Extreme route · start & finish Can Pastilla
Vuelta a Mallorca
- Epic
- 312 km
- 3,952 m
- ≈ 12½–15½ h
Map and elevation profile
Move along the elevation profile to see where you are on the map.
Food & coffee stops
Tried-and-tested places where cyclists like to stop for coffee, food or water.
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Café 59 kmCafetería Vall Hermós Estellencs
Cyclists' favourite on the Ma-10 in Estellencs: coffee and almond pastry on a sea-view terrace, often full of riders. Opens around 10 am, closed Wednesdays.
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Restaurant 112 kmMirador de ses Barques Sóller (Puig Major climb)
Halfway up Puig Major: fresh orange juice or lemon tart on a terrace high above Port de Sóller, with about 8 km still to climb. Closed Mondays.
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Café 136 kmRestaurant Coll de sa Bataia Escorca (Coll de sa Batalla, near Lluc)
Classic cyclists' pit stop next to the Repsol station: self-service coffee and almond cake, bike racks, floor pump and tools. Open daily from 7 am.
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Café 172 kmRevelo Mallorca Port d'Alcúdia
Cycling café with 3T bike rental right on the main road through Port d'Alcúdia: Arabay coffee and homemade sweet or savoury bites. Hours not published, so check ahead.
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Café 203 kmBar Pizzeria La Bicicletta Artà
Bike-themed café on Carrer de Ciutat, right on the route through Artà: good coffee, homemade gelato and a public drinking fountain next door. Open daily from 10 am.
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Café 261 kmSa Plaça Santanyí
Century-old café on Santanyí's main square: pa amb oli and coffee on the terrace before the last 51 km home. Closed Tuesdays, busy on market days (Wed, Sat).
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Vuelta a Mallorca: 311 km around the whole island in a single day
Route summary:
The big one: a clockwise lap of the whole island from our Can Pastilla shop – 311.5 km and 3,952 m of climbing in one day. It's for riders with 200-km days in their legs who can pace and fuel.
After 40 km of resort coast, the mountains take over: the whole Ma-10 through the Serra de Tramuntana, Andratx to Pollença, with Puig Major as its roof. The rest is fast and rolling – the bays of Pollença and Alcúdia, Artà, the east coast, Santanyí and the farmland of Campos and Llucmajor.
Plan 11–14 hours in the saddle, start at first light and pack lights. Refuel in Deià (km 93), Lluc (km 138) and Playa de Muro (km 175); after that, town squares are your cafés.
Cycling route summary:
Km 0–41: Palma's seafront, then the resort coast via Illetes, Portals Nous, Palmanova, Costa de la Calma and Peguera – short rises, roundabouts and traffic. Keep it easy.
Km 42–66: in Andratx the Ma-10 begins. Coll de sa Gramola (5.1 km at 5.2%) opens the Tramuntana, a second rise takes you past the clifftop Es Grau café, then you drop to Estellencs and Banyalbufar.
Km 66–104: Coll de sa Bastida (3.1 km, 6.1%) and Coll d'en Claret (3.8 km, 4.5%, 498 m) lead to Valldemossa. Then up and down through Deià to Sóller. Expect coaches from mid-morning.
Km 104–120: the crux. Puig Major is 14.3 km at 5.9% – steady rather than steep – up to the Monnàber tunnel and the highest point of the loop (872 m).
Km 120–158: past Gorg Blau and the Sa Calobra turn-off, a last gentle climb and a descent reach Lluc. Then you cross Coll de Femenia (537 m) and descend some 14 km to Pollença on fast, sweeping bends.
Km 158–311: flat past the bays to Can Picafort, a 6-km drag before Artà, rolling roads down the east coast via Porto Cristo and Portocolom, then Santanyí, Ses Salines and an almost 20-km gentle rise from Campos past Llucmajor before the final descent to the sea.
Tourist summary:
Few one-day rides show you this much of Mallorca. Before breakfast you pass beneath Palma's Gothic cathedral, then ride the entire Serra de Tramuntana, a UNESCO cultural landscape since 2011: the terraces of Banyalbufar, Valldemossa, where Chopin spent the winter of 1838–39, Robert Graves's Deià and orange-scented Sóller.
Beyond Puig Major come the Gorg Blau reservoir and the pilgrims' sanctuary of Lluc. The afternoon changes the mood: Alcúdia's medieval walls, the hilltop sanctuary above Artà, the harbour of Porto Cristo with the Coves del Drach, and golden-stone Santanyí. The last hour crosses the farmland of Campos and Llucmajor – the quiet inland Mallorca most visitors never see.
Climbs
- Length
- 5.1 km
- Avg. gradient
- 5.2 %
- Max.
- 10.3 %
- Top
- 360 m
- Length
- 3.1 km
- Avg. gradient
- 6.1 %
- Max.
- 9.7 %
- Top
- 298 m
- Length
- 3.8 km
- Avg. gradient
- 4.5 %
- Max.
- 9.1 %
- Top
- 498 m
- Length
- 14.3 km
- Avg. gradient
- 5.9 %
- Max.
