It looks small and maybe not very exciting. Stay more than 15 minutes and you'll be in love.
From the road it looks like a small garden, vaguely going downhill, something possibly converted from an old house nobody could afford any more - and there are no glasshouses. Something happens as you start walking about, getting lost in the nonchalant paths that are at the same time deep labyrinths and simply logical: there is an inherent charm to these gardens that makes you want to stay and take your time.
If you're used to botanic gardens, you'll find plants sorted according to the 'normal' categories: wet, dry, sunny, exotic, etc. Yet for once the distinction between each of them is done so sweetly that the garden moves away from being a simple catalog, to becoming a place where you're simply enjoying yourself. Other visitors seem to be on the same wavelength and everybody moves about as if in a dream.
How long will it take you to realise that it's the same water trickling down from the top terrace to the one at the bottom? If it's springtime, how long can you resist before you stick your nose into one of those orange trees in full blossom? How guilty will you feel when you snatch that plump, ripe mandarin from that tree when nobody is watching, and want to cry when you compare with what you've been eating so far?
The garden may be small, and far away, but spend an hour there and it feels like you've spent a week-end at someone's place who is going to be your friend forever.
It's quite easy to find, specially if you took the old wooden train from Palma: right out of the station as you head towards the city square, turn left into the first street marked with a one-way sign, going against the traffic (Carrer d'Isabel II). Walk for five minutes until you get to the church then turn right into Cami de son Pons - a small street that soon joins up with a bigger road. Keep walking for three minutes and you'll find the garden on the right handside. read more
