How difficult is the Camí de Cavalls?

Four official stages that never settle into one kind of walking. The first few kilometres out of the harbour are on a road with no pavement and summer traffic, and they are the part of the whole circuit walkers most often skip. From sa Mesquida it becomes what people come for: low windswept shore, cushion scrub, boardwalk over the wetland at es Grau, then sandy tracks between pine and mastic inside the s'Albufera des Grau natural park with steps cut into the earth dropping into each cove. Approaching Cap de Favàritx the vegetation thins and the ground turns bare and rocky. After the cape the coast is broken up by resort development and by more tarmac, particularly between Addaia and Arenal d'en Castell, before nearly an hour of pinewood behind Son Saura del Nord. The climbing is small and constant rather than sustained, so pace here is set by surface, tarmac and heat rather than by ascent.

Navigation: Waymarking is the best thing about this trail: wooden posts topped with a white horseshoe plate roughly every hundred metres, GR 223 red and white flashes, and an information panel at the start of each of the 20 official stages. Losing the line is not the problem here. The problem is that several kilometres of the official route are on tarmac with no pavement, out of Maó and again between Addaia and Arenal d'en Castell, where walkers share a road built only for cars.

In poor weather: North-facing and open, with the tramuntana arriving off the sea and nothing between the coves to break it. Shade is limited to the pinewood in the last few kilometres, and there is no water on the ground at all, so the official advice to carry enough is literal rather than cautious. The boardwalks and the earth steps in the natural park are the surfaces that change most in wet weather.

Escape options: Road access is better here than anywhere else on the north coast. sa Mesquida, es Grau, Port d'Addaia and Arenal d'en Castell all have tarmac to a beach car park within a few hundred metres of the trail. Cap de Favàritx is the awkward one: the nearest parking is about 2 km short of the lighthouse and private vehicles are restricted in peak season, so being collected there is not quick.

The wildest sixteen kilometres of the circuit and the only stretch where the walking is genuinely hard. From Cala Tirant the path picks along a rugged shore of loose pebble macars and rock outcrops to the Roman remains at Sanitja and the northernmost point of the whole route, with a stretch of road to the Cavalleria lighthouse car park in the middle of it. Past Binimel·là the official stage to Els Alocs is graded the hardest on the trail and earns it: half an hour to Cala Pregonda, another to Cala Barril, an hour of ups and downs to Cala en Calderer and then a long climbing traverse of the Binidalfà cliffs. None of it is technical. What makes it slow is hours of loose stone and uneven rock underfoot with no shelter of any kind, and the fact that nothing on the section is flat for long.

Navigation: Posts are frequent, but the line across bare rock is not always obvious and the official description for this stage admits some paths are hard to identify at times. The habit that works is to spot the next post before leaving the one you are at, rather than following the most trodden ground, which on the pebble macars often just leads to the water.

In poor weather: The most exposed ground on the island. This is the coast the tramuntana hits first and there is nothing to break it, so a strong northerly turns the cliff traverse between Cala en Calderer and Els Alocs into slow, tiring work rather than a hazard. There is no shade whatever between Cala Tirant and the pines past Els Alocs, no water on the ground, and the pebble and slab surfaces that are merely awkward when dry take real attention when wet.

Escape options: Two, both at road ends. Cala Tirant at the start, and Binimel·là at km 54.5, which is the only vehicle access in the middle of the section. Past Binimel·là you are committed to Els Alocs, and the road to Els Alocs is 7 km of tarmac followed by 2.5 km of track that needs a high-clearance vehicle, so arranging to be met there is not a quick fix.

Two walks bolted together. The first seventeen kilometres finish the empty north: a drop to the sand at Cala del Pilar on a wooden staircase, then pine groves and farmland into the twin beaches of Algaiarens, and an easy stage over low scrub to Cala Morell, where the rock changes and the island's northern half ends. The path reaches the cove past the mouth of its necropolis, fourteen burial caves cut into the rock and used as a cemetery from the middle Bronze Age until well into the Roman period, the most monumental of them faced with classical relief work. It is 85 m off the line with a car park at its entrance, and the Consell's own page says access is open and free with no guided visits, so it costs a walker a few minutes rather than a detour. From there to Punta Nati is the strangest ground on the circuit, the treeless plateau of dry Menorca, flat but stony underfoot and divided by endless dry-stone walls and stone livestock shelters, with the lighthouse in sight for the last stretch. The final twelve kilometres reverse the mood completely: the rock arch at Pont d'en Gil, then residential streets, a promenade and a cycle lane into Ciutadella, and out through the developments south of the town. Close to half of this section is on tarmac or paving, and it contains the only real town on the route.

Navigation: Two places to pay attention. On the Punta Nati plateau the path threads between walls and gates and looks much like the farm tracks either side of it, with nothing on the skyline to steer by until the lighthouse appears. In Ciutadella the waymarking effectively becomes street furniture: the official line runs through the old town on named streets and then out along pavements and a cycle lane, so expect to navigate by street names rather than by posts for several kilometres.

In poor weather: The plateau between Cala Morell and Punta Nati is the longest continuously unshaded and unsheltered stretch after the cliffs, and on a tramuntana day it is felt for hours because there is nowhere to drop out of the wind. The pines around Cala del Pilar and Algaiarens are the only shade in the first half. The street section into Ciutadella is the reverse problem, hot and reflective in summer with no sea breeze.

