Traversing the Serra de Cavall Bernat

Five hours of hard ridge scrambling under a burning sun - aka fun!

The Serra de Cavall Bernat rises 300m vertical from the sea in the north of the island of Mallorca. It forms a jagged ridge that can be seen from both the famous Formentor lighthouse and many places inland. The Serra is one side of the picturesque Vall de Boquer which leads to a small and quiet beach. The roughly 3km (plus 1km to get on it and another to get down) ridge is broken up by many rock pillars and is capped off by the sea and its highest point, the Talaia Vella (340m above sea level), on the inland side.

Besides looking at this line across the sky formed by the ridge many times on bike rides and other trips I had read some accounts of people doing the travers and describing it as quite difficult (exposed scrambling and climbing up to UIAA grade 3), long (about 8h) or suggesting to only do part of it (climbing up to Talaia Vella and going down into Vall de Boquer halfway over the ridge). Taking this and the 30 degree celsius heat into account I packed quite a bit of water, some food and the necessary gear to get me out of trouble if necessary.

I started early and decided to go counterclockwise to the Boquer beach and climb onto the ridge there, over it and then back down from Talaia Vella. My reasoning was that I would do the most difficult parts first and would not need to slog through the valley after the travers. On a side note: There are some climbing routes in the Valley, which I of course took a look at. However I think climbing in that area is not allowed for some reason - and some of the bolts are chopped...

Hiking the 3km to the Beach of Cala Boquer is very pleasant and beautiful. The path is good and there is little elevation to deal with. I can recommend this to anyone. From the beach I took a good look at my options to get on the ridge which is about 250m high at that end. The lower part has very deep weathering scars and is quite steep, then the angle eases a bit and ramps up again. I chose to go quite directly through the lower parts which turned out to be quite climby and seriously exposed. The second steep part was not as bad as I found a few piles of rock that pointed me towards an opening in what looked quite intimidating earlier. After roughly an hour I was on top of the ridge with 250m of at times more than vertical drop to the sea to my right and the Vall de Boquer to my left.

The actual traverse is a constant up and down over and around the rock pillars on ridge which stick out up to 50m. The hardest part in my opinion are the dozends of downclimbs that sap your physical and mental energy. Another challenge is route finding because even though you follow the ridge some of the pillars can be climbing onto but you do not get down on the other side - which means retracing your steps and getting around the thing.

After about 1,5km there is the lowest point (~200m above sea level) and the option to get down into the valley. If you go the same direction as myself you might be tempted to do that as the following rock tower is the highest and does look quite scary. However it turns out that climbing up is not too difficult and fun on solid rock and from the top you can see the shark tooth line of rock you have already done and the rest of the ridge towards Talaia Vella. A word of warning however: The downclimb from this tower is definitely type 2 fun and setting up a rappel might have been the better option.

A bit later I did find the only flat part of the whole traverse and took a bit of a lunch break before continuing towards the highest point of the Serra. The Talaia Vella offers a great view of the Valley, the ridge and northern Tramuntana mountains. Getting down is quite annoying however after already four hours of high concentration scrambling as you descend ~300m elevation in ~800m distance on the same sharp rocks that make up the whole Serra.

In the end the 9km loop took me about five and a half hours with 4,5h being spent on the actual travers. The Serra de Cavall Bernat is definitely a great option for a small adventure. However do not mistake this for a hike - I would call it light mountaineering!

Adventurer: Bengt