Ibiza
Ibiza has been settled since 654 BC and its walled Dalt Vila is a UNESCO site, but the modern island dates from the hippies of the 1960s and the DJs who followed them and rewrote dance music from these hills. Divide the visit deliberately: old town and salt flats by day, the north's quiet coves for two nights, the clubs for one.
Why go
A Phoenician port with a UNESCO old town — Dalt Vila's walls are the finest Renaissance fortification in the Mediterranean. The club culture that changed dance music — Ibiza's DJs rewrote a global genre from these hills in the 1980s. The quiet north — Sant Joan, the coves, the hippy markets, and an island that empties in October. Salt — the flats that made the island rich for two thousand years, now a nature reserve full of flamingos.
The character
Ibiza has been settled since 654 BC, when the Phoenicians founded a port here and began exporting salt, and the salt flats at Ses Salines remained the island's economy into the twentieth century. Dalt Vila, the walled upper town, was fortified by Philip II's engineers in the 1550s against Ottoman raids and is the best-preserved coastal fortification of its kind anywhere.
The modern island began with the hippies of the 1960s, who came for cheap living and an authoritarian Spain's blind eye, and continued with the DJs who arrived in the 1980s and took the Balearic sound back to Britain, where it built acid house. That single export — a music policy from a handful of open-air clubs — turned a farming island into a global brand, and the tension between the two Ibizas is the island's permanent subject: package tourism and superclubs in the south-west, farmhouses and coves in the north, and residents who have watched both arrive.
Places of character
Dalt Vila — enter by the Portal de ses Taules ramp and climb to the cathedral for the whole port below. Ses Salines — the salt pans at sunset, with flamingos and the mountain of Formentera across the water. Sant Joan de Labritja — the northern village, its Saturday market, and the road out to Cala d'en Serra. Es Vedrà — the limestone islet off the west coast, best seen from the cliffs at Cala d'Hort at sunset. Cala Comte or Benirràs — clear water and, at Benirràs, drummers on Sunday evenings since the 1970s. A club night, once — Pacha, DC10 or an open-air terrace; the point is the sound system, not the celebrity.
The way to do it
Split the island deliberately: two nights in the north for the coves and farmhouses, one in the town for Dalt Vila and one night out. Rent a car — the north is unreachable otherwise. And decide in advance which Ibiza you came for; trying to do both every day produces neither.
One perfect day
Breakfast at a village bar in the north, then a morning at a cove you have to walk down to. Drive south along the interior roads through almond and fig country, stopping for lunch at a finca restaurant. Afternoon in Dalt Vila: the ramparts, the cathedral, the archaeology museum, all in shade and mostly empty. Down to Ses Salines for a swim, then the salt flats at sunset with the flamingos. Dinner late in the port, and then either a terrace with a sound system or a boat back north — both are legitimate, and the island is used to either.
Grand hotels
Hacienda Na Xamena — 1971, built into the cliffs of the north coast, the island's first luxury hotel and still the view. Six Senses Ibiza — at Cala Xarraca in the north, the definitive contemporary address for the island's quieter half.
When to go
Best expression: June or September — sea warm, clubs open, roads driveable, prices below the peak. Consider: May, for the island itself with the season not yet started. Avoid if possible: August, and the closing parties in early October if you want sleep.
The frame
Ideal stay 4 nights · Minimum 3 nights · Best arrival by air; ferries from Barcelona and Valencia · Airport IBZ, 7 km · Walkability Dalt Vila only · Best without a car no — the north needs one