LA FONDA DE LA MARINA

The Fonda de la Marina is mentioned in the tales of some travellers who visited the island in the 19th century, although not with that name. The Archduke Luis Salvador of Austria, who came to Ibiza for the first time in l867, mentions the inn named d'es Coix, situated in the street then known as 'del Norte' and which already belonged to Olozaga, as today. In the Fonda d'es Coix, the modesty of which is not concealed by the Archduke, noisy gatherings would take place involving people from Ibiza and confined politicians, many of whom resided at the inn, to discuss cultural or political issues. In some corner, once night had fallen, cards would fly, not tolerated by luck...

A French artist, Gaston Vuillier, who visited the Balearic Islands in l888, treated the inn much more severely and published, in 1893, his book ‘The Forgotten Islands’, the drawings of which are by general opinion much more valuable than the text. The landlord José Roig es Coix, is described as ‘a monster who walks among the tables of his guests lurching like a bear, spitting and smoking vile-smelling tobacco’. The meals, according to Vuillier, were barbarian, and the waitress Vicenta, who served them, when the owner did not, was a witch disguised as a waitress...

But suddenly, as in a peripetia, a change occurred. Fifteen years have passed. We are at the beginning of our century and an English traveller, Margaret D'Este, visits the Balearic Islands. While the Archduke and Gaston Vuillier still used the pencil of an artist, the English lady appears with a photographic camera. 'In Majorca with a Camera' is the title of her book, published in London in l907. For this English writer, the Fonda de la Marina, which has by now adopted the name, only deserves praise. Neither monsters nor witches inhabit there. The beds are excellent and the cook is very good. Perhaps his cuisine is excessively limited to island fare. However, the description she provides is irreproachable. See the menu for an Easter dinner: Fish soup with rice and lobster, haricot bean and cabbage stew; salt cod with eggs, potatoes and peas; different kinds of boiled fish, with sauce; sweet cake cheese, grapes and oranges...

After Margaret D'Este, other English visitors came and stayed at the Fonda de la Marina. With their exotic air, their pipes and their trousers, they attracted general attention and were followed along our streets by retinues of insolent children. In my days, the Fonda de la Marina was still, I think, the only inn in town. Some foreign travellers, passers by or civil servants posted to the island stayed there. Juan Larrouquere, the Frenchman who lived in Ibiza from l9I4 untill his death in October l9I9, lived there. Don Alvan Piernas de Tineo, the ports engineer, lived there, always with his drink and chimera. There lived Don Jose Monresinos, the rubicund religion teacher from the high school, a meticulous but carefree priest. Don Francisco Planells ran the inn for many years, known to all as Paco de la Fonda. He was a member of the Carlos Román gang, a group of men prepared to make the most of life. I can see him in a flashback of my memories and I can find nothing better than his figure to recommend the inn; heavy without being obese, mobile extended lower lip, he made brilliant roasts, and with a slightly gurgling voice, of cooking, that had not originated from fasting or abstinence....

Extract form the book 'Lo que Ibiza me inspiró' from Enrique Fajarnés Cardona published in 1987