Torre de Portopí

The Torre de Portopí guards the entrance to Palma's harbour on Majorca, as it has done for over seven centuries. Raised in the thirteenth century as a coastal defence, it ranks among the oldest working lighthouses in the world. In Spain no other lighthouse survives so close to its original form.

Ships have sheltered here since Roman times, when this shore was Palma's principal anchorage. By the fourteenth century the tower worked as a signal post, guiding crews safely in. Its partner in that watch was the Torre de Peraires. The defenders could stretch a heavy chain between the two towers, closing the port to hostile ships. They remain the only coastal towers of Palma that combined defence with signalling. Officially it became a lighthouse in 1600, as Mediterranean shipping and trade made a proper beam essential. It stands protected today as a national monument.

You cannot simply walk up: the tower sits within a naval base, and visits run through a permit process. Many say the finest close-up comes from a boat on the water. Inside, though, a museum holds one of the world's most important collections of lighthouse lenses. Those great glass elements concentrate a lamp's glow so its light reaches far out to sea. The Castell de Sant Carles, a seventeenth-century fortress that now serves as a military museum, stands close by. Along the same shore lies Caló des Grells, a rocky stretch where coarse sand meets clear water. The tower's light still does the job it took on more than four centuries ago: guiding ships safely into Palma.