On the beach of Santa Ponça

 Das besonders von britischen und holländischen, aber auch gelegentlich von deutschen und irischen Touristen frequentierte Santa Ponça gruppiert sich um eine lang gestreckte, von steilen Felswänden umgebene Bucht. Der im Vergleich zum Nachbarort Peguera deutlich kleinere Sandstrand, der zudem von einem Kanal durchflossen wird, befindet sich an der Stirnseite der Bucht. Angeschlossen ist eine kleine Grünanlage, in dem eine Kolonie von derzeit ca. 300 Mönchssittichen lebt - der einzigen Ihrer Art auf Mallorca.

Von einer mäßig stark befahrenen Uferstraße abgetrennt ziehen sich Restaurants, Cafés und Souvenirläden die Strandzone entlang. Voluminöse, fünf- und sechsstöckige Mittelklassehotels in einheitlicher Ausstattung dominieren das Nordufer und den mittleren Bereich. Santa Ponça gilt als Musterbeispiel einer einfallslosen, ausschließlich auf den Massentourismus ausgerichteten touristischen Infrastruktur.

The resort of  Santa Ponça in the southwest of Mallorca / Majorca is primarily popular with British, Dutch, but als well with some German and Irish tourists. Certainly there are many other locations on the varied island which are much more beautiful and interesting.

 

Especially Santa Ponça's architecture is a "masterpiece" of unimaginative, boring five- to six-storey piles of concrete, mainly opened up to mass tourism .

But as a kind of "island of happiness" amidst scheduled mediocrity, you find the Quaker Parrot / Monk Parakeet colony direct behind the main beach in a little stone pine forest (see post below).

 

There are many British pubs with great ;-) Anglo-Saxon food and narcotics to daze / bemuse your five senses, so that you may see Santa Ponça thereafter in a much brigther & more shining light.

Mallorquin Piepmatz - the Monk Parakeet

 The Monk Parakeet, also know as Quaker Parrot,

originates from the temperate to subtropical areas of Argentina and the surrounding countries in South America.

 

 Self-sustaining feral populations have been recorded in several US states and various countries of Europe, as well as in Brazil, Israel, Bermuda, Bahamas, Puerto Rico and Japan.

 

 In areas where they have been introduced, some fear that they will harm crops and native species.

But in the south-west of the island of Mallorca, more precise: at Santa Ponça, they live in a colony / family of approximately 300 birds peacefully together with local Collared Dove in a little stone pine wood direct at the main beach.

 

 

 The Monk Parakeet is the only parrot that builds a stick nest, in a tree or on a man-made structure, rather than using a hole in a tree. This gregarious species often breeds colonially, building a single large nest with separate entrances for each pair.

 

 

 Monk Parakeets are highly intelligent, social birds. Those kept as pets routinely develop large vocabularies. They are able to learn scores of words and phrases.

"May I have some ketchup for my burger?"

Jardins d’Alfàbia - part 1

The Jardins d`Alfabia are one of the most beautiful gardens of Mallorca. They are located on an estate that was originally a Muslim residence of a Moor known as Ben Abet.

The pleasures of the gardens are made possible by a spring that always flows, even in the driest of summers in this very arid land.

 

 

The inner courtyard of the hacienda

with a cherub fountain and large, sprawling plane tree.

 

The terraced cascade:

palm-fringed stairway left of the gatehouse

to a wall-mounted well and - right of it - to a magic cistern.

 

The stony well guard.

Well roar'd Lion.

 

The Alfabia cistern - a magic interplay of water and sun, light and shadow.

 

The trick fountains garden.

Press the button and get wet.

 

Bougainvillea - fireworks in purple.

 

An extraordinary range of trees flourishes in the gardens, including white fir, maple, cedar of Lebanon, Monterey cypress, poplar, date palm, holm oak, carob, lemon, orange, magnolia, walnut, eucalyptus, olive and acacia.