Back on the Rock of Gibraltar – a little corner of England at the end of Spain!

Sonny has been parked up for the last two nights on the marina Aire at La Linea de la Concepción, right next to the border of Gibraltar (N36.15547 W5.35436).  It's a nice clean Aire with all the usual facilities and even a laundry.

To get into Gibraltar from here it’s about a 5 minute walk to the border and passport control.  You then have to cross the runway (that has sea both ends) – and you need to make sure you time it so it's open, when no planes are coming in or taking off!
Gibraltar is recognised historically as one of the southernmost point of Europe and forms one of the ancient Pillars of Hercules.  The rock is a massive wedge shaped lump of limestone, over 200 million years old and has been a British colony since the 18^th century.

Crossing the runway into Gibraltar

Can't get more British than this sign - I couldn't resist doing the 'Churchill Victory salute'

This drawbridge was originally the only way into Gibraltar, other than by sea

We were here last at the end of April 2017 and development continues on this small piece of land (just over 4 square miles).  The building of high rise apartments and hotels continue and my beloved home ‘HMS Rooke’, where I lived for a year in 1983 has now been demolished, probably to make way for more high-rise blocks.

HMS Rooke bottom left surrounded by high rise building (2017) and now flattened to make room for more said buildings (2018)!

 Love this piece of artwork of an octopus on the side of a house, walking up the castle steps

The old Moorish Castle, half-way up the rock, and view across the runway and into La Linea

This is as far as you can walk without having to pay.  As we did the ‘tourist tour’ last year of the castle, St Michael’s caves, the great siege tunnels and top of the Rock we decided to headed back down to the town.  It's a steep climb to the top and if you're not feeling up to it you can always get the cable car up.

There is virtually every English high street chain shop going here and definitely a tax haven for multi-millionaires.  If you have a few million lying around, you might want to consider it?!

The cost of living in Gibraltar isn’t cheap though.  We have been used to paying as little as €1 for beer/wine and tapas dishes, travelling around the little villages in the mountains; however, here it is more expensive than England!

Cheers!

Trafalgar cemetery where a few bodies are buried, those who died of their wounds during the battle (1805). Most of the others were buried at sea and Lord Nelson’s body taken back to London, where he was given a state funeral and burial.  Every Sunday closes to 21 October the Royal Navy commemorates the Battle of Trafalgar at the cemetery.

Nelson's statue outside the cemetery.  Nothing in size compared to his column in London

The Botanical Gardens - a rare patch of land that hasn't been built on yet!

Duke of Wellington statue in the gardens

Changing of the guard outside the Convent – official residence of the Governor of Gibraltar

Gibraltar was taken by the English in 1704 during the War of the Spanish Succession.  Ongoing debates/arguments continue as the Spanish government fight tooth and nail to get it back and are heating up even more as Brexit moves forward.  But legend has it, as long as these animals remain in residence on the rock it will remain forever British!

Barbary apes (Macaques)

The next day we took the Sonny across the border to Morrisons to fill up with cheap fuel and to stock up on English goodies that you can’t get in Spain.

Crossing the border into Gibraltar

Cheap diesel at Morrisons - only £0.80 per litre

Morrisons goodies for  our son, Adam - it's surprising what he misses living in Spain!

We liked revisiting Gibraltar but after a while it can make you feel really claustrophobic and after a couple of days we were ready to move on.

Sally x

Back in Spain! And the beautiful Pueblos Blancos (white villages)

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!

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!

Mel is in that queue somewhere sandwiched between all these people!

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.

Casares

Before ending up on the Aire, and the fabulous views from the village of Benarrabá.

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.

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.

Mel was missing morocco but we managed to find him a donkey sculpture!

An interesting sculpture - but a lovely tree!

A pencil drawing a line up the wall

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

The Rock of Gibraltar

Sonny, our 2-room house on wheels is currently parked up at the marina aire at La Linea de la Concepción, right next to the border of Gibraltar.

We stopped off for a night between Cadiz and here, at Conil de La Frontera and parked up right next the beach (N36.27282 W6.08994).  It's an official parking place for motorhomes to stop overnight, although there are no facilities but that said, it is free!  We are parked up next to a couple from Norway who tell us it’s currently -30 over there, ironically the temperature here is slowly creeping up towards +30 degrees!  It was lovely just to go walking along the beach and then relaxing by the motorhome, sitting looking out to sea.

