Cabrera Island is the largest of the nineteen islands and islets that make up the archipelago of Cabrera. This coast has beautiful cliffs, impressive headlands, coastal rocks, deep coves, several caves, sandy beaches and crystal clear water. Inland there are pine woods, juniper, rosemary and heather scrubland - all of it protected as it's a National Maritime and Terrestrial Park.

The tiny harbour is small with no port facilities beyond a couple of short jetties for dinghies and ferries to moor up to. Despite the ferries arriving daily the volume of tourists seem to be kept to a minimum and didn't spoil the tranquility of the island.

With only a few inhabitants and a few military personnel, the harbour has a warden's office, police office, chapel and a tiny cantina where ice creams, tapas and refreshments can be purchased and bread can be ordered for the following day.

There are guided excursions up to the peaks and along the ridge lines of the island and a variety of nice, easy, dusty walks that you can enjoy on your own over to the castle, museum, the French monument and lighthouse - far too much to do in only a two day visit so we headed off up to the castle, climbed the winding staircase barely wider than shoulder width to enjoy the views over the bay and out to sea.


15th century castle overlooking the harbour

From there we trekked along a path behind two small beaches before it headed uphill and meandered around bends up towards the lighthouse at the extreme southeast tip of the island. The perfume scent coming from the surrounding pines, junipers, rosemary and heather scrubland will never be forgotten together with the many lizards that we saw en route. We didn't actually finish the walk as we were finding it a bit too hot so after a brief stop at a vantage point to admire the view of the lighthouse and nearby cala we returned back along the track to the harbour for a cold beer and then back to Flirtie for a refreshing swim and snorkel around the bay.


lighthouse

Snorkelling in the crystal clear water was a delight with shoals of fish, varying in size, species and colours, including star fish. It's the best snorkelling that we've experienced so far. Admittedly we've been sceptical about buoys' being laid for marine conservation thinking more of the revenue being raised but there is certainly evidence here showing a difference. By comparison, Sant Jordi has a similar seabed, sporadic patches of sea grass, minimal fish and species.

Day 2, and with no wind and flat seas we were able to become intrepid explorers as we ventured offshore in our dinghy armed with a few essentials; lifejackets, vhf radio, cameras, oars, additional fuel for the outboard in search of a 'Blue Cave' and only accessible by sea, some 1.4 miles from Puerto de Cabrera. We found two with crystal clear blue water. Being so close to the coastline provided some excellent views of the rock formations, cliffs and caves.


cave with crystal-blue water!

Two days just wasn't enough, we wanted to stay a day more but the online calendar showed no availability despite there being several 'free' white buoys around us. We headed over to the office to ask on the off chance whether we could stay another night but unfortunately this wasn't to be.

This is one peaceful spot in the Balearics, without jet-skis, water skiers and speedboats (they're not allowed), making it a very special place to moor in a stunning horseshoe shaped bay. Without doubt this is another favourite on this season's cruise!