Chilled Ibiza: Experience the Ultimate Sunset Mix

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From a hardscrabble peasant economy to one of the world’s wealthiest enclaves in the space of 60 years. Moving from its party-hard peak, Ibiza has gone through an introspective shift, with a desire to slow life down so it can hit its rhythm again. The old north-south divide is also increasingly redundant: you’re as likely to discover a cool boho scene among the glitz of the south as a whopping heavyweight resort on a wild northern beach. Today the space, renamed El Silencio by its new French owners, has morphed into a sand-on-the-floor seaside restaurant with gorgeous wabi-sabi-like styling, a pool out back and a menu by young-gun chef Jean Imbert, known as the Jamie Oliver of France. Meanwhile, it’s drawn in more bohemian creatives such as Patricia Marañón, a floral designer working with organic and wild blooms, and her friend Laura de Grinyo, a ceramicist inspired by the forms of classic ibicenco pottery.

As I traversed the island, I found plenty to confound my expectations as well as stir up long-dormant memories. Here, the reinvention effort was a labour of love, taking an Eighties, plain-Jane family hotel to the next level with a total overhaul, a fine, Italian-inflected restaurant in La Mesa Escondida, wonderful gardens and rooftop tables for soaking up the extraordinary panorama. Meanwhile, the island continues to evolve, even if old-timers such as me sometimes have a hard time adjusting to the new realities.I drove back west to a place that has lingered in a corner of my mind for a quarter of a century: Punta Galera, where the natural terraces of smooth rock act as shelves for sunbathing like a lizard. Most purchases from business sellers are protected by the Consumer Contract Regulations 2013 which give you the right to cancel the purchase within 14 days after the day you receive the item. Another example of this is Petunia, where I stopped one evening for dinner on a terrace with mesmeric views of the rocky islet Es Vedrà. Arriving at the sweeping bay of Cala Xarraca, on the far tip of the island close to Portinatx, I cast my mind back 25 years to a summer weekend’s camping beside a freshwater spring that dribbled out of the cliff.

Finance is provided by PayPal Credit (a trading name of PayPal UK Ltd, Whittaker House, Whittaker Avenue, Richmond-Upon-Thames, Surrey, United Kingdom, TW9 1EH). My stomping ground was always the rural north: the hills and villages around Santa Inés, San Juan and Cala San Vicente. A moratorium by the Balearic government has halted the construction of new hotels on non-urban land, essentially forcing would-be developers to revamp old ones. Few places on the planet have undergone changes as sweeping, as transformative, both for good and ill, as Ibiza.Not to be missed are the multicoloured installation by artist Miranda Makaroff and chef Jean Imbert’s avocado dish – it’s oven-baked and delicious. And that was where I headed next, drawn by the single-track roads winding among almond fields and the secret calas (creeks) of the coast. A 300-year-old casa payesa in the classic ibicenco style, this gorgeous San Lorenzo property had stood abandoned for 80 years before its exemplary six-year restoration job.

And with Hilton’s Curio Collection no longer running the show, the Experimental Group has taken over, opening a recharged restaurant designed by Dorothée Meilichzon this summer and bedrooms next year. Though most of my friends here have moved away, a few stubbornly cling on, resisting the sky-high cost of living in a spot that’s become a magnet for the super-rich. Back in the day, the sleepy hamlet of San Lorenzo had a single bar, the Casanova, where country folk went to smoke cheroots and play cards. As an indication of just how far it is from blaring techno around the pool, there are plans to host a classical music event here next year. Neighbouring Eat is Life and Alma Canalla, with burgers by Valencia’s The Black Turtle, make Port des Torrent something of a gastro melting pot.But if the coast is reimagining the infrastructure of the package-tour era, out in the countryside the movement is fuelled by nostalgia for the Ibiza of a much earlier time: simpler and more pastoral. I cast myself off a rugged slab into water as intensely blue as turquoise ink and somehow viscous, so swimming in it felt languid and sensuous. Which almost sums it up, except the rebooted San Lorenzo bar also does a great line in small plates such as Iberian pork loin with courgettes. Or a smart seaside hotspot such as Beachouse at the scrappy end of Playa d’en Bossa, where the large Ushuaïa and Hard Rock Hotels fizzle out into overgrown waste ground and car parks. On the walk down through the forest, balsamic scents of heat-baked pine and rosemary flung open the synapses of my memory.