MALLORCA TODAY - Weather Alcúdia and Pollensa 4 January 2014

No Frills Excursions


Morning high (8.15am): 15.5C
Forecast high: 17C
Sea conditions (northern Mallorca; Alcúdia and Pollensa bays): Southwest 3 to 4 increasing 4 to 5 during the morning, 5 to 6 during the afternoon and veering West and Northwest 6 to 7 by the evening.

Mild morning, fairly cloudy, though rain likely to stay off until the evening. Wind and rough coastal conditions meaning yellow alerts are in place, the wind also a factor tomorrow but easing somewhat for the Kings' parades in the evening.

Evening update (18.15): The wind has made things colder than temperatures suggested. A high of 20.8C.

Society In Reverse: Spain's abortion reform

Strip away the religion and abortion remains an issue of morality and ethics. No one, or at least I assume no one, can ever suggest that it is an easy issue. It is not an issue which requires either men of religion (and it is of course men) or politicians to present the moral dilemma. But retain the religion and the issue is one of circumscribed moralism, of doctrinaire prescriptiveness that asserts the self-proclaimed moral authority of religion to dictate to secular society how it should think and behave. In addition, this religious assertiveness is embraced by zealous politicians eager to be bedfellows (no condoms allowed) in issuing dogma of scriptural correctness.

The reform of Spanish abortion law is the reaffirmation of the political-religious alliance of years past. It is regressive, a legislative move out of step with a changed society, which had been - the female members of it in particular - granted a greater liberalism in tune with progressive instincts of a modern Spain. But though religious doctrine is the philosophical basis for this reform, political dogma has provided the impetus. This is a reform which highlights the political divide in Spain, undoing as it does the relaxations on abortion introduced by the previous socialist government which operated according to its own dogma, one which was avowedly anti-clerical. It is a reform about the Catholic right-wing imposing its authority, regardless of changes that have occurred in society and regardless of medical opinion.

It was known that the Partido Popular government would enact the reform. It had after all filed actions against the Zapatero government's 2010 law, the one which had finally brought Spain more into line with much of Europe and which was viewed with horror by the Catholic Church, fearful of even more of its power evaporating. By removing the possibility of free choice to abort up to fourteen weeks, it is a reform which is more restrictive than that which had been in place before 2010. The Church may look upon it with delight, while the horror is on the faces of women, many health professionals and many in society who had believed that Spain had indeed thrown off the shackles of Catholic conservatism.

In theory, there could yet be amendments to the abortion bill, but in practice they are unlikely. Justice Minister Alberto Ruiz-Gallardón has ruled them out. However, he may just be moved to think again. Regional PP presidents - in Extremadura and Galicia - are among members of the PP who believe the reform goes too far.

These presidents, as well as city mayors, will be only too well aware of the potential damage that the reform could have. While the government has grappled with attempting to turn the economy around - its foremost concern - it has managed to undermine support for its austerity by engaging in legislation which casts it in a reactionary mould. To limits on protests can now be added abortion. The usual classification of the PP as "centre-right" (a questionable classification at the best of times) has been shown to be erroneous. This is a right-wing government and party, one that is displaying its historical roots. Regional presidents and mayors have every reason to be concerned that electorates will make them suffer.

Governments don't of course concentrate on single issues such as the economy. It is why they are governments. But there are times, and these are such times, when meddling in other issues appears counterproductive. It was Lord Palmerston who declared that "the function of government is to calm rather than to excite agitation." It is a reasonable maxim, but governments pay it little heed. Why enact something which will only serve to agitate an already agitated society?

In much the same way, the Balearic Government has been doing something similar with its law of symbols. It is a very different issue to abortion, granted, but would it not be a sign of wisdom to leave alone a matter which can only foment more agitation? In some respects, the attack on symbols, i.e. the Catalan flag, is far less wise than the national government's abortion reform, as it is a case of tilting at windmills. The Catalanist enemy within, if it exists, sits in a corner of Balearics society being paid little attention to. President Bauzá only succeeds in drawing the enemy into the centre of the room, all the time threatening his position and his attempts to take society with him along the course of righting economic woes.

There is a point at which political dogma and its consequent legislation become expressions of fanaticism. Abortion is most definitely not an easy issue. It is one for which there is arguably no right, only a wrong. So it becomes a question of the scale of the wrong and what drives it. When fanaticism takes the wheel and places society into reverse, only a wrong turn can be made.

MALLORCA TODAY - German man in Puerto Pollensa dies after attack in home

Kurt Schwab, a retired German businessman, aged 78, has died five days after two men attacked him in his home in Puerto Pollensa, handcuffing him and subjecting him to repeated blows. The victim's wife also suffered injuries. Nothing of any value, it would appear, was taken from the house.

See more: Diario de Mallorca

MALLORCA TODAY - Weather Alcúdia and Pollensa 3 January 2014

No Frills Excursions


Morning high (8.00am): 13.5C
Forecast high: 20C
Sea conditions (northern Mallorca; Alcúdia and Pollensa bays): Southwest 3 to 4.

With southerlies dominating, very mild, and possibly quite warm today. Going downhill tomorrow though with rain coming in.

Evening update (18.15): Well, that was a warm day. A high of 22C.

1914 And All That: The Pollensa School

No explanation is needed as to why the year 2014 marks a very important centenary. But while 1914 and the start of the Great War will be commemorated in various countries, in Spain there is less reason to: the country was of course neutral. Though Spain stayed out of the war, there were enormous internal tensions. Political violence was on the increase, led to no small extent by the followers of Antoni Maura, the Mallorcan who was Spanish prime minister on various occasions. The "Maurists" were to prove to be something of a precursor to the Falange, formed in 1933 by the son of the first dictator Miguel Primo de Rivera.

The war and the tensions left Mallorca relatively untouched. Its idyllic isolation was a contributory factor which made 1914 a year of importance for a very different reason to war. It was the year that art really made its mark on the island. It was the year when the Pollensa School was founded.

