We made it back from the long wait at Tanger Med Port after nearly
3 days! We have spent a couple of days at La Linea and across the bordern into Gibraltar and are now
parked on a beautiful Aire at Benarrabá (N36.54935 W5.27901). There are spaces for 5 motorhomes and each space has its own fresh water
tap, chemical toilet waste and tap and grey waste disposal and on top of that
we have fantastic views across the valley of white washed villages and all for
FREE - wow what a little gem!
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| The Aire at Benarrabá |
The journey back from Morocco was a tough one. Having spent 2 days/nights at the port, the
ferries started sailing again mid-day on the Saturday. We got in a queue at
12.30pm to get our ticket validated and 3 hours later we had our ticket, (when
I say we, Mel was the hero and did most of the queueing!). The queueing system was a joke though. You lined up between barriers (5 lines) which
took you to 4 windows to get your ticket, the only thing was that only one was
open so 5 had to become one – chaos!
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| Mel is in that queue somewhere sandwiched between all these people! |
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| Lots of motorhomes and cars parked up waiting for tickets |
We managed to get a ticket for the 6pm sailing with Balearia, only to have to get in
another queue to get the motorhome through passport checks, get the paperwork
approved to export the motorhome out of Morocco back to Spain and then put the motorhome through
an x-ray machine - presumably to check we weren’t smuggling any Moroccans or drugs
out of the country! That took us from 3.30pm to 5.30pm. Another disorganised system of 5 lanes of
vehicles going in to one, and all getting as close as they can to one another! As you can imagine a couple of vehicles got hit,
including this one below that had its wing mirror hit and a lot of irate drivers
blasting their horns.
All this going on whilst the police and security just looked on in ignorance. So, all that done it was a short drive round to the boat. We were
excited as we could see it being loaded - however, that was short lived! As we got nearly to the front of the queue, the
barriers went down as the boat was full – regardless that we had a ticket for a
space on that boat we were not getting on!
The next one was due in at 1am Sunday morning, which took nearly 3 hours
to unload and load again and set sail argh!
We eventually got to Algeciras at 6am on Sunday (with the hour ahead
difference) – exhausted!
We spent the night on the carpark in Algeciras, one that most
motorhomes use when going out to and coming back from Morocco, before driving around to La Linea on the Gibraltar border and stopping on the Marina Aire that
we used last time around.
We walked across the border into Gibraltar, to be reunited with our scooter –
thanks to Joyce who had kindly stored it in her garage whilst we were in
Morocco. Then it was round to Morrisons
to stock up on all those English goodies that we missed and can’t get in Spain
and on to a restaurant for some junk food – burgers and pizzas, and copious amounts of
beer and wine yummy! We were also able
to do 2 washing machine/drying loads.
Unfortunately, our fridge then decided to play up. It kept sending
out a 15 second beeping sound every 2 minutes which, according to the manual implied
that the door wasn’t closing properly.
So, straight on the internet we sourced a Dometic (fridge) motorhome/caravan
service place in Estepona to get it looked at – about 40km drive around the
coast. As luck would have it, when we
got there the problem seemed to have righted itself – typical! So, from here we headed inland through ‘white
village’ land. Passing through some
lovely hamlets/villages, including the beautiful town of Casares.
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| Casares |
Before ending up on the Aire, and the fabulous views from the village of Benarrabá.
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| Benarrabá from the top of the town |
After lunch, we got on the scooter and rode 8kms to the village
of Gaucín. Unfortunately, the old ruined castle at the top of the hill was
closed but it was worth a walk up for the views.
Algatocín, where most of the houses had lovely window boxes - looking a bit like an Alpine Village.
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| Algatocín |
The next day, as we had plenty of free water on offer Mel gave
Sonny (the motorhome) and scooter a good hose down, whilst I cleaned the inside. Followed by a fry up of English bacon (courtesy
of good old Gibraltar Morrisons!). We
then took the scooter for a ride around the windy lanes through the valley to Genalguacil
The village is really picturesque, with lots of narrow winding
streets that are full of sculptures and artwork. In 1996 the village mayor came up with the initiative to offer
food and lodgings to aspiring artists in return for a donation of one of their
creations to the village. Every year in
August there is an art festival and prize winning works of art are put on
permanent display in the village.
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| Mel was missing morocco but we managed to find him a donkey sculpture! |
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| An interesting sculpture - but a lovely tree! |
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| A pencil drawing a line up the wall |
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| Graffiti or art - you decide! |
On the ride back we drove up to a fantastic view point overlooking
where we had been You can just make out the white blobs that are the villages - Genalguacil (on the right) and Jubrique (on the left), about a 50km round trip.
Next stop Ronda, the most famous of the ‘white towns’!
Sally x
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