Escape options: Once past Els Alocs the first easy pick-up is Algaiarens, 10 km north of Ciutadella with a beach car park, then Cala Morell. From Cala Morell onwards road access is effectively continuous and Ciutadella itself is a full town, which makes the second half of this section one of the easiest places on the circuit to stop early.

The flattest stretch of the circuit and the first that feels properly southern. It begins on residential road through the developments south of Ciutadella, then improves steadily: a flat but stony path along low limestone cliffs to the Artrutx lighthouse at the island's south-west corner, and a long easy traverse east over wide rock shelves and small coves, with Aleppo pine, wild olive and holm oak inland of the line. The last six kilometres carry the three best known beaches on the south coast, Turqueta, Macarella and Macarelleta, and the only real climbing of the section, a steep pull through woodland out of Turqueta and another up to the marked viewpoints above Macarella before the drop into Cala Galdana. In summer this is busy in a way that nothing on the north coast prepares you for.

Navigation: Straightforward, and the pine woodland is threaded with signed paths rather than confusing ones. The beaches sit on short spurs off the official line, Macarelleta on a signed path to the right, so most of the wrong turns taken here are voluntary and cost a climb back out.

In poor weather: The first sustained shade of the walk, from the pine and holm oak between Artrutx and Cala Galdana, and the gentler side of the island when the wind is northerly. The rock shelves along the Artrutx coast are open and glaring in midday sun. Little here is materially harder in rain.

Escape options: Good throughout. Cap d'Artrutx, Son Saura, Cala en Turqueta and Cala Galdana all have parking within a short walk of the trail. The exception is Cala Macarella, where private vehicles are barred in peak season, so it works as a place to walk to and not as a place to be collected from.

The gully coast. From Cala Galdana the trail spends four official stages crossing the limestone barrancs that cut down to the south shore, dropping into each and climbing out, with wooden footbridges over the streambeds at Trebalúger and Binigaus and Aleppo pine over much of it. It is shaded, kinder underfoot than the north and easier than the profile suggests, but the repeated descents and climbs accumulate. Through Sant Tomàs and Son Bou the route runs on promenade and dune boardwalk behind the beaches, the flattest and most built-up walking of the circuit so far, and beyond Son Bou it turns inland for good: fields, dry-stone walls, wild olive and a mosaic of small pasture, with the ravines at Llucalari, Calescoves, es Canutells and Biniparratx still to be dropped into and climbed out of. Above the double cove at Calescoves the line passes a little over 200 m from the largest prehistoric cemetery on Menorca, about ninety chambers cut into the ravine and cliff walls and used for close to a thousand years from the eleventh century BCE, with Roman inscriptions in the cave called the Cova dels Jurats. It is reached on foot from the Sant Climent to Cala en Porter road and is the one short detour on this section worth taking for its own sake. Around 1.75 km after es Canutells is on a road with traffic. The sea is out of sight for long stretches here, which surprises people on a coast path.

Navigation: Well waymarked, and the gullies are unmistakable. The confusion is at the resorts, where the line runs along promenades and through streets at Sant Tomàs and Son Bou, and where Son Bou has a signed beach alternative along 3 km of sand that rejoins at the eastern end. The road stretch after es Canutells is signed but has no pedestrian provision, and is the one place on the section where care is about traffic rather than terrain.

In poor weather: The sheltered half of the island, and the pine cover through the barrancs is the best shade anywhere on the circuit. Rain shows itself in the gullies, which carry water to the sea and are crossed on footbridges, and at Son Bou, where the lagoon mouth is a barefoot crossing when it is open. The inland farmland stretches beyond Son Bou lose both shade and sea breeze.

Escape options: The best-served part of the circuit outside the towns. Cala Galdana, Sant Tomàs, Son Bou, Cala en Porter and es Canutells are all roadheads with parking close to the trail. The two committing stretches are the 12 km of gully country between Cala Galdana and Sant Tomàs, where the beaches in between are reached on foot only, and the 9 km between Son Bou and Cala en Porter.

The circuit finishes on tarmac. The official stage to Punta Prima runs almost entirely on the streets and roads of the south-east developments, Binibèquer Vell, Binibèquer Nou, Biniancolla and Son Ganxo, with only short dirt sections at either end, on roads that are busy in summer and were not laid out with walkers in mind. It improves past Punta Prima: a real coastal path opposite Illa de l'Aire and its lighthouse, old saltpans, the tower above Cala Alcalfar, and then the one surprise of the day, the drop into the Barranc de Rafalet, a shaded holm oak gully with a small beach at the bottom that feels nothing like the rest of the section. From Cala Sant Esteve the last stage is entirely paved and urban, through es Castell and along the harbour road into Maó. Read it as a way home rather than a day's walking.

Navigation: There is little to lose here: the line follows named streets and pavements for most of the section, and the walking that matters is judging traffic rather than reading waymarks, both through the developments before Punta Prima and on the road into Maó, which is busy but does have a proper pavement.

In poor weather: Little of consequence. Tarmac drains, the Rafalet gully is shaded and cool, and the harbour road is sheltered. Heat is the only real factor, and it argues for walking this section early or late rather than in the middle of the day.

Escape options: Escape is barely the word. The section is built up throughout, with parking along most of it, and Punta Prima, s'Algar and es Castell all sit on the main road network. The Barranc de Rafalet is the one place a vehicle cannot reach the trail, and it is short.