- 7.7 %
- Top
- 846 m
Tips from our guides
- Start at first light and ride it around the longest days (May–July) – you need 11–14 hours in the saddle. Pack front and rear lights: you will want them in the Monnàber tunnel at the top of the Puig Major climb (about 400 m long; solar lighting went in from 2014, yet riders still call it dark) and perhaps for the final kilometres.
- From mid-morning the Ma-10 between Valldemossa and Sóller, and the road up Puig Major, fill with hire cars and tour coaches. Ride single file and expect drivers to brake hard at viewpoints.
- After Playa de Muro (km 175) you still have about 137 km to go. Buy water and food in the towns – Artà, Porto Cristo, Santanyí, Campos – and only drink from fountains marked 'aigua potable' or 'agua potable'.
- If you have to cut the loop short in Sóller, don't take the Sóller road tunnel towards Palma – bikes are not allowed. Climb the old Ma-11A pass road over Coll de Sóller (8.9 km at 5.3%) and descend to Palma.
- Ride an endurance road bike with compact gearing: the steepest 100-m sections of the main climbs are around 10%, but the day adds up to almost 4,000 m of climbing. Pack a gilet and arm warmers for the descents from Puig Major and Femenia – at 850 m it is noticeably cooler than by the sea.
Did you know?
- Between Andratx (km 41.5) and Pollença (km 157.8) you ride the entire Ma-10, the 112-km 'Carretera de la Serra' across the Tramuntana. It used to be numbered C-710. source
- Artà, which you ride through at km 203, is the hometown of Enric Mas. After finishing second in 2018, 2021 and 2022, he won the Vuelta a España in Granada on 13 September 2026 – his first Grand Tour. source
- Right beside Porto Cristo (km 224) lie the Coves del Drach and Lake Martel, an underground lake about 115 m long named after the French explorer who found it in 1896. Tours end with a short classical concert played from boats. source
Places along the route
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19 km
Palma – Passeig Marítim
The seafront promenade runs beneath La Seu, Palma's Gothic cathedral: begun in 1229, finished only in 1601, with one of the largest Gothic rose windows in the world. Antoni Gaudí led restoration work inside from 1903 to 1914. Enjoy the calm – from Illetes on, the resort traffic begins.
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266 km
Banyalbufar
Just before the village, the Torre des Verger watchtower stands on a clifftop beside the Ma-10. It was ordered in 1579 after pirate raids and was standing by 1597, one of a chain of signal towers that guarded the coast. Banyalbufar itself clings to steep dry-stone terraces once planted with Malvasia vines.
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383 km
Valldemossa
The route dips into the village below the Real Cartuja, the charterhouse where Chopin and George Sand spent the winter of 1838–39; his Pleyel piano is on show in the cells. Valldemossa is also the birthplace of Saint Catalina Thomàs, known locally as 'la Beateta' – look for the ceramic tiles in her honour beside the house doors.
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493 km
Deià
Stone houses stacked on a hill above the sea. The poet Robert Graves settled here in 1929 and, apart from the war years, stayed until his death in 1985; his house, Ca n'Alluny, is now a museum, and he is buried in the small cemetery by the church at the top of the village. The Ma-10 is the main street, so refuelling is easy.
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5104 km
Sóller
A town of orange and lemon groves in a bowl of mountains – the citrus trade even paid for the railway to Palma. The wooden tram to Port de Sóller rattles across Plaça de sa Constitució past Sant Bartomeu, whose Modernista façade (1904) is by Gaudí's collaborator Joan Rubió. Fill both bottles: the next 15 km go almost only uphill.
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6125 km
Gorg Blau (Ma-10)
A turquoise reservoir right under Puig Major (1,436 m), the island's highest mountain, whose summit is a military zone. Gorg Blau and neighbouring Cúber were inaugurated in 1972 to supply Palma with water. The day's hardest climbing is now behind you.
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7138 km
Lluc
Mallorca's spiritual heart: a sanctuary that grew up in the 13th century around a dark statue of the Virgin, La Moreneta. The Blauets, named after their blue cassocks, have been its permanent choir since 1531. The cafés and restaurants around the main square make it the natural place to refuel before Coll de Femenia.
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8169 km
Alcúdia
The route skirts the old town's walls, built between 1298 and 1362 – you can walk along much of them. Just outside lie the ruins of Pollentia, the Roman city founded after Rome took Mallorca in 123 BC, complete with a small theatre.
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9203 km
Artà
Look up: the Sant Salvador sanctuary crowns the hill inside a fortified wall with towers, 180 steps above the parish church. On the south-eastern edge of town, just off the route, lies Ses Païsses, a Talaiotic settlement whose first tower dates from around 900–800 BC.
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10261 km
Santanyí
Honey-coloured local stone everywhere – the houses, the parish church with its organ built by Jordi Bosch in 1762, and Sa Porta Murada, a 16th-century gate from the old town walls. The café terraces around Plaça Major make a good late stop with 51 km to go.
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