Pas de s'heura

Over too infrequent visits over the last 2 decades, it seems that the tide of closure of access in the Serra de Tramontana has turned. When I was growing up and this was the adventure playground, some estates needed to be sneaked into or around, but it was mainly an open wilderness with a virtual infinity of paths to explore and ways to find. Then it looked like that would be reduced to a handful of authorised and marked routes with the rest fenced-off private land. One such case was the path along the coast from Port de Sóller leading to pas de s'heura, the ivy pass, and on to Balitx d'amunt and from there to Sóller. This was no. 2 of the 70+ editions of Rutes Amagades de Mallorca (hidden paths of Mallorca), a classic series that, so far as I know, is the first to record the fantastic wealth of walking routes of this island. So I was very sad to find, about 10 years ago, that about an hour into the route it had been closed off so effectively as to make the walk impossible. On the occasion I found the way blocked, being alone, I got round the fence but it went far down such a steep, unstable slope above the sea that it was really rather unpleasant and not a way to consider taking anyone but a goat for company. I was delighted to find recently that the point at which the path had been blocked was now open and there was just a multi-lingual sign warning of a dangerous path, at your own risk etc. So, on the last day of a busy two week visit of paper chasing and sheet mulching (see companion blog for the latter), I set out to do this walk once again.

One of the reasons I like it so much is that in under 5 hours, including lunch and photo stops, you pass through 3 very different landscapes, each superb examples of their type. The first is the "cliff path", initially a track which passes a number of houses perched above the sea. It then becomes a true path, at times a bit narrow above the drop into the sea, but the sheep fence on a particularly exposed slab of rock has now gone. The first photo shows the coast above which this route leads. It was taken on another occasion from the Torre d'en Picada, which would make a half-hour diversion near the start of the walk.

A pass next to this outcrop of rock, the second Cavall Bernat of the walk, brings you into the hidden valley of the Barranc de Balitx, where the going is hard if you lose the way, as a I and number of family and friends have done (it took a number of us several goes to find the pas de s'heura itself, despite the photos in the Rutes). The start used to be marked by an enormous growth of ivy, but the ivy is no longer there, only a yellow mark on the rock. You have to look for a ramp going up from right to left, a bit of a scramble but there is a sort of natural ballustrade of rock between you and the drop.

Then it's up and up, not really a path as much as a way between the rocks, but marked with cairns. Hollows in the pointed stones sprout plants like asphodel, arum lilies and a this plant whose name I don't know - it forms a bulb like an enormous onion, later in the year.

Finally you reach the olive groves around Sa Tanca d'es Bous, where I had lunch in the sun in shirt-sleeves.

From here, and the next stretch of path, you have a great view of the Puig Major over the asphodels.

Then it's into pastoral landscape as you pass the finca of Balitx d'amunt. The modest looking hill in the background is the Puig de Balitx, which this walk circuits. It's more of a scramble than it looks to get up it as the terrain is rent with fissures between the rocks, but the view of the wild coast to the north-east is worth it. You also look almost straight down into the sea some 500m below, the drop broken only by the shelf on which the finca of C'an Verí stands, directly below.

In the past I'd always gone down to Sóller as suggested in the Rutes, but now there is a signposted way to the Port. This is a beautiful path through olive groves, and at one point I stopped to listen to the sound of bells from a dozen sheep grazing. Looking above them I could see an almond tree in blossom, an orange tree with fruit and a date palm. The latter however is just decorative - the summer heat here is not intense enough to ripen dates. Maybe I missed the last bit of this path and ended up walking 2km of the road past Sa Figuera. Never mind, it's a very quiet road an leads past groves of orange trees in full fruit - a sight I find fantastically beautiful and emblematic both of Mallorca and of winters that don't freeze.