Mallorca : Soller
The train was old and noisy, perfect for Dan! The trip took an hour, and was indeed spectacular, going to and through the mountains. No health and safety regulations here, the lower parts of every window were wide open, and we passed many concrete posts and signs between 8 and 18 inches away, so you had to be pretty careful especially with Dan. The long tunnel we passed through was also very narrow. Soller was a reasonably-sized town completely surrounded by mountains. Although we thought it would be very hot, it was actually very pleasant, perhaps due to the altitude. We found a café just off the main square, out of the tourist area, which was cheap and good value. Then we wandered the town for a couple of hours before returning to the station. Unfortunately all the passengers from all the trains going to Soller during the day were forced to return on only one train scheduled in the evening. There were hundreds of people waiting, and although there were in fact three trains, no-one informed us of anything, and we found it nearly impossible to get on the train. Nigel put Dan and the pushchair through a window to reserve a seat, then I tried to get to him through one of the doors, but it took several minutes to force my way through the crowd. By the time I did, Dan had got so upset that Nigel had got him out again, and as I got to the seat two people just sat down in it! I was very cross and got them to move, our pushchair was there anyway, and in the end we all sat down. In the end Nigel got chatting to the people we had displaced, who were on holiday but were very impressed with our sailing story!