Palma

The combination of beautiful architecture, sunshine and the Mediterranean is the first thing that strikes you about Palma, and the thing that makes it immediately different from every other sun destination in the Mediterranean. This is not a resort. It is a city. A proper historic city with a medieval old town, narrow streets that reward slow exploration, incredible restaurants in buildings that have been standing for centuries, and the most extraordinary Gothic cathedral I have visited outside of France sitting right on the waterfront.

La Seu, the Cathedral of Santa María, announces itself before you have quite arrived. The scale of it, rising from the waterfront in a way that makes you recalibrate your understanding of Gothic architecture on the spot, is immediately astonishing. It is one of the largest Gothic cathedrals in the world and Gaudí worked on the interior, which means the inside is unlike any other Gothic space I have been in. The rose window in the morning casts coloured light across the interior in a way that photographs struggle to capture and that is genuinely moving in person. Go at opening time and you may have it almost to yourself.

The old town of Palma is where the city reveals itself properly. Narrow streets. Golden sandstone buildings that glow in the late afternoon light in a way that makes you stop and stare. Independent restaurants in courtyards that have been serving food since before anyone alive can remember. Small squares with fountains. Baroque churches that appear suddenly at the end of lanes you walked down because they looked interesting. The old town rewards the visitor who has no plan and plenty of time, which is the best possible way to spend an afternoon in Palma.

What surprised me most about Palma was how much more there is beyond what most people come for. The old town is beautiful to explore, there are incredible restaurants at every price point, historic buildings at every turn, and you can genuinely combine culture, food, relaxation and adventure in the same trip without any of them feeling like a compromise. It is not a difficult city to love once you discover what it actually is rather than what you expected it to be.

The best restaurants are consistently not in the most obvious locations. Walk further from the Cathedral than feels natural. Turn down narrower streets. Eat where the menus are in Catalan as well as Spanish and English. The food in Palma's old town, the fresh fish, the sobrasada, the locally grown vegetables, is outstanding and considerably more interesting than the tourist-facing restaurants around the main waterfront.

The moment from my time in Palma that I keep returning to is spending time around the beaches and taking the opportunity to go cliff diving. It sounds like an activity for someone younger and less cautious than I consider myself. It is not. Done properly, at a recognised and safe spot with suitable conditions, cliff diving is simply the best way to experience the Mallorcan coastline and adds a dimension of genuine adventure to what could otherwise be a very relaxed beach day.

The water around Palma is extraordinarily clear. The cliffs are dramatic in the way Mediterranean limestone cliffs are dramatic, sharp and pale above water that is improbably blue. The combination of the physical sensation of the dive and the visual experience of the coastline from that particular vantage point is one of those travel moments that is difficult to explain fully to someone who hasn't done it. You have to be there. Use a recognised spot, make sure conditions are suitable, and go.

Palma is perfect for a long weekend where you want a bit of everything. Three or four days is the right amount of time, enough for the Cathedral and the old town and the beaches and the cliff diving and the restaurants, without feeling rushed through any of them. The city is compact enough to cover on foot and the distances between things are manageable even in the heat of the afternoon.

Don't stay around the main tourist areas for the entire trip. Explore the old town, find some of the smaller streets and restaurants, and make time to get out to the coastline beyond the city itself. The Serra de Tramuntana, the mountain range in the north of the island, is a completely different Mallorca to Palma: medieval villages, terraced olive groves that have been worked since the Arab period, views down to the sea that are among the most beautiful in the Mediterranean. If you have four or five days rather than three, rent a car for a day and drive north to Deià and Valldemossa. It will be the best decision of the trip.