his victory in Sunday's race in Palma. The Challenge moves to Deià and the mountains today and tomorrow.

Balance On A Bike - The other side of cycling

Those of you of long blog experience will know that I am more than happy to quote feedback or comments that you send me. I don't recall though ever having a sort of guest blogger for the day. So something of a first.

Occasionally, I do get pulled up. There was once an accusation of anti-Catalan sentiment, which was quite unjustified. The post in question may have suggested this, but there were and have been plenty of others that are anything but anti. Though I may now and then "go off on one", I try and avoid one-eyedness. Blogs, comment pieces and so on are easy to exploit as a means of presenting one particular point of view or prejudice. God forbid I should ever sound like a Leapy Lee, and were I to, I trust someone would be good enough to shoot me. Balance in all things is important. So when someone suggests to me that I might not have been balanced, rather than dismissing this, I can accept the point and also happily seek to redress the balance. And so it was that, following a recent piece about cycling, I had an email from Marcus who questioned the balance. An exchange of emails has ensued, and Marcus has forwarded what is today's guest blogger feature. Over to you, Marcus ...


February is the time of year when you might start to notice groups of cyclists, in all sizes of groups, appearing on the roads around Alcúdia. From individual, mature loners who look like they have spent their whole life on a bike, to identically clad groups of Germans or Danes happily going about their daily holiday excursions. There are times when, as a driver, you may have been put out slightly by these pedallers in lycra, but let me offer some explanation of the type and why they happen to appear in the first place.

For the northern-European cycling enthusiast, Alcúdia holds a number of charms and I for one have been taking advantage of them for several years now. First there is the wide choice of good quality hotels, and those that open this early in the season seem well prepared to pander to the needs of cycling groups. They provide exactly the facilities in terms of comfortable rooms, keen prices, bike storage, relaxing pool areas and abundant nutritious food that we cyclists look for. Then there is the great Alcúdia beach to enjoy at the end of a long day in the saddle and finally there is the town's perfect position on the island, just a day's ride and back from all kinds of places like Soller, Porto Cristo and Sa Calobra. Even the monastery at San Salvador is a comfortable jaunt away.

We've been coming to Mallorca for so many years that it has been tempting to try other areas, but Arenal meant a dull ride through the lowlands of the south or the busy roads of Palma at the start of each day and Magaluf was just a bit cheesy unless you wanted a drink-fest every night, which was not our bag. Nor did it offer many escape routes other than the busier west coast road or a route straight uphill at the start of every day.

No, Alcúdia is almost perfect and what better way to finish off a day's riding than an all-out burn-up along the coast from Pollensa. We all suppose that the smooth, well-maintained Mallorcan roads are a result of EU subsidises, but wherever the money came from they provide a welcome respite to the pot-hole littered lanes of Surrey. And there's the considerate approach of motorists too, which also compares favourably with the hasty, "don't make me late", get out of my way driving skills of many in the UK.

Here I must reference Andrew's previous post about some cycling bad habits like running red lights and not giving way where needed, none of which are to be condoned. As a rider I don't intentionally ride to block the road for any driver, after all an angry driver is far more a threat to me than an happy one. But bear in mind that if you approach a group of riders, even after they have realised they are holding you up, it may take a moment or two for them to organise themselves into a narrower line so that you can pass safely. A short, friendly toot on the horn before and after the overtake is all it should take. Try it, the friendly thank-you wave from the front of the group may warm your heart for the rest of the day! And then there are the Mallorcan winds which can easily blow a rider a few feet off course without notice, so please leave a healthy gap as you pass.

Finally there's the issue of lycra, which other writers on Mallorca, not just Andrew, seem to take slight offence to. Well from the horse's mouth the reasons for the crazy garments are two-fold. Be seen and be comfortable. I'm sure we'd all look very smart in black Paul Smith tailored jackets, but the Mallorcan truck driver might just not see me in time and my poor wife and kids back home would be distraught if that jacket was returned damaged! And how sore would my more delicate areas be after 6 or 7 hours in the saddle unless I dressed carefully in appropriate gear? Don't worry we do normally change into more suitable attire before frequenting the local bars and restaurants in the evening, so you may not even notice us unless you eaves-dropped the boring conversations about who rode fastest that day. In that case, come and say hello and give us something more interesting to talk about, please!