The Argentinian painter Francisco Bernareggi, reflecting on his time in Mallorca, said in 1949: "That landscape in Mallorca is extraordinary. You cannot imagine anything like it. Olive trees shade the beach, such as the one of the Cala de Tuent, and fishermen's boats are moored from their trunks. These are trees from the time of the Apostles. Its landscape is poetic, pictorial and musical."

The Tramuntana mountains and the coves like that of Tuent were what helped to attract painters to Mallorca. Prior to the establishment of the Pollensa School, two painters from Barcelona, Santiago Rusiñol and Joaquim Mir, had come to Mallorca; the first time was in 1893. They stayed in Pollensa and Cala San Vicente as well as in Sa Calobra, Palma and Valldemossa. Rusiñol it was who was instrumental in another painter from Barcelona, Hermenegildo Anglada Camarasa, coming to the island. It was Camarasa and the Argentinian Tito Cittadini who were to create the "school" in 1914.

Though the Pollensa School became the most important artistic movement on the island, a Deyá School had been formed some years earlier. Bernareggi was one of this group. So Mallorca had been gaining a reputation during the early years of the twentieth century, and for painters who were predominantly based in Paris, like Camarasa, Mallorca offered a location well away from the gathering turmoil in Europe. It was tranquil, it was isolated, it was beautiful, it was idyllic. It was a painters' paradise. Removed from the horrors of war, Mallorca was paradise and utopia and the Pollensa School was its pictorial chronicler.

It can't be underestimated how important this artistic movement was not only to the world of art. In the history of the Fomento del Turismo (the Mallorca Tourist Board), which was nine years old at the outbreak of war, art played a very significant role in the development of tourism. The war meant that there was little by way of tourism, but the output of what became known as the Pollensa School and the "American artists" was extremely useful to the tourist board in spreading the name of Mallorca. The school was doubly important in this regard because the war meant that the island was deprived of the person who had been, up to this point, the prime promoter of Mallorca, the honorary president of the tourist board Archduke Luis Salvador, who was recalled to Prague (and indeed died in 1915).

These American artists were central and southern Americans. In addition to Cittadini, there was, for example, the Mexican Roberto Montenegro and yet another Argentinian, Roberto Ramaugé. These two had close links with, respectively, Puerto Pollensa and Formentor. Montenegro stayed at the Hotel Miramar, which had opened in 1912, and mainly paid by donating paintings to the hotel. Ramaugé bought the Punta Avançada on the Formentor promontory, and with it came Sa Fortalesa, which became a base for all manner of artists. As well as Camarasa, Cittadini, Rusiñol and Mir, visitors included the Argentinian poet Adan Diehl, and he was to be behind the Hotel Formentor, which opened its doors in 1929. Another visitor to Sa Fortalesa was the Spanish classical guitarist, Andrés Segovia.

Rather like the Archduke, who had invited various intellectuals, artists, scientists and others to the Miramar in Valldemossa in the nineteenth century, so Ramaugé and his fellow artists created a centre of artistic excellence in Pollensa. The founding of the "school" by Camarasa and Cittadini in 1914 had been the impetus behind this and behind also an artistic and cultural tradition that Pollensa has enjoyed ever since. 1914 was an important year therefore, the year when the Pollensa School started, though the actual title of the Pollensa School was not, or so it would appear, coined until 1916. It was a journalist called Pedro Ferrer, who had a close relationship with Camarasa, Montenegro and others, who seemingly first used it in a book published in Barcelona which was called, oddly enough, "Flirt".

Photo: Mountain by Hermen Anglada Camarasa.

MALLORCA TODAY - Weather Alcúdia and Pollensa 2 January 2014

No Frills Excursions


Morning high (8.15am): 14C
Forecast high: 17C
Sea conditions (northern Mallorca; Alcúdia and Pollensa bays): Southwest 4 increasing 5 at intervals and also easing 3 occasionally.

A much warmer morning. Due to be mostly sunny. Fine tomorrow but rain due to come in on Saturday.

Evening update (19.00): A high of 17.7C on a day that has been a mix of cloud and occasional sun. 

What Has Happened To Malén Ortiz?

Mallorca is a small place. It is not a place where a crime can be committed, a serious one that is, and for it to be easy for the perpetrator to hide or escape. The smallness of the island is one reason why it isn't easy. Being an island is another. But crimes can go unresolved, just as they can anywhere. In the case of Malén Ortiz, it is still unknown if a crime has been committed. A month on from her disappearance, and the investigation shows no sign of uncovering a crime or of proving, one way or another, how or why she went missing.

Though a small place, people can disappear in Mallorca. They may disappear without any crime having taken place, but it is hard to say categorically that no crime has occurred. One thinks of Jacqueline Tennant, the rep who disappeared over six years ago when she was out hiking on a day off from the hotel at which she was based in Can Picafort. Her body has never been found. It may never be found. And one says that there is a body to be found with just ever such a slight doubt. Might she actually be alive? It would seem very unlikely. It is unlikely there was any foul play, though who can say for sure? The most likely explanation for her disappearance is that she met with an accident in the mountains. She may have fallen into the sea. No one knows.

Malén Ortiz wasn't in the mountains. She was near to her school in Calvia. Just after three o'clock on the afternoon of 2 December, she phoned her boyfriend to arrange to go to his house for something to eat. She then left a text message for her father to tell him where she was going. A security camera, viewed some days after she had disappeared, recorded her movement, heading in the direction of Son Ferrer where Dani, her boyfriend, lives. Another camera, close by, did not record her movement.

Initially, Malén's disappearance bore all the hallmarks of a problem at home. She lives with her father Alejandro and younger brother. The parents are separated. Her mother was in Thailand when she went missing. Both parents pleaded for her to come home, the mother saying that Malén could come and live with her if she no longer wanted to live with her father. The assumption that was being made was that Malén was staying with someone. That she was a runaway. That she had gone missing voluntarily.

