Castles, cocktails and a casualty of war (RIP, AirPod)

6:00am — Awake before the world, doing what any self-respecting blogger does: fixing a photo that refuses to load properly. It’s the small hills we choose to die on. Diagnosis: needs coffee. Prescription: coffee in bed. I am nothing if not a responsible patient.

7:30am — The breakfast room is already buzzing, and I have located the Americans. You always can — matching tennis whites, sunglasses pushed up like tiaras, ready to serve both breakfast chat and a mean backhand. Between coffee number one and coffee number two, I manage to book tickets for the hop-on/hop-off sightseeing bus, still the undefeated champion of “how to see a whole city without destroying your feet.”

8:30am — Back in the room to let the eggs and bacon settle before we head out into the world. A brief but essential intermission.

10:00am — Up to Bellver Castle on the hill, and the view over Palma is the kind that makes you stop mid-sentence. On the way back, a quick detour to a shopping centre that promised much and delivered very little. Some attractions are best left un-hopped-off at.

1:00pm — Swim gear on, rooftop bar acquired. The cold beer is less a drink and more a small miracle. Salads all round, in the name of restraint, and — unlike yesterday’s crowd scene — we actually get sun loungers without a fight. A rare and beautiful thing.

3:00pm — The sun wins, as it always eventually does, and we retreat to the basement wellness area for a pool-and-whirlpool combo so relaxing I accidentally fall asleep sitting up. No shame in that.

5:00pm — Back in the room, bubbly from the hotel gets opened early, because tomorrow is our golden anniversary and pacing yourself is for amateurs. One small tragedy interrupts the celebrations: one AirPod, brand new, gone. A moment of silence, please.

7:00pm — Dinner is a short stroll away, on the restaurant street we scouted yesterday. The Indian place gets a polite nod-and-walk-past, and we land at La Bottega di Michele for proper Italian pasta. Two large gin & tonics precede the meal — the second one, in hindsight, may have been ambitious given the full bottle of red that followed. No regrets. Well — one AirPod-shaped regret.

10:00pm — Bed. Glorious bed. Lights out almost instantly.

Another very good day in the books. Tomorrow: the beach, allegedly — though at this rate, “the plan” is more of a gentle suggestion than a promise.

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