Palma is the one place you must visit on Mallorca. If you are staying in one of the coastal resorts everything is designed with the foreign tourist in mind and you don’t see anything much of the real Spain. While Palma is a tourist city it is also very Spanish place from its yellow painted houses to its Mediterranean food.

It’s  the capital of Mallorca and half the population live here. It’s star attraction is the huge Santa Maria cathedral overlooking the bay of  Palma.

 

Next to the cathedral is the Moorish Almudaina Palace.Rebuilt in 1309 by king James second of Mallorca it shows off  paintings and furniture from different times. The amazing upper floor was built later and the huge space displays tapestries. As you go outside you can look down on the gardens below.

 

 

The old town is a small area next to the cathedral with many small coffee shops and trendy boutiques.

 

There are lots of beautiful squares in Palma. The  Plaza Mayor is the main tourist square with its lovely yellow painted buildings and performance artistes hoping to provide a  photo opportunity for a couple of euros.

The Plaza de Cort has an ancient olive tree.

A trip to the Joan Miro foundation was in our plan but its a thirty minute journey from the  bus station and we were short on time. Instead we visited the Museu Fundacion Juan Marc in a very grand seventeenth century building in the centre of Palma. This is full of examples of twentieth century Spanish works. It has a work by Juan Gris, one of my favourite painters and a Miro.

 

 

The Miro is called Woman, Stem, Heart. Good job it was labelled!