A month on and this hypothesis is shot to pieces. Police have been searching small manmade lakes in the Son Ferrer area; they have been searching in the sea. They have looked for her in a flat in the Es Pil-lari area of Palma, having apparently found a message on social media that came from the girl. She wasn't there. They have even searched for Malén in the Son Banya district of Palma, the neighbourhood notorious for its drug dealing and drugs gangs. And to make the story stranger, "El Ico", one of the La Paca clan, the chief gang in Son Banya, has offered a reward for information that will lead to her being found. Her father says that he came into contact with El Ico purely because of Malén disappearance; he wanted to help. Investigators were nevertheless surprised by El Ico's intervention.

The search for Malén has drawn criticism. The hypothesis that she had gone missing voluntarily may have been why the search was suspended for a weekend. The indications were, those that were being discussed in the media and social media, that the police expected her to be found. But these indications proved to be false. The search effort has intensified over the past few days. The voluntary disappearance theory looked ever more shaky when the two video recordings were taken into account.

Four days after she went missing, Teresa Palmer, who is the government delegate for the Balearics and so the person ultimately responsible for police and security matters in Mallorca, reiterated the view that Malén had left home and that she had acted "voluntarily". Alejandro Ortiz did not subscribe to this view, even if he and family and friends posted a video on YouTube calling for her to come home.

It wasn't until just about Christmas Day that the official line changed decisively. Malén's disappearance had not been voluntary. Meantime, on 20 December, there was an attempted abduction of an 18-year-old girl in Sa Pobla. It may have had nothing to do with Malén, but it inspired Alejandro Ortiz to issue a third video, one calling on the people of Mallorca to help find her. It was now being openly admitted that Malén had probably been kidnapped.

Small place Mallorca may be, but people can disappear. Malén Ortiz, though, is not a woman in her forties who in all likelihood had a terrible accident. She is a fifteen-year-old schoolgirl who was on her way to have lunch with her boyfriend. A month on, the runaway hypothesis having been dismissed, serious questions have to be asked.

MALLORCA TODAY - Weather Alcúdia and Pollensa 1 January 2014

No Frills Excursions


Morning high (8.15am): 8C
Forecast high: 16C
Sea conditions (northern Mallorca; Alcúdia and Pollensa bays): West 3 to 4 backing Southwest 4 to 5 later.

A cold New Year's Day morning. Clear skies with sun during the day. For the rest of the week, staying fine and getting a bit warmer.

Evening update (19.45): A high of 18.9C, so pretty warm for the first of January.

Mallorca In 2014 ... Just Like 2013, 2012, 2011, 2010 ... ?

Tradition demands that the end of the old year and the start of the new year are celebrated by looks back at the old year and looks forward to the new. I have indulged in both over the past seven years but not fastidiously. If I could be bothered, I did; if I couldn't be bothered, I didn't. But being curious as to what I might or might not have said, I have delved into the archives, starting with awards for 2006.

Notable among these was the Special Bryan Adams Award For Murdering What Was Already Lousy Music. It went to the Ecuadorean pipe players who still insist on putting in appearances on market days. The award went to them because, as I had observed on 27 May, 2006: "The next time I’m trying to avoid a market and I hear the strains of canned Ecuadorean “Everything I Do ...” piping its way across a hot square, I will take one of the offending pipes and oblige by indeed doing it for them and placing it in a part of the anatomy perfectly moulded and sculpted to accept a pipe". There was also the First Choice Contribution To Local Culture Award. It went to a rep at a hotel in Puerto Pollensa, one which is barely a minute's walk from the pinewalk. She had, by this time, been at the hotel for a couple of months. Rep: “What’s this photo of?” Me: "The Calvari steps." Rep: "And this?" Me: "The pinewalk, here in Puerto Pollensa." Rep: "Oh yes, I must go there some time."

It took a couple of years for me to be bothered again, and so at the start of 2009 I offered some predictions for the year ahead. Only one of them sort of proved to be correct, though the effects of crisis on fiestas didn't really hurt hard until the following year. "The economic crisis will hit the annual fiestas hard. Firework displays are cancelled, but everyone is given a sparkler." Other predictions were, sadly, wrong.

"1. The British Government, as part of its anti-obesity drive, realises that a major contribution to the nation's lard mountain is the Alcúdia and Can Picafort all-inclusive. A short waddle from the lift to the pool, and that's the exercise for the day, save for one belly-flop that creates a parting of the pool's waves. Otherwise, the only other movements of the already lard-bucket chav ASBO cases are to raise an arm in order to cram ever more pizza and grease and watered-down lager and, therefore ever more fatness, into their gobs, from which emanates some occasional vomit or an admonishing shout directed at a hideous and equally voluminous offspring as it prepares to shit in the aforementioned pool. Step forward, consequently, HM Government with an order via Brussels to ban all all-inclusives.

"2. Alcúdia's Mile will be decreed a site of international heritage and cultural importance. And because they can't raise the money to effect the re-development, the old power station, rather than a science and technology museum, will become a giant bouncy castle.

"3. Albufera is turned into the world's largest water theme park. And just to make things more interesting, they release a bunch of crocodiles as well."

At the end of 2010, I wrote an article entitled "The Year Of Living Corruptly". I suppose this could have applied to any year over the past God knows how long, but 2010 it was, and the article contained quotes from the spokesperson for the new political party, the UPyD (it was three years old then). "The Balearics have the highest number of people who are corrupt or allegedly corrupt per square metre in Spain." He then reeled off a list of cases, all of them ongoing, and concluded by saying that all the main executive and legislative bodies in the islands are implicated along with various individuals - "businesspeople who are friends of certain politicians, businesspeople who assemble companies in order to receive adjudications decided by their political friends, as well as the wives, husbands, cousins and nephews of politicians".

For 2011, I forecast that it would be the same procedure as every year, borrowing the hilarious (sic) line from the unfunniest comedy ever made, "Dinner For One", the popularity of which among Germans says much about cultural differences when it comes to comedy. What did 2011 hold? Moans about all-inclusives, for example. And talk of protests. Complaints about dog mess in Puerto Pollensa, about the price of car rental, about the price of a cup of coffee. The same procedure as every year.

