MEMORIES OF THE 70’S
22
JULY 2023
Menorca Airport c. 1975 Photo: Antonio González Rodríguez
A TRIP DOWN ME MORY L AN E
1970’S MENORCA By Sarah Folley
You could have a drink with your friends and watch them pass through a small gate, waving them off from the garden area as they walked across the tarmac. I also learnt to drive at Sol del Este, in our old Seat 600 with the engine in the boot. I have to admit that there were not many bushes left intact on our dirt track course, as we drove timed races on the “roads” they had laid out for the future development. Sol del Este was then just the Tramuntana villas - La Gardenia didn’t exist, nor any other houses or apartments all the way to Santa Ana which just had a smattering of large villas mostly overlooking Calas Fonts.
Calas Fonts c. 1975
This was a defining moment in my life! No, not the stern ticking off I was receiving from my father for some serious misdemeanour at school but rather his announcement. While I was stood on the mat in front of his desk, head bowed in shame, he followed up with the news that he had purchased a villa on a tiny Spanish island. And so began a lifelong love affair with Menorca.
And oh, Calas Fons! (as we used to call it). Then THE place to go for all youngsters looking for fun. Trebol and Nikki’s (then Dumbo’s) are still in the original ownership they were back then. The port of Mahon had very little to offer in terms of restaurants or bars. My foray into “acting” was at Bar Port Nelson where free drinks were being offered to all the extras for the film “Spanish Fly” with Terry Thomas and Leslie Philips. The parents were none too pleased with the group of drunk teenagers rolling home later that day!
Number 1, Sol del Este was one of a group of 25 villas with a pool developed by Andrew Manners, whom many of you will know from his days with Don Cars or as Chairman of the Menorca Cricket Club. The deal was struck for under £5,000 in the Bar Andalucia next to the American bar, where most of their sales were signed up! It was the early 70’s, flights were few and far between - the days of Aviaco, Dan Air and Freddie Laker. In 1969 the “new” airport opened on the current site with one runway and two check-in desks. It was all very casual.
Filming Spanish Fly, Calas Fonts 1976
D O N ’ T M I S S A N E D I T I O N , S U B S C R I B E T O D AY ! V I S I T: R O Q U E TA M A G A Z I N E . N E T
