Before the island wakes.

There's a version of Mallorca most visitors never see: the one that exists before eight in the morning, when the coach parties are still asleep and the coastline belongs entirely to whoever's awake enough to claim it. Taylor and Noah got that version of the island and it suited them.

They'd come out from California already married, not for a wedding but for the days after it, when the ceremony is behind you and all that's left is each other and somewhere beautiful to be together. We met before sunrise at a small cove, cut in by cliffs, the sort of place that feels like it was made for whoever finds it first. The sun came up slowly over the water and for a while it was just the three of us and the sea deciding what mood it wanted for the day.

By evening we'd made our way to Arta, a town tucked into a valley a few kilometres inland, half asleep and unbothered by the season. We wandered its streets as the light started to soften: whitewashed houses, narrow lanes that don't seem to lead anywhere in particular until they do, doorways painted in that faded blue Mediterranean towns seem to specialise in. Taylor and Noah are easy company, already leaning into each other without needing to be asked.

We climbed up to the cliff tops to catch the last of the light. Gold, then pink, then something closer to copper. They danced a little, more from instinct than performance and the sky did most of the work for us.

Mallorca offers mornings like that and evenings like that within the same twenty four hours, which is part of why I keep finding reasons to come back. It rewards the people willing to be up before the island wakes and out again after it's gone quiet.

If a trip like this is the kind of thing you'd want a record of, that's exactly what Flâner exists for.