In 2012, there were no predictions, but right at the start of that year there was an article which might now seem vaguely prophetic. It started thus: "Are you aware that in twenty years time half the world's population will be homosexual?" This was what two leading figures in the Catholic Church were saying, taking aim at both UNESCO and the former Zapatero government and alleged pink liberalism. What seems prophetic now is that, despite Pope Francis having ushered in a humbler and more tolerant Church, the now Spanish Government appears to want to turn the clock back to the days when it was the Vatican's standard-bearer for Catholic fundamentalism. I hesitate to suggest, however, that 2014 will witness a return to the Inquisition, so exclude this possibility from my predictions for this year. Instead, I forecast that this year there will be complaints about a lack of winter tourism, about a lack of flights to and from Palma in winter, about all-inclusives, about holiday rentals. Same procedure as every year, except for President Bauzá being ousted in the Balearics. Well, that at least would be interesting ...

MALLORCA TODAY - Weather Alcúdia and Pollensa 31 December 2013

No Frills Excursions


Morning high (7.45am): 6C
Forecast high: 16C
Sea conditions (northern Mallorca; Alcúdia and Pollensa bays): Southwest 3 increasing 4 to 5

Crisp and clear and set fair for a sunny day, clouding over somewhat though for tonight's revelries. New Year's Day, remaining fine.

Evening update (18.15): Colder than had been forecast, a high of just 14.5C.

Heading For Rockier Rocks: Bauzá in 2014

What a difference a few days make. A look forward to what 2014 might bring has changed as a result of Carlos Delgado's resignation. Before the resignation one could have predicted a rocky but nonetheless unswerving year for President Bauzá. With the resignation the scenarios shift. They will still be rocky but they might be less rocky or rockier still.

I have suggested that Delgado's departure might mean that the Partido Popular is looked upon with less animosity. The cheers that went up when his resignation was announced had comparatively little to do with his day job as tourism minister. They were to do with Delgado the dogmatic defender of Castilian, the arch "españolista" in the Bauzá administration and the philosophical champion of anti-regionalism.

Bauzá must know that he has a problem with the government's stance on Catalan and with its indifference towards regionalism. With Delgado out of the way, he could take the opportunity to soften this stance and so reduce the animosity. There will be many in his party (and formerly in his party) who will be urging him to do so, not least those who were helpful to him in the past. The dislike for Delgado was what prompted certain grandees, now disaffected, to support Bauzá at the last leadership election.

These grandees might have been naïve, but they hadn't anticipated that the former mayor of Marratxí would turn into Delgado Mark II. One-time backers of Bauzá, Jaume Font and Antoni Pastor, pro-Catalan and pro-regionalism, have both fled the PP; the first voluntarily, the second because he was excommunicated. Of those who haven't fled, old-school sorts such as Pere Rotger, Cristofal Soler and Gabriel Cañellas who were of a PP regionalist bent, have looked on as previous moderation has given way to radicalism. Cañellas didn't say so directly in his recent address at the PP's annual awards, but it was clear what his metaphors meant. Jeroni Salom, the party's president, has been less than fulsome in his praise of Bauzá. Mayors have fallen out with Bauzá over language and even over the new casino - Isern in Palma at any rate. His opponents now begin to appear as though they are a small army preparing for battle.

There are concerns that Bauzá is damaged goods and that his candidacy for president in 2015 would be harmful to the PP. He remains odds-on to be the candidate, but the mutterings are growing louder. Change might be in the air, and with Delgado, the president's ideological soul mate, having taken himself off to find richer pastures outside politics, the Bauzáists (or should that be Delgadoists) are deprived of their guiding light and look increasingly vulnerable. Bauzá can go one of two ways. He can soften and enjoy a relatively smooth ride. Or he can be unmoved or harden and face potential revolution. It is unlikely to be the former. He can't backtrack on Catalan, teaching or the law of symbols. Were he to, then he would be damaged beyond the repair of lost credibility.

Bauzá can at least draw on the support of his government inner circle, but events during 2012 and 2013 have made his cabinet one which comprises lightweights who owe their positions to patronage. Whatever one thought of Delgado, he was a politician of some substance, and so were Pep Aguiló and Rafael Bosch, both sacked in May. Who can Bauzá now call upon? A political hack at tourism (one who, however, might stick to the task of tourism rather than be involved in running the government show); Mrs. Malaprop, Joana Camps, out of her depth at education; Marti Sansaloni, last man standing at the health ministry following two resignations, and heavily criticised over his insensitivity regarding the Alpha Pam affair; Antonio Gómez, originally minister to the president (a sort of without portfolio function) and now the vice-president, who recently attacked the one-time PP member, Antoni Pastor, calling him a turncoat and a "disgrace" to the Balearic Parliament. Bauzá was forced to reprimand him.

There is a general view that Bauzá has managed to lose people of substance and to surround himself with mediocrity. And it shouldn't be overlooked that he himself was totally new to the upper echelons of politics when he became president. There is an unnerving sense of a government bound together by a radical programme that causes division within local society and by gratitude to its leader but which lacks experience, wisdom and savvy. Rocky or rockier still? I'll opt for the latter.


