Ses Salines
May 16, 2017
It was a very long car ride to the beach in the South part of the island. This time we were going to Ses Salines with Hannah, Arjan, their mom, and their abuela (grandmother). Sam hadn't arrived yet back from Barcelona. It was a very full car with all of us stuffed in the back. There were signs at the rotonda (roundabout) that pointed towards Ses Salines which meant the salt in mallorqui, the native language. The town where the beach was had a salt factory where they harvested the dried sea salt. I decided I would have to get some for my parents because they love seasoning and spices.
We parked the little beat up car and walked towards the beach. There was a light house that stood next to the entrance. The real attraction, however, was the beach. It was long and rocky and sandy in parts. It seemed to sprawl forever. At that point I was tired of riding in the car and hungry. We had to walk for quite a ways over the rocks until we got to the sandy part.
The water was just as beautiful as the day before when we went to another beach (we went to a lot of beaches, but I can't complain). It had a turquoise hue with some darker parts that Hannah told me were just seaweed. There was a sailboat in the crescent of beach where we sat.
Hannah told me a lot of their family would be there and some of them were American. We found them already sitting at spot on the beach and we joined them. They had family from new Hampshire there and they didn’t do the same customary cheek kiss that I had expected at this point. I was surprised when they said hello to me in English. It was the first time since I had been there that I had heard anyone from America with my same accent, other than Hannah and Arjan of course, but this was different. I was really happy that I could talk to them freely without hesitation or guilt that I was not speaking in Spanish. It was nice to be able to listen to a few speak in English. They were of course fluent in Spanish too.
I was even happier after I ate something. Arjan give me bread and a mixture of cucumbers, tomato and red pepper mixed with lemon and salt. It was called tabbouleh and it was a common Spanish food to have on bread. I was very hungry and I ate two pieces and then another mandarin orange I had brought. I pretty much took the tiny oranges with me everywhere.
At first I sat by myself on a towel far away from the rest but Hannah insisted I come sit with them. Everyone was talking and laughing and eating bread with the toppings or spreads. They also drank gazpacho which tasted like cold tomato soup with lemon. It was, as Hannah described, a very Spanish food. I ate some more bread with avocado and was full.
We all sat on the beach for awhile. I took pictures of the beach and sat and talked with Hannah. Tim later inflated a paddleboat and took it out for a spin. We took a time lapse of him traveling around on the little board, impressed that he didn't fall off standing up against the waves. Hannah and I tried after but tried to stand up but tipped over when a wave hit us. The water was freezing but the younger kids were laughing and playing without a care.
Eventually we packed up our things and headed back. It was a long walk back to the car, but the sunset was gorgeous and I couldn’t help but stop and take some pictures. We crammed into the little car again and headed for home after another long day.
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