English Corner  Capt. Lawrence.  Today: Mallorca´s King without a crown.

Escolta-ho mentre navegues

Hello friends,

Two dead giveaways summer has hit. First, you wake up already sweating and second, the lunatic cicadas are up before you are.

I´m sitting here at Mitj and Mitj in Port Andratx, my favorite spot to eat, write and gaze out across the bay. What a day! Not a cloud in the sky. Throwing caution and diet to the wind, I just powered back two of their enormous BLT´s. Life just doesn`t get any better than this. There is a lovely sea breeze and my pups are playing in the water. Everywhere you turn you are met with beautiful women in gossamer summer dresses, their hair let down in flowing locks over golden shoulders. I´ll be honest, putting my mind to this article is rather hard. All I want to do is sit here in the sun like a fat gecko and take it all in. What a tough life!

This week I´d like to talk a bit about Archduke Luis Salvador and his boat the NIXE. I must preface this article by confessing that in no shape or form will I be doing justice to this great man. Shame on you if you´ve lived on Mallorca and aren´t familiar with this chap. Luis Salvador – now deceased – epitomized the perfect expat. He visited Mallorca, fell in love and spent the rest of his life honoring her with brilliant literary works and innumerable scientific studies. A man of means, he bought large tracks of land and houses up and down the Northern Mallorca coast. One such house without a doubt his most important residence, is the now museum house of Son Marroig. Look it up and go for a visit. In my eyes it´s a must do pilgrimage for anyone setting foot on our island.

Luis Salvador loved this island like no other. A manic naturalist, he would literally adopt trees on the spot if he saw them being cut. One of the things he loved most was the sea. He spent years traveling all over the Mediterranean compiling perhaps the largest body of scientific observations ever made on the area. Some people say he wrote 60 books, others put that number at twice that. His writing was so prolific that scholars are still finding new works to this day.

Tired of traveling aboard commercial liners, the Archduke decided to commission his own yacht. It was the first private mega yacht ever built.The NIXE measured a whopping fifty two meters in length by six meters in breadth. Her main method of propulsion-common in that day-was steam. Apart from the steam engine, NIXE was built with three beautiful masts all of which were gaff rigged.

This revolutionary vessel was home to the Archduke. As such she was fashioned with all the mod cons and comforts a nobleman was accustomed too. What I find very amusing is that Luis had to ask mommy for the cash, giving her some shpeeal that it would cost much less to build than it did and would save him money in the long run, yeah right! What ever he said, she bought it because she……bought it, and in 1872 NIXE was launched.

For the next twenty years NIXE would sail all over the Med calling Mallorca home base. Unfortunately in 1894 at the hands of Mallorquin Captain RafaelVich, the sea would claim her. It happened on a balmy summer night in Algerian waters off cape Caxine. The story goes that the Archduke warned Captain Vich of possible shoals in the area but the captain pushed on. When they hit the rock the boat practically split in half. Fortunately everybody was able to get off alive. Sadly nothing could be done to save the NIXE and to this day she rests on the sea floor.

It wasn´t long before NIXE II was commissioned and back in Mallorca like her predecessor. When Luis Salvador died, the boat and a great majority of his estate was left to the current Mallorquin landlords of Son Marroig. I have visited the estate on many occasions over three years, they are lovely people and great cultural stewards.

Sadly, boats especially wooden ones are tortuously expensive to maintain. I know, I have “El Gordito” a twelve meeter traditional wooden Mallorquin sailboat known as a llaüt. Unfortunately the new owners of NIXE II, unable to foot the bills, decommissioned her, broke her up and sold her as lumber.

I often sail where NIXE sailed, a magical spot known as Sa Foradada located directly below the Archduke´s house. If you´ve got salt in your veins, Mallorca in your heart and you want to know more about our magical island then….

Fair winds amigos, come on back next Tuesday.

Capt. Lawrence

Llaüt El Gordito RCNP

llautelgordito@gmail.com