Index for December 2013

Algaida and tourism development plans - 8 December 2013
Balearics identity - 3 December 2013
Carlos Delgado's resignation - 28 December 2013, 31 December 2013
Catalan Lands don't exist - 12 December 2013
Catalonia's referendum - 13 December 2013
Christmas songs - 17 December 2013
Citizen Safety Law - 1 December 2013
Corruption in Spain - 6 December 2013
Eurovegas - 15 December 2013
Funds for resort modernisation - 18 December 2013
GOB: forty years - 9 December 2013
Gotmar improvements - 26 December 2013
Holiday rentals - 11 December 2013
Jaime Martinez, tenth Balearics tourism minister - 29 December 2013
Law of Symbols - 20 December 2013
Mallorca/Spain quiz of the year - 25 December 2013, 27 December 2013
Marca España decline - 10 December 2013
Non-hotel sector organisation - 27 December 2013
Quotes of the year - 24 December 2013
Paramount theme park - 19 December 2013
Pardons asked for in corruption cases - 16 December 2013
Partido Popular Larus awards - 23 December 2013
PISA survey and Balearics educational performance - 4 December 2013
Ramon Llull and the national education ministry - 14 December 2013
Rural tourism - 22 December 2013
Spain's tourism promotion - 30 December 2013
Tax breaks for hotels opening all year - 7 December 2013
Thomson Scene brand - 5 December 2013
Tourism season benefited hoteliers only - 2 December 2013
Urban tourism - 21 December 2013

MALLORCA TODAY - Weather Alcúdia and Pollensa 30 December 2013

No Frills Excursions


Morning high (8.15am): 7.5C
Forecast high: 14C
Sea conditions (northern Mallorca; Alcúdia and Pollensa bays): Variable 2 to 3, West dominating during the morning. Swell to one metre.

A chilly, clear morning. A good deal of sun likely but staying on the chilly side. Forecast for New Year's Eve and New Year's Day is good and a bit warmer.

Evening update (19.15): A high of 16.9C, so rather better than had been forecast. 

The 5.5 Million Gamble: Spain's tourism promotion

When the 2.7 million euros for Balearics tourism promotion in 2014 is derided, as it is often is, a thought should be spared for promotion budgets elsewhere. I have previously noted the higher regional budgets, e.g. those of the Canaries and especially Catalonia, but what about the national budget, that at the command of the national tourism institute, Turespaña? You might be amazed to learn that it will be all of 5.5 million euros in 2014, only twice as much as the Balearics and lower than the Canaries. There again, you might be even more amazed to learn that it was only 1.1 million euros this year.

The figures don't do full justice because they don't include all the work done by  tourism offices and delegations in parts of the globe. There is more to what Turespaña does than merely promotional campaigns, but one can't help but feel that 5.5 million euros is a pretty miserly sum for a country with such a high dependence on tourism. Marta Blanco, the new director-general, will argue (and she already has) that it isn't miserly because it is five times the 2013 budget, but five point five million ...? It sounds like a promotional drop in the Atlantic, Pacific, Indian and any other ocean you might wish to mention.

Not, it must be said, that these oceans are particularly relevant, except for European countries with an Atlantic coastline, most obviously France and Great Britain. The 5.5 million is mostly going to be spent on mature tourism markets, says Sra. Blanco. So much, therefore, for all those emerging markets. Apparently it is a far more efficient use of resources to concentrate on established markets, which it probably is, but tourism in 2013 and 2104 does not live by established markets alone. Or shouldn't.

These established European markets will be regaled with promotion which focuses on urban tourism, cultural tourism, health tourism, shopping tourism, meetings tourism and, a newer theme, so it is said, rural tourism. My just having examined two of these - urban and rural - was coincidental but it was fortuitous, as things have turned out. There is an obvious form of tourism that isn't due to be focused on, that of sun and beach. Fair enough perhaps as it pretty much sells itself, but Spanish tourism should never neglect the bread and butter and the bucket and spade that got it to where it is, no more so than in Mallorca.

On rural tourism though, this has a sense of back-to-the-future promotion. Before the days of the Costas and the Mallorcan beaches being packed by northern Europeans in desperate search of post-austerity sun in the late 1950s and 1960s, rural tourism was a big thing. Or at least, the Franco regime attempted to make it a big thing. It eyed up what the French were doing and had hopes of a tourism that was and still is very much more diverse than Spanish tourism. With hindsight, it is perhaps a shame that the diversity and spread between countryside and coast which typifies French tourism was never attained in Spain. The coasts would look very different, had it been.

As my two recent articles noted, urban tourism is a growth market while rural tourism is in a bit of a trough. It seems counter-intuituive to therefore promote a type of tourism that has registered a 10% fall in general tourism terms, but this said, maybe rural tourism could do with some more effective promotion. Back in the day, i.e. before the peseta dropped and Franco's mob came to understand that tourists wanted to go to the seaside, a not untypical image was the "Castilian Landscape" of a rainbow tumbling into a wheat field. Perhaps it's unsurprising that it never took off. One trusts that current-day promotion might be better.

Where Mallorca is concerned, a Turespaña drive in urban and rural tourism might be beneficial and opportune, despite my misgivings about Palma as an urban tourism destination and about the contribution of rural tourism to the island. The new Balearics tourism minister, having helped with the clauses regarding the advancement of rural tourism in the 2012 bill, will doubtless be happy and will be sending felicitations to a fellow novice in Sra. Blanco.

The campaign for 2014 is the first which she will have overseen since her surprising appointment in September to succeed Manuel Butler. It was a surprise to many in the tourism industry who had never heard of her. A career politico with banking experience, like Martinez in the Balearics and Borrego at the national tourism ministry, one does have to wonder as to the personnel in charge of tourism both regionally and nationally. Still, she seems like a very nice lady, and I wish her well. But really ... 5.5 million euros? Is that all?

MALLORCA TODAY - Weather Alcúdia and Pollensa 29 December 2013

No Frills Excursions


Morning high (8.15am): 11.5C
Forecast high: 14C
Sea conditions (northern Mallorca; Alcúdia and Pollensa bays): North 3 to 4 backing Northwest during the morning. Swells to one metre.

Some rain overnight, a largely cloudy morning and a colder day in prospect. The forecast for New Year's Eve and New Year's Day is better: not especially warm but little chance of rain.

Evening update (19.00): Got sunnier after a greyish start. Chilly though, a high of 14.7C.

The Ten Tourism Ministers Of Mallorca

The coronation of the new Balearics tourism minister failed to acknowledge a landmark in the islands' tourism ministerial history. Jaime Martinez is the tenth tourism minister since tourism ministers started to be appointed in 1983.

