Mallorca · the south-west

The guides.

Every place here was looked up by hand this month: open or closed, what it costs, when to go. Written by someone who lives in Andratx.

LISTS

Where to eat, where to swim

MOVE

Getting around

PLACES

Beaches, coves and walks

  • Camp de Mar

    BeachAndratx

    A small bay of fine white sand with a restaurant on an island you walk to over a wooden bridge. The family beach of the south-west, and quietly one of its prettiest.

  • Cala Llamp

    CovePort d'Andratx

    No sand. Flat rock shelves, iron ladders straight into deep blue water, and the sun going down in front of you. The port's own swimming pool, and in October you have it to yourself.

  • Sant Elm and Sa Dragonera

    Village and islandAndratx

    The end of the road on the west of the island: a small fishing village looking straight at Sa Dragonera, an uninhabited island shaped like a sleeping dragon that the locals saved from developers in 1977.

  • La Trapa

    WalkAndratx

    A ruined monastery on a cliff terrace above Sa Dragonera, built by Trappist monks who fled France, abandoned, burned, bought back by the island's bird society with public money. Two hours up from Sant Elm, and the best view in the south-west.

  • Gelateria Capri

    Ice creamPort d'Andratx

    The ice cream in the port since 1979. Made in their own workshop behind the square, no additives, twenty-odd flavours, open until half past eleven. The last stop of every evening walk.

  • Sa Foradada

    Sunset and paellaDeià

    A rock with a hole in it sticking out into the sea below Deià, a shack restaurant on the cliff above it that cooks paella over wood, and the best sunset on the island. Reached on foot down from an archduke's estate, or by boat.