QUIZ
I never understood what the video had to do with the song, but which duo (or band even) featured in a cycle race?

Any comments to andrew@thealcudiaguide.com please.

Birdland - Cycling and bird-watching in Mallorca

Come on, 'fess up. Cyclists behaving badly or even behaving well, and do you lose your rag, shout and scream? Does Matthew Parris's piano wire cross your mind? What if maybe I just give a little nudge with the bumper? No, no, don't do that. Whatever you do, don't do that.

Me? I move from ultra polite to ultra pissed off. I will gladly observe the rules, gladly let a line of cyclists enter a roundabout, the only time you are meant to stop on a roundabout. I will even let a lone cyclist come onto a roundabout in front of me, so long as there isn't a truck about to demolish my boot. I will happily give a wide berth, slow at the central islands where there isn't sufficient space for car and two-abreast cyclists, even if they are meant to be in single file. I will do all these things. I don't suffer from road territorialism. It isn't that. What it is, is when the rules are broken, when the cyclists do what no car driver could get away with - running a red, coming out of an exit that they shouldn't be, cutting up, or just going the wrong way. But why get so peed off? Does it really matter? Well actually it does, given that the car driver is invariably always at fault if there's an accident.

The recreational cyclist is not the issue. He or she usually pedals at a sedate speed. He or she can stop easily. It is the pros, the semi-pros, the pretend-pros who get the driver's goat. The ones who act as they own the roads. Ah yes, own. It's that territorialism again. And it's also the provocation, the one that comes from the attire, the dress-code, the lycra. They dress deliberately to antagonise.

But it's not just on the roads of Alcúdia, Pollensa or Muro that the great cyclist-driver divide occurs. In Dublin, according to a piece in yesterday's "Sunday Times", "cyclists are facing a backlash from motorists and pedestrians who claim they are a menace". The paper reveals police figures for transgressions - 1,847 motorists done for going through a red, 28 cyclists for doing the same. Strangely enough, given the lunatic nature of the Mallorcan driver, I have rarely actually witnessed a driver running a red. I couldn't tell you how many cyclists I've seen doing the same. What I can tell you is how often I've seen Trafico dealing with an errant cyclist. Once. A girl went through a red right in front of the patrol vehicle. They could hardly not stop her. But whereas a driver can be easily identified, a cyclist cannot be. They all look the same, all stretched into blue outfits. There may be sponsors' logos, different colour helmets and so on, but you can't really pick a cyclist out. And that's it, the cyclist knows damn well that he or she can get away with it. It's this that hacks the drivers off.


Bird-watching in Mallorca
"The Bulletin" ran a piece yesterday about a book that has been published, in English, which highlights the rich bird life to be found on the island. It is called the "Birding Tourist's Guide to Majorca". Three lucky readers may well have emailed the paper to win a copy in response to the question "which red-breasted bird from northern Europe is starting to breed in Mallorca?" Hmm, let me think, bird, red breast. Is it a blackbird?

The robin is just one bird that is now laying down roots in Mallorca. So also is the little egret and the hoopoe. The Albufera nature park is home to them, as it is to many other birds, migrant or relatively full-time. Bird-watching is something of a growth tourism market and a not unlucrative one. As one of the book's authors points out, bird-watchers spend a fair amount of dosh on twitching kit and they are "relatively big spenders", like other tourists who splash out on specialist equipment and clothing, such as golfers or - dare one say it - cyclists.

The book is all part of an initiative to grow this tourism market further. It's a good idea, a very good idea. Now all that's needed is a tourism minister and someone in charge of tourism promotion.


QUIZ
Yesterday's title - Pet Shop Boys and Dusty Springfield, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IZip7Y_IDqQ. Today's title - "Birdland", probably the best-known thing done by one of the most important of jazz fusion bands.

Any comments to andrew@thealcudiaguide.com please.

Walk Is Cheap

Capdepera is the municipality on the north-eastern tip of Mallorca. Its coastal resort is Cala Ratjada. It is mainly a German destination, the resort itself a peculiar stretch between two sea fronts, the main beach small and crowded, one to which one can see hordes of lilo carriers heading in summer, taking a long-ish walk from the centre of Cala Ratjada. The town has announced some "initiatives" designed to attract more tourism. And these are? Cycling, audio guides for the mediaeval castle and a Nordic walking track. These, together with promotional materials, will cost somewhat less than a hundred thousand euros.

