All Along the Watchtower

Here in Ibiza we're blessed with a fine collection of watchtowers. In fact we even have one at the top of our street! Today Marli and I visited the Torre d'en Rovira which sits out on a spit of land between Cala Bassa and Cala Conta.

The towers date back to a period when Barbary pirates raided Ibiza in a non-alcoholic frenzy of pillaging and carrying off the natives into slavery. The idea of the towers was to form a defencive network which gave cannon coverage of all the coastline.

The Torre de'n Rovira was started in 1756 by local engineer Ballester, finished in 1763 and is the biggest tower constructed in that period. Together with the cannons on San Antonio church, it commanded the entrance to San Antonio Bay and took its name from the bloke in charge of the defence of the area - Rovira.

In a 'Time Team' type recreation of what the tower may have started out like we constructed a mock up of the same materials that were available 250 years ago and here it is..................

and it didn't take us 7 years to complete!