To give the full list of ministers, they have been Jaume Cladera, Joan Flaquer (twice), José María González Ortea, Celesti Alomar, Francesc Buils, Miquel Nadal, Miquel Ferrer, Joana Barceló and of course Carlos Delgado. Of thirty years of the ministry, seventeen of these years saw only two ministers - Cladera for ten and Flaquer for seven. With Martinez now getting his feet under the ministerial desk, his appointment means that eight ministers have averaged just a fraction longer than a year and a half in office.

One does have to bear in mind of course that during the last administration there were no fewer than four ministers. Buils and Nadal both had to go and both have since been convicted. Ferrer lasted only a few weeks before his party, the old Unió Mallorquina, was booted out of the coalition. Barceló got the job solely because the president, Francesc Antich, was desperate to find someone, anyone, from his own PSOE party to take over. Four ministers over the course of a four-year administration between 2007 and 2011 help to explain the low average tenure of Balearics tourism ministers.

Delgado's resignation is indicative of instability in two respects. One is the cabinet of President Bauzá because of its resignations and reshuffle dismissals. The other is the job of tourism minister. A new minister can be expected after elections, but the ministry has now had six ministers in six years. Continuity, it might be said, has been in somewhat short supply. So also has been contentment among those in the tourism industry. The Balearics, for a region that pioneered mass tourism, has a pretty lamentable recent record when it comes to governing this tourism.

But what of these various ministers? The one who stands out is the first minister, Jaume Cladera. He had the job for the longest period and of all of them he has been the only one of whom it can be said that he was genuinely qualified. His background was tourism before he became vice-president of the Mallorca Tourist Board in 1979 and was a logical choice to be minister in the first regional government in 1983. Of others, Alomar had been the director of the old IBATUR promotion agency prior to becoming minister in 1999, but none could boast Cladera's industry background.

Starting pretty much from scratch, Cladera was bound to make some impact. And, by introducing the plan for tourism and for introducing all manner of legislation to do with tourism, he did make an impact. He commanded a deal of respect as well as being a symbol of stability for the industry.

It isn't a pre-requisite of ministerial office that a minister has to have a background specific to his portfolio, but it certainly helps if he or she does.  President Bauzá appeared to acknowledge as much when he appointed Gabriel Company, at the time an independent and not a member of the Partido Popular, to head the agriculture-environment-land mega-ministry. Company was a businessman with years of experience in agriculture, but in terms of economic importance agriculture is a long way behind tourism. Why, therefore, is there not a minister with specific industry knowledge? Someone like, say, a Jaume Cladera?

The new man Martinez has been knocking around the tourism ministry as well as Calvia town hall over the years. He knows about tourism, but this isn't the same as understanding tourism or, perhaps more importantly, understanding tourists. Part of the Calvia clique which Delgado, rather like a new football manager, took with him to the ministry, it can be said that Martinez has experience of administration in one of Spain's most important tourist towns. But does he have experience of tourists? What does he really know of the differing types of tourist, the differing nature of tourism in Calvia and therefore in Mallorca and the Balearics? Administration yes, but not necessarily experience of the right variety. An architect by profession, what have been his priorities? As with the Mallorcan property lawyer Isabel Borrego who is the national secretary of state for tourism, there is the fear that he views tourism as an exercise in real estate and bricks and mortar (and a certain type of bricks and mortar) rather than in hearts and minds.

Do we, though, expect too much from tourism ministers? There are certain issues which they can do precious little to influence - all-inclusives being one, save perhaps from legally established standards of service. There are others which they can influence; holiday rentals is one, were they of a mind to. But the expectation lies more with a sense of vision, and this is most unlikely to ever come from someone whose knowledge of tourism is administrative as opposed to strategic and hands-on. Martinez is really no different to most tourism ministers that the Balearics have had in this regard. The tenth minister, and the ninth not to have come from the industry.

MALLORCA TODAY - Weather Alcúdia and Pollensa 28 December 2013

No Frills Excursions


Morning high (8.15am): 12.5C
Forecast high: 17C
Sea conditions (northern Mallorca; Alcúdia and Pollensa bays): Southwest 4 to 5 veering Northwest during the afternoon and easing North 3 by the evening.

Bit breezy. Should be sunny. The outlook for the next two days is for lower temperatures and sun.

Evening update (18.45): A high of 20.7C. So not bad.

He Killed Bambi: Carlos Delgado's resignation

So, farewell, Carlos, we shall miss your entertainment factor. We say goodbye to you, slayer of Bambi. You gave us a pantomime last year - "Cinderella And The Magic Orbs" - when as Prince Charming you told Cinderella that your hat was made from magic sea-grass orbs. Cinderella thought they were a deer's testicles. Silly girl. We say goodbye also to your finding a nice little job for your lady of Lourdes at your ministry (46,000 euros a year). What a pity you had to withdraw the job offer. She was so well qualified after all, your girlfriend, now Mrs. Delgado. We wonder what Lourdes made of the magic sea-orbs and how the photo of them came to be in the press. Did she speak to your former wife? We bid farewell also to your comparing the Guardia Civil investigators of alleged irregularities at Radio Calvia when you were mayor to a fascist, whoring, heavy-drinking, Atletico Madrid-supporting fictional comic detective. Is it true you had offered to resign at the end of June? Was that not when you were making this comparison?

We wish you safe journey also knowing that you gave the hoteliers all that they could have wished for, that you did nothing to help the non-hotel sector or the owners of private apartments for holiday rental, that you could only run to a tourism promotion budget of 2.7 million euros a year, that you turned the Balearics exhibition stand in Berlin into a laughing-stock, that you didn't concentrate only on tourism, that you were the power behind anti-Catalan policy, behind trilingual teaching policy, behind slagging off mayors who disagreed with this policy, behind getting nice Rafael Bosch removed as education minister. Or maybe some of this should only be allegedly.

