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The castle-like structure stands 4 km (2 miles) east of Felanitx, on top of Puig Sant Salvador, the highest mountain of the Serres de Llevant. Founded in the 14th century, and remodelled in the 18th century, the scanctuary is an important place of pilgrimage. The view includes the southeastern coast of Mallorca. As in other former monasteries, visitors are allowed to stay in basic rooms (see Santuari de Sant Salvador, Felanitx).

A link with the Mallorcans of some 3,000 years ago, these Bronze Age ruins of a Talayot village include a massive Cyclopean portal formed from three stone slabs weighing up to eight tons each. Inside are several rooms and an atalaia (watch-tower); and the entire settlement is surrounded by a Cyclopean drystone wall.

The town’s name reputedly derives from the Arabic suliar – “golden bowl” – the valley is famous for its orange groves. Notable buildings include the Modernista Banco de Sóller and the Neo-Gothic church of Sant Bartomeu, both the work of a disciple of Antoni Gaudí. Few visitors do more than sit in Plaça Constitució soaking up the atmosphere and sampling tapas, pastries, ice cream and fresh orange juice. The town’s vintage electric train provides a superb ride through the mountains to Palma.

Perched high above the sea, with its famous Neoclassical gazebo imported from Italy, this L-shaped mansion was fashioned by Archduke Salvador see Archduke Luis Salvador of Hapsburg-Lorena and Bourbon. Much admired in Mallorca, the archduke is remembered here with a museum devoted to his life and collections. In the gardens, you can sit in the white Carrara marble rotunda and gaze at the Na Foradada (“pierced rock”) Peninsula, jutting out to sea with a gaping 18-m (59-ft) hole at its centre.

Board a tram at the little station above the main square of Sóller, which will take your family 5 km (3 miles) down through town and along the water’s edge to the Port de Sóller. The cars are ex-San Francisco rolling stock from the 1930s, operating at a rattling snail’s pace.

It was in Valldemossa, Mallorca’s highest and one of its prettiest towns, that lovers Frédéric Chopin and George Sand spent one dramatic winter in the early 19th century. The result was Sand’s infamous book A Winter in Majorca , both a scathing indictment of the island’s people and their ways and a poetic rhapsody in praise of the natural beauties of the place (see Museu Municipal de Valldemossa).