We had great intentions of rising early to get a good start on Gibralatar. Instead we woke up around 9 AM to a dreary, cloudy day. We ate a quick breakfast at Topsiders (got to love their custom made omelets) and disembarked for Gibraltar. Thankfully we docked and didn’t have to take a transfer to get to ashore.
At first glance, Gibraltar is a single mountaintop sloping into the sea with a variety of buildings and homes sprinkled from the top and bunched up at the bottom. As we got off the ship, there were taxis waiting to tour us around the Rock. For a mere 28 Euros each, they would drive us to four points of interest from one end of the rock to the other. Since it was overcast and looked like rain, the taxi tour was a reasonable alternative to taking a cable car to the top and walking the rest. We soon found this was an excellent decision.
Willliam was our driver. We were joined by another family from Reading, PA. They were even fellow homeschoolers! Our taxi van lurched forward on the damp streets and the screeching of the gears going into place. First we drove to the outlook for the Pillars of Hercules. Greek legend has it that Hercules wanted to open this end of the Mediterrain Sea so he split the rocks in two (all this so he didn’t have to take some sheep around the mountains). Gibratar is one pillar and there is another pillar in Morocco, Africa. The views were breathtaking. On a good day, you could see across the straits to Africa. Today we could see to below. We could still see the clouds above us. The locals call it the HAT. The “hat” seemed to only sit on the mountain because the bay below was sunny. To the left of our wonderful view was row after row of flat gravestones. Our drive revealed this was the Jewish cemetary. Oh, and we met our first Gibraltar Apes here.
Our next stop was St. Michael’s Caves. These natural caves were found in the mountain and used for a variety of applications through the years. Here they found neanderthal remains. More recently, it was planned as a hospital in World War II. Today it is a beautiful view of God’s handiwork. Everything was well lit and easily accessible. My favorite was the amphitheater. The accustics were tremendous. We enjoyed our 20 minute tour.
A tour of Gibralatar wouldn’t be complete without a visit to the Apes. These apes are taillless (after about 6 mo old their small tail falls off) and are free roaming. In fact, they are the only breed of free roaming apes on the European continent. We had prepared the boys not to touch them; they bite. There were lots of warnings not to feed them as well. Seemed like many of the taxi drivers ignored those warnings and fed the apes plenty. They were adorable little creatures. Full grown they were about 2 feet tall. Most of the ones we saw were very fat, too. The babies clung to their mother’s backs. It was a smelly area (no surprise) and we were happy to get back into the taxi van. Our driver, William, didn’t even get out for the monkeys. He said he didn’t like them because they were dirty. I didn’t think much about this until I heard stories from other passengers about the the apes jumping on them and getting ape poop in their hair. Can’t say I blame him!
Our next stop on our tour of Gilbraltar was the Siege Tunnels. These are on the opposite side of the rock from the pillars of Hercules. I am again thankful for the taxi tour as we had planned to walk this. It was miles apart. The Seige Tunnels are a British creation. They were started in the Great Seige in the 1700’s. I find it humourous the Spanish fought the British for Gibraltar about the same time as the Revolutionary War. The British got to keep Gibraltar, but lost the Americas. The seige tunnels were amazing. They were built using picks and gunpowder (how dangerous was that!!). The fumes were overcoming so many men that some decided to blow a hole outward to gain some air. A smart soldier realized the hole would also serve as a great place to put a cannon. Thus, they continued the pattern throughout the tunnels. There were 33 miles of tunnels. We only saw a small part, but it was easy to imagine them weaving throughout the Rock.
Our final stop in our tour was shopping in downtown. We were struckby how compact everything was. The city was lovely with narrow streets and Spanish architecture. Always on the look out for a good bargin, Ken was looking for someone to bargain with. We visited a few shops selling watches and stopped into an antique store. So far nothing exciting. Peter and Kaleb were NOT thrilled to have to walk the streets and were ready to return to the ship. After walking 10 blocks or so we decided to turn around and head to the taxi to take us back to the ship. On the way, we found a lovely silver shop. They had lots of pendants for reasonable prices. We found a lovely cross embedded with shiny chrystals for a great deal. Ken was bummed they wouldn’t negotiate, but the price was still worth it. Then we returned to the ship.
It’s nice getting back to the ship early from a port because the ship is much quieter. This cruise was much quieter in general as we only had about 2/3 the number of passengers they usually have onboard and I suspect about 1/3 of the children they normally host. The boys headed back to their clubs and Ken and I headed on deck to get in some quality reading time in the sun (well, Ken found some airconditioning).
At last the ship was getting underway from Gibraltar. Ken and I were on the top (10th) deck to watch the Rock as were leaving. The captain was kind enough to round the tip of the rock to give us a brief look at the other side and a closer glimse of Morocco before heading out into the Atlantic for Madiera. We were surprised at the size of Gibraltar. The pictures do not do it justice. Ken snapped lots of pictures through the entire process. Next it was dinner, a few shows and off to bed anticipating another sea day!
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