Perhaps you don't deserve only opprobrium. There is so little money, and that tourism promotion budget had previously been wasted on the stupid. You were not wrong in this regard. Nor were you wrong in attempting to drive modernisation and renewal of hotels and resorts. Nor were you wrong in moving promotional efforts to greater use of new technologies. This use was in your tourism plan. It looked very impressive. You were not wrong, but we haven't seen any evidence. Nor have we seen any evidence of improvements to winter tourism. Do you remember these? True, the two-to-three years are not yet up, but the meagre spends on promotion were going to reap some benefit and your plan for winter tourism was the first ever such plan for winter tourism. Wasn't this what you told us?

Now you have gone, where are you going? Do you have a nice job in business somewhere? It must be good in order for you to leave politics and not just the tourism ministry. You had so much ambition. Two times you had tried to become leader and two times you had missed out. First to Rosa Estaras and then to your chum José Ramón Bauzá. Or is he your chum? Rival? It's hard to say, but many say that it was you, and not José Ramón, who was the driving-force in the party. What will he do now that you have gone?

And what can we expect of your successor? Jaime Martinez. "Square man". Isn't this the nickname he has? Something like this. He clearly enjoys a good lunch anyway. What will he do now that you have gone? You had at least been mayor of Calvia before you became minister. Calvia, town of Magalluf, Santa Ponsa, Peguera, Illetes, Palmanova. Town of so much tourism. More than any other town in Mallorca. More than mostly any town in Spain. Yes, you must have known about tourism. But what of Jaime? He was an architect. He worked with you at the town hall and then he became director-general at the ministry. Now he has your job. What will he have learned from you? What will he know of tourism other than drawing up architects' plans for hotel developments? Oh, possibly quite a lot. How you praised his efforts in putting together the tourism law, the one with so much for the hotels and so little for others.

Farewell, Carlos. Mallorca's politics will not be the same without you. The deer's balls, the girlfriend's job, the slur on the Guardia. And there was also your saying that the Costas Authority were useless (maybe we didn't completely disagree with you on this one) and the business with your personal trainer, his sister and the 800 grand. Whatever that was all about. With your going, we lose not just entertainment but also interest. You were never boring, put it that way. Maybe we also lose some honesty and consistency. Why were people so taken aback by your policies? You had spoken of them before the elections in 2011. We knew what you thought. We might not have agreed, but you said what you believed in and, for the most part, you did not veer from saying what you believed in.

And I have lost a prime character in the Mallorcan play. In the Mallorcan political pantomime. You have been my Prince Charming, my Hercules Grytpype-Thynne, my Carlos Slim. Or simply, Carlos. Your Christian name alone was enough. We knew who you were. We shall indeed miss you.

The Mallorca (And Spain) Quiz Of The Year - Answers

Here is the quiz posted on Christmas Day together with the answers. 

Majorca/Balearics
1. A theme park in Sineu was talked about. What was to have been its theme?
Dinosaurs.
2. Javier Salinas became the new what in January?
Bishop of Majorca.
3. A Mr. Gary Gale produced a map of the world in which the small town of Búger was the only place in Majorca to be identified. What was it a map of?
Rude place names.
4. A town hall was raided by the Guardia Civil, acting on complaints regarding the town's radio station. Which town?
Calvia.
5. A book was published about the Canamunt and Canavall. Who were they?
Two clans whose feud lasted for much of the seventeenth century and which was typified by violence and murder.
6. The 2009 Miss Balearics, Verónica Hernández, was appointed as secretary to whom?
President Bauzá.
7. The German tour operator Oböna opened the first what this year?
Naturist hotel in Majorca (in Colonia Sant Pere).
8. Who was told to stay away from the Minorcan and Ibizan stands at this year's Madrid Travel Fair?
The tourism minister Carlos Delgado.
9. Majorca was referred to as the "seventeenth state" and was said to be "toppling". The seventeenth state of where?
Germany. This was in the report into Majorca's "dark side of summer" by the newspaper Bild am Sonntag.
10. In June, the Balearic Government dropped plans for what sort of taxes?
Green taxes on large retail centres, some packaging and car hire.
11. "The Sunday Times" journalist Matt Rudd wrote an article entitled "Escape from All-catraz". What was he writing about?
An all-inclusive hotel in Can Picafort.
12. Where is there an arena called La Macarena? What is it and why has it not been used since 2008?
Felanitx.
It is the bullring and is considered to be unsafe.
13. Who, during a press briefing whilst visiting the King at Marivent Palace, referred to Majorca as the "island of Palma"?
Mariano Rajoy.
14. Which two towns were said to have been the hottest (temperature-wise) during August's heatwave?
Muro and Sa Pobla.
15. Despite economic crisis, the number of what type of business had increased by 15% in 2012?
Bars and restaurants.
16. Minorca has this year celebrated twenty years since UNESCO declared it to be what?
A biosphere reserve.
17. What type of tourism is said to attract a tourist who spends twice as much per day as regular tourists?
Golf.
18. An amnesty on 20,000 what is due to form part of a new law in the Balearics?
Illegal rural properties.
19. Under reforms of local government, the number of what are set to be reduced from 701 to 206 in Majorca?
Paid councillors.
20. An estimate of 28.6 million euros was placed on demolishing which uncompleted building?
Palma's Palacio de Congresos.
21. The German Frank Hanebuth was arrested in Majorca in July. He was the leader of a criminal organisation associated with an international club formed in California in 1948? Which?
Hells Angels.
22. Ryanair decided to charge passengers flying from Majorca eight euros for taking oversize what onto its planes?
Ensaimadas.
23. The right-wing union Manos Limpias denounced which mayor for, so it said, failing to pursue prosecution of crimes committed in which resort?
Manuel Onieva in Calvia. The resort was Magalluf.
24. Where did two dogs die having ingested poison at a beach allocated for dogs?
Puerto Pollensa.
25. The first law for what in the Balearics was approved in October?
Fishing.
26. What peaked at 1,926,681 on 9 August?
Total number of people on the Balearics.
27. 28.45% of people in the Balearics were unable to do what, according to a report issued in November?
Speak Catalan.
28. Work on a new luxury hotel complex started this autumn? Where?
Canyamel in Capdepera.