Looking towards the Aire at Conil de La Frontera

The next day we took the scenic coastal route and followed it down to Tarifa, the most southerly point of Europe, around Algeciras and then looped back down to Gibraltar. 

We have seen a few of these bulls on the roadside around Andalucia, which were created by the Osborne Sherry Company in 1956. 

They stand about 14 metres high and were originally used as advertising boards for their sherry/brandy.  In 1994 EU passed a law that prohibited all roadside advertising of alcoholic beverages, so the advertising signs were removed but the bulls were allowed to remain.

There’s no overnight motorhome parking in Gib so we are stopping right on the border at La Linea (N36°9’19” W5°21’14”). It's quite pricey at €12 but it has water, chemical toilet, and laundry facilities, so we're happy especially as we have a stack load of washing to do! Sonny has a brilliant spot overlooking the marina, with the Rock as a backdrop! 

We are stopping here 3 nights, before going back around to Algeciras for a night to purchase our ferry ticket for Morocco.  We are both excited and apprehensive about going in to North Africa with the motorhome, as this will be our first time.

From the Aire it’s only a 5 minute walk to the border and passport control.  Then a short stroll across the 'live' runway and to the Gibraltar Rock!  

When I was last here in 1983, the border control was very strict and you were limited as to what you could bring through, plus you could only walk across the border - no cars!  Just as we got across the officials closed it off, as a plane was about to take off. The runway isn't very long and has sea both ends, so the aircraft have to have some powerful engines to take off!

Passport Control and walkway across runway

Mel hasn’t been here before but I was last here 34 years ago; it was my first foreign posting when I was a young wren based at HMS Rooke, which sadly closed down last year and now stands empty whilst the government decides what to do with it.  It took us nearly 2 hours to find as it was so hard for me to recognise the place, as every inch of land now has either high-rise apartment blocks, restuarants, hotels, and nearly every English high street chain shop going, oh yes and even a massive Morrisons!  Mel kept saying to me "are you sure you used to live here?" as I just couldn't get my bearings. Thirty four years ago there was just a small Marks and Spencer, a Liptons grocery store, a few hotels and lots of bars - happy days!  Everything has to come in on container ship so I am guessing that must be a logistical nightmare for Morrisons.

HMS Rooke, now surrounded by fencing

The area around the rock is only 2.65² miles and unfortunately the roads are clogged with cars and lots of scooters.  I think it must be one of the most densely populated areas going. For me it’s strange being back but nice to be able to walk round and reminisce. 

Before heading up the Rock, we walked to Europa Point Lighthouse, which stands at the southernmost point of Gibraltar and serves as a waypoint for vessels passing through the Gibraltar Strait.  Fingers crossed we will be passing through the Strait on in 2 days time - North Africa bound!

Europa Point Lighthouse

We took the scenic route up the rock via the Mediterranean Steps, which crisscrosses the Nature Reserve. The gigantic limestone rock rising up from the Mediterranean was one of the mythic pillars of Hercules.

The Pillars of Hercules

It was taken by the English in 1704 during the War of the Spanish Succession, but there are ongoing diplomatic arguments as the Spanish government are desperate to get it back.  Legend has it that Britain will retain sovereignty of the rock as long as its most famous residents – the Barbary apes – remain.

Walking up the Mediterranean Steps, looking back to Europa Point

Looking down on Catalan Bay

You can just make Morocco out in the distance!

Then round to St Michael’s Cave – a dramatic natural grotto of stalagmites and stalagtites

A fallen, centuries old stalagmite and the remains showing a cross-section

It doesn’t matter where you roam on the rock, you come across the apes, or as they are properly known, Barbary Macaques.  You are warned not to feed them as you will get fined a maximum of £4,000 but people blatantly were and unfortunately we saw a few take people's bags off them looking for things to eat and even snatch a sandwich out of a child’s hand, so beware!

Cheeky Chappy looking for food and drink

From here we walked up as far as you can go – the top of the cable car and got some great views.

Then down to the Great Siege Tunnels.  These were excavated by the British Army during the Great Siege of 1779-1783.  They were used again and further enhanced during WW2 and are arguably the most impressive defence systems anywhere.

Moorish Castle, built in 1160

They certainly have some interesting road signs on the Rock! 

Next stop North Africa, which I am sure will be even more interesting and certainly an 'eye-opener'!

Sally xx