Okay, I scoured the internet looking for a good quote for today’s post…couldn’t find a darn thing that applied. So, here is one that resonated with me and the best I could do.
“A journey to the unknown shores needs a port, a ship, a wind; but more important than all of them: courage; courage to leave the known for the unknown!” Mehmet Murat Ildan
Yesterday, I joined a group for a day trip to Gibraltar from Sevilla. It took about two hours and ten minutes each way, plus a little extra going back due to traffic. It didn’t feel like a long ride, especially when we arrived. I had a clear view of The Rock through the windshield of the bus as we were getting close. Just look at this mammoth of a boulder. What a beauty.
It’s an interesting process going to Gibraltar on a group tour. I don’t know what you know about the place but it’s a little slice of land about five square miles in circumference. It has been a British Overseas Territory since 1704 and is located at the Souther tip of the Iberian Peninsula and is bordered to the North by Spain. Nations fought over this piece of land for years. It controls the mouth of the Mediterranean Sea…so yeah, it’s a big deal.
I made you a graphic from Google Maps. You’re welcome.
There are about 32,000 residents and approximately 12,000 workers who cross back and forth daily from Spain.
By the way, all of these “facts” are according to our tour guides, so don’t shoot the messenger if they are inaccurate. With that being said, I looked up the square mileage, and online it says it’s only 2.6 so either David our tour guide is wrong or someone messed with the official Gibraltar Wikipedia page.
Anyhoo, when we arrived, the bus stayed parked on Spain’s side of the border. We exited the bus, walked through border controls and customs. The exciting part of the process was we got a stamp in our passports! The not so exciting part, it was another one from Spain. Gibraltar does not give out passport stamps. Booo!
Once we were through the red tape, we had to walk across the airport runway (no, I’m not kidding) but first, we had to wait for, not one but two planes to drive to one end, turn around and take off. I made you a video. It’s kind of wild how this works. Also, people on bikes, skateboards, scooters, and even roller blades/inline skates, must enter with the vehicles through customs…which looks hilarious to see a guy with a skateboard standing behind a car to have his “vehicle” checked.
According to David, in 1922 there had been so many head-on collisions that they changed the side people drive on the road from left to right. Due to so many Brits almost getting run over while crossing the street (in their own territory), they’ve painted signage on all the streets so pedestrians know which direction to look for oncoming traffic. (Petra, the other tour guide said it was 1927. Again, just reporting the facts from a game of telephone. Remember that fun yet annoying game from childhood?)
Back in the day, there was only one official way to enter Gibraltar by land (all other ways were by sea), and you still walk through this same tunnel to this day.
Once you are on the other side, the first thing you see is….drum roll…bet you think it’s some fun British landmark, huh…nope, a Domino’s Pizza. My bestie is an executive for one of the franchisees…I had to give her a hard time about this. I will say, it looked clean and welcoming…but not British.
We had a two-and-a-half-hour break to eat lunch and shop. I bought a tiny souvenir for my dad and mailed a couple of postcards.
For lunch, of course, I ate fish and chips! Roy’s came highly recommended…because it’s world famous don’t ya know. I dined with a lovely family from Oklahoma City who was on the tour…but they asked to not be written about in detail. A promise is a promise.
After lunch we started the official tour of Gibraltar. We drove around the tiny area and up onto and into the rock.
We saw beautiful views of where the Mediterranean Sea and the Atlantic Ocean meet. It was also a clear day so we could see Africa! Morocco specifically.
We saw the famous Barbary Monkeys. They almost went extinct in the 1920s but Churchill saved them. He had more brought in from Algeria and they are a national treasure and well protected and fed.
We went into St. Michael’s Cave to see the stalagmites and stalactites. They have a nice little light show that displays color on the ceiling to illuminate the darkness to get a better view.
They love mailboxes, phone booths (that actually work!), and the color red.
The time flew by and in no time we were back on Spanish soil. It was a fun and full day trip from Sevilla. It’s loaded with history (more than what I wrote and probably more accurate too if you look it up in a history book).
Oh! And I got one of the new coins with King Charles’ head on it.
Goodnight and much love & gratitude from Gibraltar/Spain! 🇬🇮 🇪🇸
Scenes from the Day
I didn’t walk past a traffic mirror so I had to get creative.
Here is one of me and a monkey who jumped on the roof while we were driving down the hill! He wanted a free ride. 🙈
Another window selfie with my new friends. “What are we looking at, guys?”
When I arrived back in Sevilla, I went to walk on the Setas de Sevilla. A giant art sculpture made if wood, designed by a German architect who won a public contest to fill this area of Sevilla. It cost €300,000,000 to build. It’s amazing. Definitely check it out online. It looks amazing at night when it is all lit up. Also, below it are the ruins of a Roman city. It was 100°F at 7:45 pm when I was up there so I made it a quick visit. But it’s a dry heat. 😉
