EuroTrip 2018 Part 3: Wedding in Mallorca, Spain

Let me set the scene before I begin: there are 16 states in Germany.

The joke is that Mallorca, one of the Balearic Islands off the coat of Spain, is the 17th German state.  The joke is...not wrong.

Literally every German I've ever met has been to Mallorca multiple times.  So it's only fitting that when two Germans wed each other, Mallorca is where they do it.

Philipp & Lara

I hadn't seen Lara since last year and Philipp since our last trip to Europe.  But more on them and their exquisite nuptials later.  First there are sights to see and food to eat!

After several hours of delay spent sitting on the floor of the Barcelona airport, we finally arrived to Palma de Mallorca a short 40-minute flight later.  It was much later than we had planned to arrive, so our first and only order of business for the night was to sit down for a good feed.

Little did we know this meal would be the crown jewel of the entire trip!

We had eaten plenty of tapas in Barcelona, but this was the first time we had the evil genius idea to eat a main dish on top of tapas.  We rolled out of that place, and it was absolutely delightful.  I can't recommend it enough!

The next day in the afternoon we were booked in for the bucks and hens parties.  That's bachelor and bachelorette parties for the Yanks in the audience.  That left us with exactly one morning to wander the tiny, adorable streets of Palma to see the sights.

Cathedral of Mallorca & Royal Palace of La Almudaina 

Until I researched for this post, I had no idea that the cathedral and palace were two separate places because they're right next to each other and look almost identical.  From my 30 second Google search, I think one is on the left, and the other is on the right here:

But I couldn't tell you which is which!  We had no time to do any deep exploration, but we got our first glimpse of the Balearic Sea, where some of us would later spend the afternoon.

Arab Baths

Few historical sites sound more awesome than ancient baths, so we coughed up the 5 Euro to go visit them.  Little did we know it was all dried up and what was left was just a garden.

And a fancy doorway.

Nice enough, but not quite the ancient mini waterfalls I had in mind.

Y'all know how I live a good, Christian life so no trip could be complete without a stop to see my girls at the...

Santa Clara Convent

Except I saw no nuns, boo!  So as far as I'm concerned this was just a regular 'ol church.

With our city center touring time over we got cleaned up and went our gender separated ways for an afternoon, evening and night of boozing.

The ladies started at the bride's hotel to surprise her after a massage.

Kindly note I am literally the only person in that photo who does not speak German.  The only one!  There's the odd foreigner who moved there and learned the language, and a few Germans who actually spoke zero English!  It was a wild, new experience for me and entirely predictable on Mallorca.

We then went to a leisurely, boozy dinner which my fat ass only took pictures of the food so we'll skip right to the cocktail making course.

This bar was right near the beach, but alas our day of boozing was strictly an indoor affair while the boys were boozing with this view:

Less than an hour into the festivities we got word that the groom was blowing chunks...from sea sickness.  Poor guy!

Meanwhile back inside we convinced the bartender to take his shirt off.

That was our wild encounter for the night.  Except for the absolute madness that is Bierkonig.

The Beer King

It's hard to put into words what this place is, or what it's like.  It's a beer garden-slash-nightclub and the most Eurotrash drinking establishment in the entire universe.

If I were 18 (and German) I would have loved this place!  But alas I am a 35 Ameri-straylian and to say it is not my scene is an understatement.  But I actually didn't hate it - mainly because there were lots of food outlets (those Germans know their kebabs) and due to the sheer size of the place, ample seating.

It was far too loud, though.  Get off my lawn!

The next day off we went to the other side of the island, closer to where the wedding was held.  We stayed in the small resort town of Can Picafort and shared an Airbnb with 7 friends who were Martin's classmates in Edinburgh.

Not everyone was able to make it to the bachelor/ette parties, so with everyone reunited (bride and groom excluded) what to do for our first night all together?

More paella!  With a lovely sea view.

But the ruckus was kept to a bare minimum so we could look fresh and fly at the main event the next day.

♂

♀

All our ceremony pictures are just garbage, so let me wow you with pictures of the incredible wedding venue, which was nothing short of stunning.

This was the first wedding I've attended after my own.  Now I get to play a fun game of "This Is Awesome, Why Didn't I Do That?!" at every wedding I attend for the rest of my life.  Exhibit A:

Hilarious, ancient picture of Marv and I

They printed off hundreds of hard copy pictures, artfully tied with twine, to leave on the tables for people to browse throughout dinner.  They were categorized by table number, so you only got pictures relevant to your friend group and didn't have to sift through stacks of pictures of people you don't know.

This was a genius idea and so much fun!  They rummaged through well over 1,000 pictures to select the best ones for printing.  As a bonus, we took them home as party favors.  If you're planning a wedding you have to do this!  I imagine it took a ton of time and effort but the results were so incredibly worth it.  Weddings are a time for drunken trips down Memory Lane.

The food rocked and the booze was flowing.  Speeches were almost exclusively in German but not nearly as lengthy or painful as they have been known to be in the past.  And my personal fave, the hanky wave to usher in the new husband and wife!

Not to be outdone by sparklers for their first dance.

We partied hard until 3 in the goddamn morning.  I don't even remember the last time I stayed up until 3 a.m., much less partied until then!  We were transported back to our grad school glory days, inching rapidly towards a decade ago, for one hell of a night.

The next day for those of us still around the couple hosted a dinner, which was at the same place we dined on our first night in Can Picafort and conveniently located just minutes from our Airbnb.

Same venue, same great view.

And same menu!

I travel through food, so I can safely say I have done Mallorca (and by extension of that, Spain) justice.

The bride and groom live in Singapore practically right next door to Brisbane (in Aussie terms an 8 hour direct flight is right next door).

I need to go visit these two, soon!

Besides this EuroTrip we haven't gone anywhere or seen anything this year (for perfectly valid reasons - uno y dos) so I'm starved for a bit of adventure.  Plus, like with any wedding you don't get a substantial amount of time with the couple so we're well overdue.

Philipp and Lara are too much fun and live too close not see more often.  Here they are at our wedding in November:

We need to figure out an Asia-Pac reunion.  Soon!