Fine, you might think, but just look at that list again and at the budget. Cycling. Nordic walking. Me-too tourism facilities in other words. Take Nordic walking. Alcúdia has a route, Can Picafort has a route and now Capdepera is to have one. Nordic walking falls into the category of "alternative" tourism, an alternative aimed at extending the tourism offer and season.

Given the German dominance of Cala Ratjada, a Nordic walking offer makes some sense, but, as with the other resorts in the north, it is an addition to the tourism mix that will make only minimal impact. More than that, it is cheap. And it is this - the lack of cost - that is the most germane point in seeking more German tourists. For a relatively small spend, the town hall and the tourism ministry can announce that "something is being done", can be seen to be taking some action. It is, therefore, largely a PR exercise, not one aimed at more tourism but one aimed at trying to convince that effort is being put into extending the season.

Tourism minister Ferrer, in presenting these initiatives, spoke of the need to "create new attractions" to "re-invent" the island as a tourism destination and to "extract the value" that exists on the island in terms of its natural landscape and heritage. Well he would say that, as his predecessors and other tourism authority spokespeople will have done. It is spin, a formulaic pronouncement lifted from the brief manual that is phrases to use when talking about things other than sun and beach tourism.

The worry is not that there is to be a Nordic walking track, not that there is to be more cycling in Capdepera, not that there are to be audio guides to the castle which is promoted as having a "fascinating history", one bound up in battles against pirates. The worry is the spend and the me-too nature of the offers. If less than a hundred grand could be converted into half a million more tourists per year, then you would take your hat off to the brilliance of the thinking. But it won't. Nowhere, moreover, is any evidence offered as to how many new tourists might be created or how many existing tourists might be willing to not trade in Mallorca for another destination. It's not surprising, because the tourism authorities don't know. What they do know is that Nordic walking and the rest is something alternative on the cheap. This is one of the failures of Mallorca's so-called alternative tourism. There is not much by way of investment. Not much directed at grander schemes that might mean serious numbers of tourists. Not much, in fact nothing, by way of some out-of-the box thinking for creating genuine alternatives or even additions to the main summer tourism. One of the failures? No, the failure.

QUIZ
Yesterday's title - Kiss, "100,000 Years", http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M_a-NYivv6o.

(PLEASE REPLY TO andrew@thealcudiaguide.com AND NOT VIA THE COMMENTS THINGY HERE.)

Mirror Man

Is it the case in other countries, the UK for example, that car wing mirrors are likely to become detached from the car with quite the same degree of frequency as they are here? And if not detached, then hanging off, flapping or in some other way less than completely associated with the vehicle. I pulled up by a café in Puerto Alcúdia yesterday morning. The next car was minus its passenger-side wing mirror. Around the corner, there was a bloke who was attempting to replace a wing mirror which had, at some point, parted company with the main body of his car.

A few days ago, I commented to a friend that neither wing mirror of his Golf was quite as Volkswagen had intended it: one was minus the actual mirror, the other had assumed an angle of 45 degrees from the position it might normally expect to have. He was of course already aware of this, as you might hope, and pointed out that the car was not actually his but his wife's, thus giving rise to some under-the-breath mumbling of a women drivers' nature. To have one wing mirror battered and bruised is unfortunate, but to have both in a state of disrepair - simultaneously - is carelessness (on behalf of the other driver of course), to say nothing of making the actual act of driving more hazardous than is normally the case here and probably also illegal.

I am glad to say that I have that rather neat electronics trick that enables me to, as it were, close my wing mirrors. And it is a necessity. For this is the land of the broken wing mirror. "Take this broken wing mirror, learn to drive again etc. ..." And that was Mr. Mister, in case you were wondering; well not exactly those words of course. Whether there is anything specifically about wing mirrors and their partial or total removal in the local version of the Highway Code, I would doubt, but I am delighted to be able to report that I am now aware of someone who is taking Spanish driving lessons, i.e. Sara of Ben and Sara. And this is by way of shaming her into reminding her to send me some invaluable snippets which can form the basis of some damn good bloggery. One such is that I have discovered that there is indeed such a thing as roundabout etiquette, though etiquette is used here to mean procedure as opposed to something that might be performed with a degree of courtesy; as far as I know there is no word for courtesy or any word approaching its meaning in the local highway code lexicon. That this etiquette exists is rather beside the point, however, because no-one has clearly ever read the same theory book that Sara has, let alone ever been asked a question about it. And the same absence of etiquette at roundabouts is evident among the two-wheeled ranks of the cycling terrorists of Germany. Let me give you an example. I happened - also yesterday - to be behind a car that was intending to leave a roundabout at the left-hand exit. I say "intending" as his exit was blocked: blocked by a great pelaton of Germans on bikes who were quite happy to totally ignore the fact that the car had right of way and were advancing from behind those white marks on the road which, for drivers at any rate, indicate that you are meant to stop. Is there, possibly, someone out there who is similarly ill-disposed to the norms of the road and can thus enlighten me as to why he or she should feel that he or she has the right to treat these norms with total impunity? In other words, is there a cyclist who rides like a complete prat and is willing to admit to it in public, or as public as this blog can be?


