Renowned travel expert Simon Calder has picked his “Menorca Top 10″ for the London Evening Standard. “Parts of Menorca look so exotic, so remote that it seems impossible to believe that London is only two hours’ flight away,” says Simon. He recommends the seafood soup in Ciutadella and a trip to the top of El Toro.

You can read his feature here. 

May is going to be wet in Menorca – that’s the promise from the organisers of La Fiesta del Mar 2012 who, during the whole month of May, plan to publicise the island’s many and varied forms of watersports and activities, with the hope of getting as many people as possible to try them out.

Among the activities being promoted are windsurfing, sailing, kayaking and scuba diving, and if those sound a little too energetic for you there will be some more passive activities, like boating trips around Menorca.

“We want people to know about and try the different nautical sports and activities the water sport centre of Menorca can offer,” says the organising committee. During May the island’s watersporting companies have come together to offer special introductory prices, and have set up a special Fiesta del Mar website, though which activities can be booked.

These include windsurfing and sailing off Fornells, kayaking at Es Grau, Cala en Porter, Santo Tomas and Cala Galdana, and diving at S’Algar, Fornells and Cala en Busquets. Boat trips are on offer from Cala en Bosch, Ciutadella and Mahon.

There are plenty of dry-land sporting activities on offer in May also, including the Cami de Cavalls trail, a 158km marathon running race from Ciutadella, which gets underway on 18 May. A week later (26/27 May) the island’s first non-stop mountain bike race, the Cavalls de Ferro, will take place. Equestrian lovers can enjoy May’s sporting feel also thanks to the Menorca-breed horse fair on 12/13 May.

Full details of all the activities can be found at the Fiesta del Mar website.

Low-cost flight operator bmibaby has added a new route to Mahon from Belfast City Airport for the 2012 summer season.

The new route from Belfast to Menorca will start on 15 June and operate up to twice a week, on Mondays and Fridays, until 24 September. Flights are on sale now at bmibaby.com with fares starting from £44.99 one way including all taxes.

The airline already operates a five-day a week service to Mahon from East Midlands Airport. Its Belfast-Menorca service joins those already operated from Northern Ireland by Thomson, Jet2 and Thomas Cook.

Julian Carr, bmibaby managing director, said: “The new flights from Belfast City Airport to Mahon, Menorca, are a welcome addition to our sunshine flights. We are delighted to offer even more destinations for summer 2012 and customers can continue to enjoy our great bmibaby service and low fares.”

The world famous RAF aerobatic team, the Red Arrows, is to stage one of its superb displays over Menorca in May. The show is being put on to celebrate the tercentenary of the first British Royal Naval hospital, which was situated on ‘hospital island’, or Isla del Rey, in Mahon harbour. The display team will perform above the harbour on Wednesday 25 May.

The air show is just one of a host of celebratory events being planned for 2011: You can read more about them here

Menorca is to gain island-wide wi-fi within the coming nine months. Four companies have tendered for the 500,000 Euro project to build base stations at strategic points across Menorca so that a wireless internet connection can be accessed almost everywhere.

It’s hoped that approval can be granted for the winning tender in mid-August, with work commencing in September and project completion six months after that.

Twelve base stations are to be built, at Mahon, Binibeca, El Toro, Cala Morell, S’Algar, Es Castell, Mila, Ciutadella, Coves Noves, S’Enclusa, Son Bou and Cala en Porter.

It is estimated that the project will benefit 4200 homes and businesses, many of which do not currently have an internet connection nor, in some cases, a landline telephone.

The North-East of England is to stage a celebration of the life of one of Menorca’s modern-day founding fathers, Admiral Lord Collingwood. Collingwood died on March 7, 1810, on board his ship Ville de Paris after leaving Mahon.

In a naval career which began at the age of 12 and which spanned the American war of independence and the French revolutionary and Napoleonic wars, Collingwood is best remembered for his role at Trafalgar. He is buried next to his close friend Lord Nelson in St Paul’s Cathedral.

He was born in Newcastle; his family home in Morpeth still stands, as does his Menorcan base, Collingwood House, now a hotel.

