Your weekly news catch-up in Mallorca

While the police were putting Operation Summer into place, Operation Cloud couldn't be neglected. Clouds were pretty difficult to ignore - the dark ones that hovered over much the same parts of Mallorca at more or less the same time every day for several days in a row.

We were learning what rain radar images meant, given the regularity with which the met agency was posting them. Blues were no big deal (if at all), greens pointed to trouble, and yellows and reds were varying degrees of trouble. In Porreres, the municipality's famed apricots were their shades of yellow and red, but they were also speckled. The daily deluge that Porreres seemed to suffer had led to many a flooded field and damaged crop.

The fire brigade had to rescue some people who were trapped in cars by floods. There were no incidents of note and the depression that had caused the weather to behave with such uncanny regularity started to drift away, only for Aemet to suggest that a storm named Oscar was on its way from the Atlantic.

Who would have thought? More tourist excesses

So, the weather hadn't settled into a proper summer pattern in time for Operation Summer and the deployment of additional National Police resources, which have already been put to good use in nicking some 50 people - pickpockets and bag snatchers primarily. But what of excessive tourists, of whom there appeared to be no shortage? Oddly enough, Magalluf wasn't being given dishonourable mentions in this regard, as Cala Ratjada and Playa de Palma were in the frame.

A few years ago, the Guardia Civil had to be brought in to tackle tourist excesses in Cala Ratjada (which isn't National Police territory). These were excesses committed by young German holidaymakers, typically of the spring break variety. And they have been back in Cala Ratjada again, bringing with them annoyances such as loud music and drinking on the beaches.

In Playa de Palma, which is a National Police domain, it was being said that drunken tourism is worse than ever this year. They said that last year as well, so the current crop of excessive tourists - a great number of them German spring breakers - must be a particularly rum lot. They may even drink rum, though by the sounds of it they reach a point where they wouldn't know what they were drinking. "There is no end to the drinking. Some are still drunk on the streets at nine in the morning," said one restaurant owner.

And too many tourists - again

In the centre of Palma, meanwhile, drunken tourism isn't the issue. It's tourist overcrowding and how these tourists are being catered for. The president of the La Lonja residents association says that "the centre has become an amusement park for tourists". Lifelong residents are being driven out, such as one who has been living in the Plaça Major since 1988. The traditional shops have gone. They're now all shops for tourists, while there's the noise of street musicians all day until eleven at night.

For all the talk of tourist limits or not growing tourism, it seems almost inevitable that 2023 will end up being a record year for tourism. More tourists than ever, so more overcrowding and saturation, April having provided some early evidence of this record-breaking. The total number of tourists in the Balearics in April exceeded the previous record (2019) by getting on for 170,000.

Data from bookings portals (e.g. Hotelbeds) and analysts suggested that reservations for Mallorca and the Balearics this summer are at present up to 27% higher than they were at the same time last year. These same sources indicated that price increases were not acting as a deterrent and that bookings' behaviour is very different to what had been predicted towards the end of 2022 - that the rise in the cost of living would bring about a fall in reservations.

Air-traffic controllers a concern

The only real blot on the tourism landscape comes from the aviation sector. In Italy last Sunday, air-traffic controllers, handling staff and cabin crews were all out on strike. On Tuesday, French air-traffic controllers were again on strike. Flights to and from Mallorca were affected, and these strikes were raising concerns about another summer of flight disruptions.

At a meeting of the IATA International Air Transport Association in Istanbul, airline leaders brought up these concerns, the director general of IATA, Willie Walsh, pointing out that airlines themselves had done a great deal to avoid repeats of last year's staff shortages. Airports, Walsh added, should also be ok. So the issues for the sector are centred firmly on possible industrial action, especially by air-traffic controllers.

The ensaïmada crisis

One minor crisis affecting Mallorca's air passengers was seemingly resolved, when Ryanair issued an assurance that they have "never charged for carrying ensaïmadas". One of the final acts for the departing tourism minister, Iago Negueruela, was to bring Ryanair representatives together with Balearic bakers and discuss what had been said was charging for taking ensaïmadas on as extra hand luggage. Well, there had been charges but not for ensaïmadas specifically. It was all to do with the fare that had been contracted. If this didn't allow for extra hand luggage, then there would be a charge.

We were all no doubt greatly relieved that the ensaïmada crisis was apparently over.

On the run and on the beaches

Still at the airport, and the National Police detained an individual wanted by the German authorities for having been a member of an organised gang that was engaged in the theft of top-of-the-range cars that were subsequently being sold on the black market in Poland. He had managed to flee and disappear in March last year after a high-speed chase by German police.

At a restaurant in Alcudia, Liam Byrne, a member of the Irish Kinahan criminal gang, was arrested by the National Police, who were acting on intelligence from the National Crime Agency in the UK. Byrne had flown to Palma from Dubai, where he has been evading justice for a number of years. He was wanted in particular for the supply of firearms.

Getting back to the beaches, it won't be the National Police who need to be involved but local police forces, as and when a Spanish government decree is passed that will authorise town halls to introduce bans on smoking on beaches. The decree text is currently subject to submissions from regional authorities, but once it is finalised it will allow the police to issue fines if there are breaches of municipal bans. At present, the 'Platges sense Fum' (Smoke Free Beaches) campaign in the Balearics does no more than ask people not to smoke and not to leave cigarette waste, i.e. the ends, which are a significant environmental hazard.

Impounded car? Take an Uber instead

It was Palma police who accompanied Customs agents when they went to Real Mallorca's training ground on the Friday before the last match of the season. The agents had previously been to the ground and informed three players that they should have registered their cars with Spanish plates and paid the corresponding tax. One player did this, but two did not - Slovakia internationals Dominik Greif and Martin Valjent.

The cars were towed away, the players having initially tried to prevent this. They had to be reminded that police were present. Their tax adviser subsequently issued a statement saying that this had all been a "mere procedural error" that would be fixed. As well as the tax, the players faced fines of between 50% and 150% of the registration tax charged, which varies according to the vehicle.

Without their cars for a few days, the players might have been grateful if an Uber service had been available. There isn't one in Mallorca and the Balearics, the government having placed legal obstacles to prevent Uber and similar services. However, this situation looks as if it may change. The Constitutional Court in Madrid is currently considering whether the government's measures contravene a constitutional right to free enterprise. Uber seem so confident of a favourable ruling that they have started to ship vehicles with Uber Mallorca logos to Palma.

Forty arrived on Tuesday, and Uber promptly announced that they would be starting service in Andratx, Calvia, Llucmajor and Palma from Thursday. The taxi drivers were far from happy and called a meeting for Friday to consider their response if the acting government doesn't intervene to stop what they believe is illegal.