QUIZ
Yesterday's title - I am always delighted when a blogotee responds to one of the quiz questions for the first time, especially when the question is fairly obscure. So, congratulations to Tom for knowing Torchy The Battery Boy (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wujTB-nDe-M). Today's title - which other blog can possibly bring you Torchy and then the next day the weird musical genius responsible for this?

(PLEASE REPLY TO andrew@thealcudiaguide.com AND NOT VIA THE COMMENTS THINGY HERE.)

But Not Forgotten

There are times when I get a distinct sense of déjà vu.

There are times when I get a distinct sense of déjà vu.

And it was like it only happened yesterday. All of it. Well, a lot of it. Like the Tour of Mallorca cycle race. It starts today. It is a year since the last one, which you might expect to be the case, but it doesn't make it any less mindboggling. It was like it only happened yesterday.

There was this thing a few weeks ago about a woman who has total memory. That is total memory, as in she cannot forget things. From ever. It's all there. It never goes. Total recall. All the time. Can you imagine that? Not that I have a similar affliction, but I may see the most inconsequential of things and a whole history comes into my mind - as, for instance, with the Tour of Mallorca.

We All Stand Together, 12 February, 2008. That was the last time. A year ago. It seems hard to believe. I remember the miserable faces of the Guardia doing the security (nothing unusual about that I suppose; miserable Guardia faces, that is), meeting someone walking his dogs, going into Kroxan for a coffee, seeing the bike clothing and gear for sale close to the finishing line, missing the taking of a photo with the mayor in it, making the jibe about what do the totty on the winner's platform have in their bags, asking what the point is of being a spectator at this sort of thing. Last year a stage ended in Puerto Alcúdia. By Kroxan. It was a sunny day. I can also remember the haze that afternoon that hung over the Sant Marti mountain as I gazed the length of Tucan in anticipation of the riders haring towards the finish.

I also remember that this race used to have a stage that started in Pollensa. I remember it pouring down with rain one year, waiting in Café Illa and then heading up to the Carrer Costa i Llobera to see the cyclists negotiate the wet and slippery cobbles. It seemed like a health and safety issue to get too close to the riders.They've changed this. Not everything remains the same, even if the memory does and so it was with the Classic Car rally. A stage did start from the nautical club. Ben, who would like to run his MG Midget in the race, thinks not now. Of course it wouldn't. Stupid me. How could it? The cars went along the front line. Couldn't now, could they. Pedestrianised. Or maybe they suspend that for a day. No-one much pays any attention to it anyway. It might be good if they were to list the stages on the website. Maybe they will. Classic Car Rally, 18-21 March - http://www.rallyislamallorca.com/


QUIZ
Yesterday's title - Queen (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NuxS-9t3tnY). Today - forgiven but ... and the youtube - a real treat - is from before they were well-known.

(PLEASE REPLY TO andrew@thealcudiaguide.com AND NOT VIA THE COMMENTS THINGY HERE.)

We All Stand Together

You could have cut the excitement with a sledgehammer. Could you see the end of the third stage of the Tour of Mallorca cycle race in Puerto Alcúdia? Barely. Get a slightly wrong position a bit away from the actual finish line, and all the hanging around for half an hour was utterly pointless. To be honest, it was all pretty pointless. Except that is the presentations. These are by far the most entertaining part of the event, a photo opportunity for various worthies, the totty from Coke and the local town hall to get its name in the picture. Sadly, I had wandered off and was admiring some scrubland when Alcúdia’s mayor got onto the podium to have some flowers waved over his head. Disappointing not just for me, but also for you and no doubt him as he does not therefore feature on today’s photo montage. But he can always see himself in tomorrow’s newspapers which will devote a whole page similar to the two podium shots here, replete with happy winners, people you have never heard of and are even less interested in, adverts for Coca-Cola and Air Europa and most importantly the bags of the Coke girls.

