Sometime in the middle of July 2022 Curare and her crew anchored in front of a long beach on the south coast of Mallorca. We did not know that this was the famous Es Trenc beach which stretches for about 10 km between the towns of Colonia de Sant Jordi and Sa Rapita. All we saw when sailing past was a a large number of boats at anchor and, as we were looking for a spot to drop the hook, this seemed ideal. The beaches were crowded with pink and bronze bodies, for GG's entertainment it was clothing optional, there was a nearby grocery store and the water was warm enough for swimming. We stayed five days.
On our return to Mallorca in October we returned to Es Trenc beach as it was convenient and enjoyable, but what a contrast. Although there were still unclothed people enjoying the sun, most of them were pasty white Germans and GG did not find the view quite as entertaining. The water had cooled dramatically so we did not go swimming but we went on a few long walks and discovered the salt pans.
The most visually obvious salt works are east of the beach at the town of Colonia de Sant Jordi, but there is another salt works to the north named Salinas d'Es Trenc because it's sea water comes from a location at Es Trenc beach and flows to the pans through a rock lined channel (we started to walk to the inland pans but after one km the road was not getting any shorter, so we gave up and turned back).
The pans of Sant Jordi have been known since the 4th century BC when Punic merchants extracted the salt for 
trade, a sign states that they are the second oldest in the world. Salt extraction in Sant Jordi has always been, and still is, carried out by traditional methods. Sea water is drawn into the salt pans and as the water evaporates the salt remains behind. Most of the salt precipitates to the bottom of the pan and is harvested as coarse sea salt but some delicate, pyramidal, salt crystals float on the surface. These are harvested by hand, skimming them from the surface with what looks like a swimming pool skimmer and depositing the salt into woven baskets to dry. This is Flor de Sel and very little is produced; only 0.8% of the total 12,000 ton annual salt production. It's rarity makes it expensive, costing $80.00 per kilo or more, and it's alternate name "caviar of sea salts" seems fitting.
The harvesting at Sant Jordi is done in August so we missed seeing it. All that remained were large piles of coarse sea salt waiting to be bagged and shipped. We could have purchased some from the local shops for a souvenir but Curare has enough salt encrusted rigging, so we didn't.
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