Last Friday I headed to Palma. It was for a mission: to bring the partner and hound to London by car, ferry and train. They had been there for several weeks, enjoying a very nice life while I scurried around to the likes of Jakarta for The Chiefs conference. Now, however, the band needed to be reunited and the dog had to see her oncologist (yes, all is OK).

That evening, ahead of the Saturday morning ferry, we drove out of the city and through the mountain tunnel to Sóller before weaving along the wriggly road that takes you up the valley’s side. This route eventually deposits you in the town of Deià. But just before you breach the brow of the hill, there’s the Hotel Corazón. This was our destination.

The hotel, run by fashion photographer Kate Bellm and her partner Edgar Lopez, attracts a crowd that’s a little hippy, a little arty, dresses easy cool and can still pay a decent bill. But I’ll write about this properly another time. The point of today’s story is more about that funny thing that sometimes happens – “the moment”. That odd, magical fusing of the elements that just sneaks up on you.

There were only a few occupied tables when we arrived unfashionably early – well, 20.00. A couple of hotel guests were still finishing off their novels in silence as the sun set. But we were oblivious to everyone as we had a spot on a cocooning curved sofa where the view was of the slowly blackening valley below, of the firefly-like flashes of car headlights blinking through the dusk-draped trees.

There was a warm wind racing up the valley side, rattling the piles of menus. It should have been annoying but it lent the evening a special quality – plus we were nicely sheltered by that enveloping upholstery. The food was delicious, the wine perfect. The waiter could have been cast as Jesus in a movie – his long hair frantically dancing in the wind like the tendrils of a sea anemone in a buffeting ocean current. Even the music added to the moment – there was something of a Shazam-fest taking place on my phone. And at our feet the dog dozed, occasionally opening an eye to clock the precise location of the resident cats.

As we drove back towards the city, I knew that we had had a perfect moment. But why? Of course, there’s the place and the food – but it wouldn’t have happened without the wind, without our Christ-like waiter, without Tom Paxton and Gram Parsons whispering from the sound system. You can plan fancy dinners to the nth degree and rehearse every second of an encounter but sometimes the perfect moment appears unexpectedly on the breeze.

Saturday was spent on a Baleària ferry heading to Barcelona. There were very few cars on board but a lot of trucks. It wasn’t Hotel Corazón but there was wi-fi. As the ferry came into the city, a thick mist wrapped around us and so the captain repeatedly blasted his foghorn to ensure our presence was known. A night then followed at the home of friends who have been in our lives for decades. The dog crazy to see them, howling with delight.

And then the road trip. I get to be DJ and I have a playlist of songs netted with the aid of Shazam that are all markers of moments, of places, of fleeting encounters. An audio scrapbook on my phone. There was “Dale Comba” by Canelita, harvested from a taxi ride in Palma, and Elvis Martínez with “Tu Secreto”, snatched from a bar in Barcelona on the drive down a few weeks before. A reminder of Milan and Salone came care of Ermal Meta and Giuliano Sangiorgi’s track, “Una Cosa Più Grande”. There was Michel Sardou from Paris. Clara Luciani from a party at D90 in Zürich. 

But it was Tom Paxton’s “The Last Thing on My Mind” that was played repeatedly, its simple folk melody offering a return to the mountains – my other half becoming increasingly suspicious that I might be about to apply for a pot-washing job in a certain hotel.