Just what do they have in those bags? They seemed pretty weighty. A passing resident of many years suggested a clean pair of knickers, but it looked more like a couple of house-bricks. Don’t know why they would want those. Maybe they had six packs of Coke. Who knows? But guessing as to the contents was about as good as it got, unless you add the additional questions of what dance is one of the “winners” performing, how do you actually get to be a Coke girl, and why are cycling events like primary-school sports days – a prize for everyone? Everyone wins, it seems, or at least gets a bunch of flowers. The main sprint over, some guy gets his cup, you wander off and wonder why the Guardia need to look quite so unhappy, and, damn me, some other bloke’s getting his delivery from Interflora. Couldn’t be anything to do with all those photos with names of fizzy drinks and an airline present. Of course not. We all stand together and have our photos taken.

QUIZ
Yesterday – Spiritualized. Today’s title – who? Easy.

(PLEASE REPLY TO andrew@thealcudiaguide.com AND NOT VIA THE COMMENTS THINGY HERE.)

This Sporting Life

Cycling is one of those spectator sports I don’t quite get. If watching tortured faces as they climb an endless mountain is, like the similarly screwed and distressed countenance of an ailing marathon runner, appealing, well fine. Otherwise it is a rapid ride-past of various shades of luminous lycra or, on television, an interminable procession of the pelaton, fluctuating only as different team members assume the burden of leadership. For all that anyone pays any attention, the landscape may as well be as repetitious as Bedrock’s as Fred drives (runs) his car past the same scenes on the animation loop.

The Tour of Mallorca starts tomorrow. It is the seventeenth, and coincidentally there are seventeen teams participating. Spanish, Belgian, French, Dutch, German, and not a banned substance among them, perhaps. On Tuesday, the third stage starts in Pollensa, goes into the mountains (just over halfway up the Puig Mayor) and then descends back into Pollensa and finishes in Puerto Alcúdia. The whole thing climaxes in Palmanova on Thursday. The tour is a chance for Mallorca to put on its best bib ‘n’ tucker and parade itself and its countryside to a sports-channel-glued tourism market. Well that I suppose is the hope. The mayor of Pollensa, for one, believes so. Maybe he’s right, but where does the TV coverage exist for an international market? And even if it does exist, is it not a case of broadcasting to the two-wheeled converted as opposed to those who otherwise would press the handset for the likes of the Discovery and History channels. It sounds a bit optimistic. I fancy those who do watch are more concerned with muscled legs than mountainous vistas. The tour may help in bringing more cycling tourism, but that’s about it.

In a wider sports context, and in particular a wider sports tourism context, the tour has a place in promoting Mallorca. Cycling is the main element of the off-season sports tourism, but there are others, such as running. And then there are of course the sea-based sports. It was a shame that Valencia, and not Palma, got the America’s Cup. The niching of tourism by individual sport (cycling, golf, sailing) may be missing a wider picture, which is the promotion of the island as a sport destination. There is plenty of infrastructure to allow this. Just look at the number of empty tennis courts in winter. Nadal and Moya could surely be called on to lend their “faces” to not just tennis but sport in general. Mallorca may not have any particular sporting cachet, apart from the tennis players, but it has the facilities. Florida can attract a sports tourism. Its climate may be warmer, but I know where I would rather play tennis, and that’s in a mild Mallorca in February rather than a steamy and humid Florida for much of the year.


QUIZ
Yesterday – “The Pieces Don’t Fit Anymore”, James Morrison. Today’s title – a film, who starred?

(PLEASE REPLY TO andrew@thealcudiaguide.com AND NOT VIA THE COMMENTS THINGY HERE.)

Oh Boy!

The problem with the cyclists is that they don’t contribute anything to the local bars and restaurants.