His naval record and devotion to duty is reflected in the title of an exhibition which marks the opening of the events-packed Collingwood 2010 Festival. The exhibition, at Newcastle Discovery Museum in Blandford Square, is called Collingwood: a Northumbrian Abroad, and runs until June 27.

The main focus of the festival will be the weekend of March 6-7, which will see a civic dinner in Newcastle, a visit by the 1805 Club which celebrates the Georgian navy, and a memorial service in St Nicholas Cathedral.

There will also be a military and naval parade through the city with a visit by the First Sea Lord, and a gun salute from the Collingwood Monument at Tynemouth, to which the warship HMS Cumberland will reply as she enters the Tyne.

Links are being made with a commemorative event in Menorca from March 27-30, and with Collingwood in Ontario in Canada and in New Zealand.

It seems the United States is waking up to Menorca’s charms… Our favourite island has just been listed in the New York Times “The 31 places to go in 2010”. The article says: “While the beat of disco pounds in Ibiza and Majorca, their quiet sister Menorca offers a tranquil contrast to the glitz next door… Miles of beaches – some 120 of them – with fine sand and rolling dunes. And Minorca’s eco-diversity extends well beyond the coasts: forests, deep gorges, wetlands, salt marshes and hillsides covered in lush greenery that sometimes look more New England than Mediterranean.”
You can read the full piece here

During a brief working weekend to Menorca last July I was asked by my colleague, Carole Toomey of Menorca Homecare, if I would like to go horse riding.

Bearing in mind the temperature was up around 30 degrees, riding a sweaty horse was not top of my agenda… but the promise of riding along a beach in the late afternoon seemed quite exciting.

I hadn’t been on a horse for about 25 years but, duly persuaded, myself, Carole and her daughter, Naomi, arrived at Santa Rita, the home of Menorca Cavall
We had booked the two-hour trek along the beautiful north coast with a very mixed group of total beginners and some more confident riders. The ride started at Binimel-la, and from there we meandered our way with the guide along some of the most stunningly beautiful bits of coastal scenery – up and down hills, across cliff paths and along the sandy coast at Cala Pregonda. The highlight was riding the horses two at a time into the sea, where we all stopped and posed for photos.

It was the most fantastic experience and one I can highly recommend for getting off the beaten track and seeing more of the beautiful, real Menorca, away from the resorts and crowds. The scenery is breathtaking, it’s peaceful and relaxed, the horses are delightful. I’m so pleased that I gave it a go.

Kay Carter

easyJet is to add a three-times-a-week service from Manchester to Mahon. Flights start in May 2010, starting at £52 one way including taxes.

The Manchester flights join an increasing number of UK-Menorca routes operated by easyJet. The addition brings to six the number of UK regional airports offering easyJet flights to Mahon:

London Gatwick: daily
London Luton: Mon, Wed, Thu, Fri, Sun
Bristol: Tue, Thu, Sat
Liverpool: Mon, Wed, Fri, Sat
Manchester: Tue, Thu, Sat
Newcastle: Sat

The wreck of a 17th or 18th century galleon has been found off Fornells, on the north coast of Menorca. The wreck is being investigated by the Argo Maris foundation, an initial inspection revealing remains around 60m down and covering a radius of about 40m.

Several huge anchors, iron cannons and wooden parts of the ship’s structure have been identified, suggesting either a frigate or a war galleon from the 17th or 18th centuries.

The initial archaeological survey was carried out by a team of archaeologists from the Ecomuseo Cap de Cavalleria with the support of the Argo Maris foundation, and their report has now been presented to the Culture & Heritage Department of the Council of Menorca.

The report was supported by some 2000 underwater photos of the wreck, which show, among other items, 17 iron cannons measuring some 2m in length, as well as four large anchors, two at the bow of the boat and two more at the stern.
Experts from the Heritage department and investigators from the National Museum of Underwater Archaeology in Cartagena have said that the galleon could be of huge historical interest, having not been documented until now.

Attempts to raise the sunken ship have been ruled out and the ongoing investigations are being done by precision underwater robotic equipment.