August 25 and 26, Maó, Menorca
Our travel along the southern coast to Maó, past several calas, was in glorious sunshine and we passed through areas where the sea was azure blue and aqua. It's an easy wide entrance into Port de Maó and then a long and interesting journey into the town because the harbour is one of the largest in the world. Marina Mahon had been recommended to us but it was full because of a classic boat regatta taking place all week. So we continued on to the end of the harbour to the newer Marina Menorca which had plenty of depth suitable for DC III's deep draft. Although this was well past the main action, including the restaurant strip, it was a peaceful place to stay and no bother to catch a taxi when we wanted to go somewhere. A water taxi service also exists.
Our dinner on Monday night was a great find at Passió Mediterrània (Moll de Llevant 298), where they specialised in interesting tapas. The owners from Barcelona had only recently given up their careers in engineering and fashion design to open the restaurant because of their love of food and cooking for friends. They had eaten many times at El Bulli when it was still operating and love to experiment with cooking. They are delightful people so we hope it succeeds. Our tapas selection included home made pickled mussels, hummus with mint and raw vegetables (the best hummus we have ever had, 'ravioli' but it was made with cheese and stuffed with eggplant/mushrooms/caramelised onion and with balsamic 'caviar' on top (the caviar actually being balsamic pearls, and we knew how they would have been made now that we have learned about agar agar), 'Tagliatelle' of squid ( which was finely sliced strings of squid looking just like tagliatelle) with caramelised onions and dried tomatoes, salted cod with aioli and tomato marmalade. Dessert was apple crumble and scoops of homemade ice creams. Everything was fantastic.
On Tuesday we waited until late afternoon to explore the old town area of Maó, spread along the high cliffs above the harbour. It's not as charming as Ciutadella, with very little interesting architecture. The market was extremely disappointing, with a very poor selection of fruit and vegetables and the supermarket beneath the market cloisters was very ordinary. We are spoiled in Mallorca and I would really not like to stay long in Menorca because of the lack of quality produce and worst of all needing to buy food in supermarkets. There are some bigger newer supermarkets further out of town but the locals are upset that they gave caused the demise of independent food shops and apparently this is the major cause for the lowering of the quality of fresh food. It's a world wide problem! If only the locals had stuck by their independent food stores in the first place!
Dinner time again! This time we chose Italian and enjoyed our pastas at Il Porto (Moll de Llevant, 225) but the real treat was Tiramisu de limoncel, with limoncello replacing the coffee in the marscopone mixture. Fabulous!
There are stern-to berths right along the shoreline in the restaurant area and these are now managed by Club Nautico and there are also some pontoons in the centre of the harbour with berths for boats up to 15 metres, but the only place where anchoring is permitted is near the entrance to the harbour, a long way from anywhere. Because of the classic boat regatta there were several interesting boats to see and the entire area was almost like watching a show at the theatre as there was so much activity with people coming and going on both the land and the water.
A couple of interesting aspects about the marinas in Menorca is that they are much more expensive than Mallorca and everyone we dealt with spoke English, which is not as common at most other marinas throughout Spain. Menorca is also more humid than Mallorca, so although the temperature is slightly lower it is more uncomfortable on a warm day. Apparently dampness, causing mould, is quite a problem in their homes so it would have the same effect on boats.