As a couple of hotels in Playa de Muro prepare to open their doors to the cycling season’s lycra intake, so the above complaint will be heard above the sounds of car horns urging the pelatons off the road. These cyclists, all hale and hearty, watered and fed only on sports drinks and bananas, eschewing the calorific and arterial bombardment of beer and beef, spending nary a euro at the local hostelry. There may well be some who are tucked up by nine o’clock, sending themselves off to sleep with a study of the following day’s hundreds of kilometre route map, but there are plenty who are not.

A lot of the cyclists are German. Germany was built on beer and meat, as were most of the cyclists. It is wrong to suggest that they do not frequent the bars and restaurants and are not capable of demolishing the side of a cow and vacuuming up a barrel of lager. Or rather, it may be a correct impression if you don’t know how to attract them.

There are few places open in Playa de Muro during the late winter. But one restaurant that will be opening in February is Boy. Notwithstanding its potentially misunderstood name, Boy (the name was adopted as a translation of “chico”) has made itself a restaurant of choice for the cyclist. It helps that Juan Antonio himself is a keen user of two wheels, but that’s just a part of the story. The restaurant has forged a strong relationship not only with the springtime cycling fraternity but also with Max Huerzler who organises much of the cycling tourism.

Where others might ignore or moan about the value of this early tourism, Boy has turned it into an advantage. I think it’s known as running a business. And they have extended their own business by a couple of months by getting close to the cyclist market.

So when others are complaining, take a look at the terrace at Restaurant Boy on a sunny February late afternoon or early evening. All that lycra may not be to everyone’s taste, but all that lycra does indeed go to restaurants and does indeed spend money.


QUIZ
Yesterday – Grange Hill. Today’s title – one for those with long memories, this was a television pop show produced by whom?

(PLEASE REPLY TO andrew@thealcudiaguide.com AND NOT VIA THE COMMENTS THINGY HERE.)

Riding Along On A Pushbike

A baroness handbags a cyclist. A motorist who knocked down a cyclist and left him brain dead is imprisoned for 18 months. Two news stories from the UK, but they could equally well have come from here (and if you are wondering, there is such a thing as a “baronesa”).

As the cycling season starts, so the tensions will rise. There is an acute sense of love-hate where the cycling tourist and the cycle teams are concerned. Love because they do make some contribution to the otherwise benighted winter tourism; hate because … well why exactly?

Matthew Parris, writing in “The Times” on 27 December 2007, caused an almighty stink when he suggested that piano wire might be deployed to decapitate cyclists. Parris is not a commentator normally prone to gratuitously outrageous statements, unlike say Jeremy Clarkson who one could have well imagined having penned such a proposal. It was intended as a joke, but the cycling fraternity’s humour cell had been tossed aside and left with an empty bottle of high-energy drink in a hedgerow (to adapt one of Parris’s observations).

Parris concluded his piece thus: “Does cycling turn you into an insolent jerk? Or are insolent jerks drawn disproportionately to cycling?” It is these questions which help to explain the hate of cyclists. These and the “self-righteousness,” “the brutish disregard for all other road users”, the “bad manners” and the clothing.

As a condemnation of cyclists, Parris’s piece takes some beating. One feels loathe to agree for the reasons that cycling is such an enjoyable and healthy past-time/sport and that this hatred is seemingly irrational. But the trouble is that cyclists do get under drivers’ skins. This may all be some bonkers territorialism but it is a fact, and the great pelatons of cycle teams are the worst offenders at prompting this reaction.

I try desperately not to get needled, but it happens. And the causes are the perceived iniquities. Cyclists passing through red lights, nearly causing accidents; cyclists exiting roads that they have no right to exit, nearly causing accidents; cyclists three-abreast, overtaking each other and thus going four-abreast, nearly causing accidents (they are actually told to ride in single file). Nearly causing or actually causing accidents. A driver caught jumping a red or exiting a road illegally would get points on the licence. But cyclists seem largely immune. When, last year, I saw one being actually stopped by Trafico for going through a red, I commented that it was a miracle (27 April 2007).

The cycling season is just about upon us, and along with it will come all the oaths being shouted, all the horns being hit, all the gesticulations. But then cyclists do bolster the tourist economy, don’t they. Drive and ride safely.


QUIZ
Yesterday – Dead Or Alive. Today’s title – Careful, not who you might immediately think of, though the group you may immediately think of did do a cover many years later apparently. Who?

(PLEASE REPLY TO andrew@thealcudiaguide.com AND NOT VIA THE COMMENTS THINGY HERE.)