It’s All About The Price

How much does it cost for a tourist in Mallorca? I’ve spoken about this before, and we get a lot about tourist spend. In a piece on 5 July (Money, Money, Money!), I noted that average tourist spend was 809 euros. I was sceptical as to what this actually represented, but in today’s “Ultima Hora” there is a feature that seeks to break this spend down. The caveat for this is that the feature is biased towards Palma and its environs and probably to the Spanish tourist, but it concludes that the average weekly spend ranges from 600 to 800 euros, the difference largely depending on the type of accommodation. The upper limit of the spend on hotels is given as 525 euros for a week (for a four-star), with three-stars given as 392. So obviously the cost of accommodation is the single biggest item, but the article also included the cost of excursions and of food and drink.

Extrapolating from this to the situation for your average Brit, German or other tourist in Alcúdia, Pollensa or Can Picafort is not easy, but I’m inclined to think that the Ultima Hora figure is a bit on the low side. I say this as there is a greater cost for transport to and from the airport and also a greater spend on food and drink than the Spanish tourist more minded to do with a menu of the day and more minded not to guzzle his or her way through several large cold drinks. There is also one vital element the article does not consider - tobacco.

So, interesting, but by no means definitive.


I do not want to bang on about Diana, and thought I would not have reason to mention her again, but there is something rather odd about the Spanish reporting; odd, in that members of the Royal Family are no longer Charles, William and Harry, but Carlos, Guillermo and Enrique. Enrique! It’s not even that Henry is his name. But why does the press change the names? In Britain, does Juan-Carlos become John-Charles? For others, the press cannot make any “translation”. Gordon Brown, for instance, remains Gordon, there being no equivalent unless you take the Spanish “gordo” (for fat). But Tony Blair was never Antonio Blair, so why change the royals’ names? Strange stuff.

QUIZ
Yesterday - “Land of Confusion”, Genesis. Sorry, I said there would be no more Genesis. But there was. Today’s title - this is an incomplete line (missing two words) from a British folk (sort of) singer, whose one-time roadie has broken a restraining order. Who?

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

Don’t Look Back In Anger

Santa Margalida. The town of which Can Picafort is a part. It’s an unremarkable place, not one that attracts much in the way of tourism. Unlike the old towns of Alcúdia and Pollensa, it is not a particularly pretty place; it does not have the arty atmosphere of Pollensa or the landscaped splendour from Pollensa’s Calvari or the imposing walled heritage of Alcúdia. Yet it does have one claim. The fiesta “La Beata” is one of Mallorca’s most traditional. It celebrates the beatification, in 1792, of Catalina Thomàs who, so the legend has it, was tested by the devil to abjure God and to fall into the satanic abyss. Or something like that.

For many locals, La Beata is an event more significant than Christmas or New Year, being one with which they can most closely identify. Anyway, on 2 September this year’s procession will take place, promising “new vitality”, whatever that might be.

Of course, being a fiesta jolly, it cannot fail to have its other events of a more secular nature. Amongst others, tomorrow night, is a series of concerts with various groups, including Oasis. That’s what it says. On the poster. Oasis. It is not as it seems.

(Acknowledgement to “Part Forana” from which some of the above is taken in translation.)


It seems somehow appropriate that today, 31 August, I should be talking about a legendary saint. Today is of course the 10th anniversary of the death of someone to whom some have granted the status of modern-day saint. Everyone wants his or her piece of Diana ten years after; everyone with an angle, a conspiracy, a royalist or non-royalist agenda. Everyone obsessed with a personality cult, obsessed with what-ifs, with beatifying or demonising her. She is, therefore, an industry for the malicious, the reverential, the lunatic, the cynical, the worshipper. Whatever she really was, and I’m certainly not going to add my views, I will never forget the shock having turned on the radio that Sunday morning ten years ago. Whatever she really was, I defy anyone to say that they were not also shocked and saddened. Whatever she really was, why - as the Bishop of London says - the “regular reports of fury at this or that incident”? As for now: can we not just let it go?


QUIZ
Yesterday - Isley Brothers, a good shout, but it was Notorious B.I.G. Today - Oasis were at number one in the album charts on 31 August 1997. Who was at one in the singles chart?

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


Index for August 2007

1967 - 2 August 2007, 3 August 2007, 6 August 2007
Alcúdia - 14 August 2007, 20 August 2007, 27 August 2007
Alcúdia Jazz - 26 August 2007
Alcúdia Pins - 20 August 2007
All-inclusives - 16 August 2007, 18 August 2007
Andratx - 29 August 2007
Balearic Government - 26 August 2007
Bars - 1 August 2007, 10 August 2007, 17 August 2007, 28 August 2007, 30 August 2007
Beaches - 17 August 2007
Bodegas - 23 August 2007
British products - 28 August 2007
Café Bony - 1 August 2007
Can Picafort - 2 August 2007, 18 August 2007
Can Vidalet - 23 August 2007
Canny Lad, The - 17 August 2007
Carretera Arta - 7 August 2007
Children’s entertainment - 19 August 2007, 28 August 2007
Climate change - 3 August 2007
Diana Princess of Wales - 31 August 2007
El Laberinto Giant Maze Fun Park - 19 August 2007
Elvis impersonators - 9 August 2007
Estate agents - 27 August 2007
Excursions - 19 August 2007
Fiestas - 2 August 2007, 18 August 2007, 21 August 2007, 31 August 2007
Floods - 22 August 2007
Football - 10 August 2007
Golf Alcanada - 9 August 2007
Hotels - 20 August 2007, 28 August 2007
Indian Palace - 3 August 2007
Interest rates - 2 August 2007, 27 August 2007
Jazz - 26 August 2007
Jellyfish - 6 August 2007
La Beata - 31 August 2007
La Gola - 26 August 2007
Lilos - 29 August 2007
Manhole covers - 15 August 2007
Mortgages - 27 August 2007
Museums - 27 August 2007
Naturism - 17 August 2007
Palma metro - 22 August 2007
Patrona - 21 August 2007
Piccadilly Bar - 28 August 2007
Playa de Muro - 17 August 2007, 20 August 2007
Pollentia - 27 August 2007
Property market - 27 August 2007
Property prices - 2 August 2007
Railways - 26 August 2007
Restaurants - 3 August 2007, 9 August 2007
Road accidents - 17 August 2007
Roads - 7 August 2007, 15 August 2007
Rodríguez Castelao, Joaquín - 29 August 2007
Rubber ducks - 18 August 2007
Santa Margalida - 31 August 2007
Sea - 6 August 2007
Soller - 28 August 2007
Storms - 14 August 2007, 21 August 2007, 22 August 2007
Supermarkets - 23 August 2007, 28 August 2007
Television - 10 August 2007
Tobacco - 15 August 2007
Tourism - 11 August 2007, 14 August 2007
Tourism economics - 6 August 2007, 7 August 2007, 15 August 2007
Tourist spend - 2 August 2007, 6 August 2007, 7 August 2007
Vamps - 30 August 2007
Water - 26 August 2007
Weather - 14 August 2007, 21 August 2007, 22 August 2007, 24 August 2007, 28 August 2007, 29 August 2007
Wine - 23 August 2007