Son Moragues, Cúber and Menut. There are plenty of places where walkers are welcome, or at least tolerated, and the provision of the long-distance GR221 is a splendid way to trek all the way through the Serra de Tramuntana from end to end.
GR221 – Ruta de Pedra en Sec
The GR221 is also known as the Ruta de Pedra en Sec, or the Drystone Route. It was created by the Consell de Mallorca, or more specifically the Department de Natura i Medi Ambient, with input from local councils. While the eastern and central parts are well-signposted and fully waymarked, there is still some work to be done on the western parts, as well as on some of the alternative routes. Some old paths high in the mountains have been completely rebuilt at considerable expense, and one very popular path is protected along with its landscape as a site of cultural interest. The main route measures around 140km (87 miles) and is split into ten daily stages in this guidebook. However, there are half a dozen major variant routes, allowing several alternative start and finish points.
Most of the mountainous, well-wooded Serra de Tramuntana is made of limestone, which has provided the raw material to build all kinds of structures from humble huts to splendid palaces and churches. The limestone readily breaks into blocks, and uses can be found even for broken chippings. It can be burnt to produce lime for mortar or whitewash. Place one lump of limestone carefully on top of another and all manner of drystone constructions are possible.
Trekking the GR221 involves walking on the bare limestone bedrock of Mallorca, or following old stone-paved paths through the mountains. Massive drystone buttresses, or marges, hold cultivation terraces in place on steep mountainsides. Stone channels, or canaletes, carry water to where it is needed. Strange stone structures encountered along the way include large limekilns and igloo-like bread ovens. Circular sitges, or charcoal burning platforms, often have the crude stone hut of a carboner, or charcoal burner, alongside. There are drystone walls, cairns and stone-lined snow-pits on the high mountains, all created from limestone blocks. In effect, the GR221 is a celebration of the outdoor life and backbreaking labour of the mountains of Mallorca, as well as being a scenic and interesting route.
The GR221 visits several attractive little mountain villages, as well as passing through a couple of fine towns, often following old mule paths from one to another. The villages generally provide good accommodation and offer a selection of bars and restaurants, as well as a couple of shops stocking provisions. They also have good bus services, allowing trekkers to join or leave the route, or even commute to and from the route from a base far away. A splendid range of services is available along the route, and this guidebook contains all the details required to follow the GR221 through the mountains over a period of one or two weeks.
Looking from Puig de Maria, across Pollença, back to Calvari (Stage 10 extension)
Brief history of Mallorca
Mallorca has been inhabited for more than 6000 years, when the earliest settlers lived in caves, hunted and kept animals, made stone tools and employed certain rituals when burying their dead. Around 4000 years ago, stone buildings and large towers, or talaiots, were constructed, suggesting highly organised societies working together for the common good, while clearly engaging in serious disputes with their neighbours.
The Carthaginians established trading posts and often recruited local people to defend them. Most of the ports on the island had their origins around this time. The Romans invaded Mallorca in 123BC, but much of their work was later destroyed by Vandals from North Africa. After the breakup of the Roman Empire, the Byzantine general Belisarius dealt with the Vandals, and the Balearic islands were linked with what is now Tunisia. As part of the Byzantine Empire, Mallorca again became a trading post protected by military might.
Arab raids commenced in AD707. Arab settlers profoundly influenced the development of agriculture. The legacy of these times is recalled in placenames – Bini means ‘house of’, as in Binibassi and Biniaraix. In the city of Palma the Moorish arches of the Almudaina palace and the Arab baths can still be seen.
In 1229 Jaume I of Aragon, ‘The Conqueror’, led a fleet of 150 ships and an army of 16,000 men to Mallorca. Their intention was to land at Port de Pollença, but they were prevented from doing so by storms so they sheltered in the lee of Sa Dragonera and later landed at Santa Ponça. The re-conquest was completed in 1230, but this didn’t lead to peaceful times. Disputes between Jaume’s sons, passed on to their sons and heirs, led to successive invasions, but the royal line continued through Jaume II and Jaume III, the latter being killed in battle in 1349. The reign of independent kings ended, and Aragon took direct control of the island.
Mallorca’s chequered history continued with invasions, rebellions and natural disasters such as earthquakes, floods, and outbreaks of cholera and bubonic plague. Watchtowers, or talaies, were built between 1550 and 1650 on high vantage points, so that invaders and pirates could be spotted in good time. In 1716 Mallorca finally lost the title of kingdom and became a province of Spain. Neighbouring islands had similarly convoluted histories, with Menorca spending the best part of the 18th century as a British possession. In the 20th century, the Catalan language was suppressed under Franco’s dictatorship, but has since flourished and is now very evident throughout Mallorca.
Mountain heritage
The GR221 highlights the heritage of the mountains, and especially the built heritage, which often uses nothing more basic than roughly hewn lumps of limestone. On the lower cultivated slopes, the terraces are held in place by huge drystone buttresses and watered by stone-lined channels. Water may be stored in tanks (cisternas), or small underground reservoirs (aljubs), all built of stone.
Look out for large stone-lined pits, which are limekilns (forns de calç), on the lower wooded slopes, where fuel was readily available. On the highest mountainsides, larger and deeper stone-lined snow-pits (cases de sa neu) were used for storing snow and ice. In dense holm oak woodland look out for the dark, flat, circular, moss-grown remains of the charcoal burning platforms – trekkers sometimes use these as wild-camp sites, but it is very difficult to get pegs into the hard-baked ground. Somewhere nearby will be the low remains of the circular huts of the charcoal burner. Stone-built outdoor bread ovens are also likely to be spotted nearby, while drystone walls and cairns abound almost everywhere.
Snow collecting
Snow-pits are found on many of Mallorca’s highest mountains
The highest paths on Mallorca were built by snow collectors (nevaters). Snow was collected to make ice for use in the summer and conserved in snow-pits (cases de sa neu). These are found scattered around Puig Major, Puig de Massanella, Puig Tomir, Es Teix and Serra d’Alfàbia, mostly above 900m (2950ft). The pits were usually circular, oval, or occasionally rectangular, partly or wholly below ground level. When the mountains were covered with snow, groups of men went up to gather it into baskets. Flat platforms were made and cleared of vegetation, where the snow was arranged in layers and trampled down hard to pack it into ice, in time to the following rhyme:
Pitgen sa neu, pitgen sa neu,
i tots estan dins ses cases!
Peguen potades, peguen potades,
en Toni, en Xisco, en Juan i n’Andreu.
Tramp the snow, tramp the snow,
and throw it in the pit!
Beat it down, beat it down,
on Tony, Harry, John and Andrew.
The
