day three: monday march 3rd: gibralter

before heading to gibralter (which is a province of england and not spain), we followed our daily pattern and had some breakfast in our condo. we would do this everyday as it was less time consuming, cheaper, and easier. once we were ready for the day, we left for our trip to gibralter. it has been a part of england since the 1700s and is quite the sore spot for spain and a passport is needed for entry.

this was another great day and one of my favorites (well, i think every day was a favorite). in any case, we started off the day thinking we would take the sky tram up to the top and then walk down. only once we got there, we were convinced by a local tour guide that he and his mini bus were a much better deal and idea. and he was right. he was cheaper than a roundtrip on the sky tram and he gave us a history that we wouldn't have otherwise gotten of al the sites. if we had walked, it would have been a very long walk and probably about two hours down a very windy narrow mountain road! our tour guide was great. he gave us a lot of good info and said he'd been doing this for 17 years. he was a native of gibralter and was the 5th generation to live there. i was very surprised that about 35,000 people live on gibralter and that there is an airport! it was so much bigger than what i thought it would be.

for the first part of the tour, we saw the hercules look out point where you can see africa. legend has it that hercules separated gibralter from spain and africa in order to create a shipping lane. then we went and saw the caves. it is not a huge cave, but there are some very impressive stalagtites and stalagmites. the guide explained that during the summer (dry season) they have concerts in there and there is even a stage and seating area inside the cave. after the caves, we went to the very top where they have monkeys! this was my favorite part. there is a population of monkeys that has lived on the mountain and on gibralter for generations. the guide explained how the scientists kept the population at just about the same amount by only allowing the females to reproduce when an elder monkey died. that way they kept it a constant population. they also feed them at the top of the mountain so that they don't wander in to town. the scientists also track all of the monkeys to make sure they remain healthy and disease free. the view from the top was amazing and we even were able to take pictures with the smaller monkeys on our shoulder! after the monkeys, we continued down the hill and went to the tunnels. they call the tunnels ' the great siege' and they date as far back as the 1700s and as late as WWII. apparently there are about 60kms of tunnels under gibralter! this is where all of the landfill that a lot of the lower city is built on. this was the last stop on the tour and so we came down the rock and went in to town to stroll those streets and find some lunch. we walked to a main square where we found a place to eat and had traditional british fare. i had a delicious steak and ale pie. yum! after that we strolled back to our car and headed back to our home base.


me and my new friend


part of the caves


my parents and me with gibralter in the near background and africa in the distance!


the view from the caves: you can see the airport runway