La Mola Lighthouse

A solitary lighthouse at the island's eastern tip that inspired a Jules Verne novel

The Far de la Mola stands at the eastern edge of the island's high plateau, where the land simply stops and drops into the sea. Built in 1861, it is one of the more dramatic lighthouse sites in the Balearics — not because the structure is spectacular (it is plain and white, as lighthouses tend to be) but because of the setting. The cliffs here fall some 60 metres into the sea, the wind comes in unimpeded from the east, and on a clear day you can see the profile of Ibiza to the north and the open Mediterranean stretching south toward Algeria.

Getting here requires either cycling or driving the main road across the La Mola plateau — a route that climbs steadily from the flatlands and rewards you with views back over the whole island before the lighthouse appears at the end. There are a couple of craft stalls and a small café nearby in summer. The monument to Jules Verne stands just beside the lighthouse access road, an odd and pleasing fact about a place that already has more than enough character without literary credentials.

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A story
Jules Verne is believed to have visited Formentera in the 1870s and was struck by the remote, wind-battered promontory at La Mola. He used it as a setting in his 1877 novel Hector Servadac, in which the lighthouse keeper and his daughter are among the survivors of an extraordinary cosmic collision. A small monument near the lighthouse commemorates the connection.

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