Spain
29. There are none in the Balearics but over 80 in Spain as a whole. They are "paradors". What are they?
State-run hotels, typically old mansions or castles.
30. Luis Bárcenas supposedly had ledgers which detailed illicit payments. What job did he used to have?
Treasurer of the Partido Popular.
31. Spain beat Denmark in January to become world champions at what?
Men's handball.
32. Which global business offered to help Spain with its tourism marketing for free?
Coca-Cola.
33. Artist Eugenio Merino committed an "offence that no modern civilisation can tolerate" (it was said). Who did he place in a cold-drinks fridge?
A re-created General Franco.
34. What comprised six volumes and 4,000 pages and was completed in 1739?
The first Spanish dictionary.
35. Who suggested a "relaxing cup of café con leche"? And on what occasion did she make the suggestion?
Ana Botella, the mayor of Madrid. She was speaking at the meeting to decide which city should host the 2020 Olympics.
36. Energy minister José Manuel Soria said he believed in domestic energy self-sufficiency but still proposed a tax on what?
Photovoltaic solar panels.
37. In Candeleda in the Spanish region of Castile and León an avenue was named after which former British prime minister?
John Major.
38. Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates took a six per cent shareholding in which Spanish company?
FCC - Fomento de Construcciones y Contratas.
39. Manolo Escobar died in October. What song did he have a hit with in 1973?
Y Viva España.
40. What, from the start of next year, will not come in refillable containers in bars and restaurants?
Olive oil.

MALLORCA TODAY - Weather Alcúdia and Pollensa 27 December 2013

No Frills Excursions


Morning high (9.30am): 9C
Forecast high: 16C
Sea conditions (northern Mallorca; Alcúdia and Pollensa bays): Northwest 4 to 5 backing Southwest.

Wind down, sun out, should be a fair day. The outlook is generally good with prospects going towards New Year's Eve.

Evening update (20.00): Air pushing up from the south has given a much warmer day than had been forecast. A high of 20.7C.

Who Shouts The Loudest: Balearics tourism industry

In October there was a significant development in the way that tourist businesses are organised. Different associations representing the non-hotel sector finally agreed to create a single body. These associations include those for restaurants, nightclubs, attractions, travel agencies, car rental and others.

The reasoning behind one body was obvious. It was to create a single voice to deal with the Balearic Government that could act as a counterbalance to the very strong and dominant single voice of the hoteliers. Though it has been said that the forming of this body was prompted by concerns about the increase in IVA by the national government, there were matters of local concern that were just as important. Many of them stemmed from the tourism law of 2012 and from the way in which the tourism market functions. All-inclusives, holiday rentals, hotels' secondary activities; these are just some of the issues which unite the non-hotel, complementary sector.

There not having been one body until now is a mystery. When one part of the tourism industry dominates as it does in the Balearics and has the ear of the government as closely as it does, then surely there should have been an alternative voice for the rest of the industry for years. One can attribute the absence of such a body to different reasons but perhaps the main one is that, because there are that many associations, finding common purpose among them all has been nigh on impossible.

The penny should have dropped a long time ago, though. The hoteliers have been in the ascendant for as long as there has been mass tourism. Obviously they have. Without them, there would have been no mass tourism and so wouldn't have been all the complementary elements. The hoteliers get a bad press, but it shouldn't be forgotten who it was who created mass tourism; it wasn't attractions or even restaurants.

This, though, interprets tourism in an imbalanced way. Something had to come first to get Mallorca to where it is, and the hotels were this something, but the complementary sector was equally as important. The tourism industry comprises many parts, all feeding off each other, complementing each other. But the very term complementary offer implies a secondary function; it complements the hotel sector. Without the hotels, there would be nothing to complement.

Nevertheless, for years this complementary status functioned well enough. Hotels did what hotels did. Restaurants and bars did what they did. But then, and one can place the point in time to be in the early to mid-1990s, the relationship began to change. Some twenty years on, the complementary sector only has itself to blame for what it did precious little to challenge: the arrival of the all-inclusive.

Complacency was undoubtedly a factor. All-inclusive was still only small scale. It would probably go away. It didn't. Organisation was another, and only now has it really come home to the complementary sector that its own organisation was flawed. There was the Balearics Confederation of Business Associations (CAEB) to represent it. But it also represented the hoteliers. Twenty years since becoming president of CAEB, Josep Oliver has stepped down. Business associations are reluctant to even nominate a successor. They have serious issues with CAEB because it has seemed pro-hotelier. They consider it to be useless.

If it is, then these business associations have surely allowed it to be. It is staggering that it has taken them so long to grasp the nettle and to attempt to place their interests at the top of the tourism industry agenda and not those of the hoteliers. It is staggering just how weak the pronouncements from some of these associations now sound. They can speak about the impact of all-inclusives as though these have only just been recognised. This impact may have been less obvious in the 1990s but by the turn of the century it had become obvious. Why weren't they raising merry hell about holiday rentals when the tourism law of 1999 was passed and not waiting until this year, and the reform of the national law on lettings, to begin to object strongly? The situation is fundamentally no different to what it was at the end of the last millennium.

Better late than never, one supposes, but what will this unified body achieve? One of the myriad associations on the island is Acotur, that which represents tourist businesses. In its most recent magazine it attacks the government for being too much on the side of the hoteliers and for reneging on an electoral promise to help the non-hotel sector. But then Acotur is just one voice among many. A unified body may achieve what it, Acotur, has wanted, but it will only do so if the government is confronted with a body with an assertive agenda. One recalls how the government buckled when the large retailers took it on over the green taxes. If business shouts loud enough, then the government will listen. Until now, though, it has been the hoteliers who have been doing the shouting. And with one voice.