The snowfall initially caused enthusiasm among locals and visiting tourists, and prompted hundreds of people to go up into the mountains. Many were cut off and had to seek shelter. In the monastery of Lluc, for example, almost 100 trippers were snowed in without mobile phone reception or electricity.
The monastery, in the north of the island, had enough sleeping places and food to cater for the unexpected overnight visitors, and was reached by the island's mountain rescue team on Tuesday.
It was also unusually cold in other parts of Spain, with night time temperatures falling to minus 10 degrees Celsius in the Pyrenees.
