In Spain, the week before Easter is know as 'Semana Santa,' which literally translates to 'Holy Week.' It's full of celebrations, processionals and a lot of catholics showing up in Granada. It's a national holiday, so there's no school for the entire week. Nathan and I took advantage of the time off to finally head down to Gibraltar. We took a bus from Granada to Malaga and stopped there for a few hours to explore the city. It was the first time we've seen the ocean since we've been in Spain and Nathan's first time touching the Mediterranean Sea! I also learned that Malaga is where Antonio Banderas was born and raised, and there's even a little monument to him. We obviously had to go see that.
After our quick outing around Malaga, we got back on the bus and headed to Gibraltar. The entire country of Gibraltar is just over six square kilometres and is actually a British territory. But it's really just a tiny peninsula jutting off of Spain. So Nathan and I stayed in a tiny town called Las Lineas, which is just across the border in Spain. It's much less expensive and also so close that most people who live there, work in Gibraltar.
We got to Las Lineas in the evening, so we took a walk around the town to stretch our legs and explore. It became really obvious, really quickly that Las Lineas was sketchy and dirty and tiny. That was an experience in itself. But the view of the Rock was gorgeous and the sunset was amazing to see. And you can actually see the tip of Africa from Las Lineas and Gibraltar. It's hard to grasp how close you really are to Africa until you realize you can easily see it, still standing in Europe.
The next morning we got up and headed to Gibralter. Las Lineas and Gibraltar are so close that we actually walked across the border. It was kind of cool to do, and I was amazed at the lack of border control. The only thing I had to do was flash my passport at a man sitting at a desk five feet away from me as I walked through a door. No one even spoke to me. It was very different from any border crossing I've done before. Our walk to Gibraltar got even weirder because not only do you walk across the border, you also walk across the airstrip for the airport. We were stopped on our way across because there was a plane taking off! You just stand off to the side until you're given the all clear.
Because Gibraltar is an English territory, the official language is English and they use pounds. It's so close to Spain though that everything is essentially bilingual. We still ordered in Spanish and when we bought anything, we spoke in Spanish. It felt disorienting, like you never quite knew what you to do.
It was already sprinkling rain when we got there in the morning. I kept hoping that it would slow down but it only got worse as we explored. We walked into the townsite and adventured around a bit. But while the townsite is quite big, the main draw is the Rock of Gibraltar. A massive ridge made of limestone that makes up most of the area. The Rock is a nature reserve with amazing views. It's packed with trails, greenery and, of course, monkeys. There's a cable car that goes up to the top of the Rock, but Nathan and I chose to walk up. It's a pretty steep incline, with a low of switchbacks. It was definitely worth the views. We started walking up the Rock in the rain, with out first stop of the day being to the WW II tunnels. We took a tour through a small portion of the tunnels that have been dug into the rock. It was really amazing to see. We also learned that the Canadians came to Gibraltar to help dig the tunnels, since we had better equipment and extensive experience digging into that kind of hard rock. There are hundreds of kilometres of tunnels winding through the Rock still in use by the British army. There were some really cool views of the city from some of the look out posts around the tunnels.
After we finished the tunnels, we kept trudging up the mountain. This was also the only twenty minutes of the day it didn't rain and the first time we saw monkeys! Exciting on both counts.
The Barbary Macaque monkeys are the most famous part of Gibraltar and they live all over the Rock. They're especially famous because no one is really sure how the monkeys ended up in Gibraltar. This type of monkey actually originates in Africa, and the Gibraltar monkeys are now the only free-living primates in all of Europe.
We kept going up the Rock, with the rain getting steadily worse. The Rock isn't hard to hike up, but it's quite steep. That made it a little tricky to keep walking sometimes. We got about halfway up the Rock before we got hailed on. We ran through the hail for a few minutes before finding a run down little building to hide out in. We stayed there for five or ten minutes until the hail subsided. It was still pouring rain but at least we weren't being pelted anymore. We kept going up the Rock until we finally made it to the top. At the top of the Rock, there's a little cafe and it's where the cable car ends. Nathan and I decided that since we were already drenched, why not explore around? There were beautiful views of the Rock and ocean. Not too far away from the cafe, we found a bunch of ruins on the end of a cliff. We started walking through them and ran into a few more monkeys. It was the first time we could really get up close, and it was fun to watch them. I wish the pictures better showed how hard it was raining.
After we had warmed up a little in the cafe, and finished bothering the monkeys in the ruins, we started back down the Rock. We made it to the Ape's Den, which is where a lot of the monkeys spend their time. There were so many monkeys. Everywhere you looked, you saw more. There are about three hundred monkeys living on the Rock and this was clearly a popular spot. We had so much fun hanging out with them! You weren't allowed to touch them or feed the monkeys, and there was even an 'environmental officer' monitoring you to make sure you didn't, but the monkeys didn't seem to mind you. A lot of people take taxis up to avoid the walk, and the monkeys jumped all over the cars. Since it was raining and quite slick, it was fun to watch the younger monkeys slip and slide all over the roofs of the cars while they were playing. I wanted to stay there forever. It was so cool to get to be so close to something like that.
After we were finally done hanging out with our monkey friends, we continued heading down the Rock. The Mediterranean Steps go from the Ape's Den down through the Rock, winding through a lot of old battlement stations from the wars. Nathan didn't want to go down the steps since they're quite steep and slippery from all the rain. But I made him go, like the mean wife I am. It was so worth it. The steps are gorgeous and provide you with an amazing view of the trees and ocean the entire walk down. We even ran into some more monkeys on our way down. I also met an overly friend cat that kept wanting to touch me. I was less than impressed.
After we made it off the Rock, which took a lot longer than expected between the hail, our getting lost a few times and being distracted by the monkeys, we headed back to the townsite. The rain finally broke and we got a little bit of a break. We explored around the town and headed to the Alameda Gardens. This is where John Lennon and Yoko Ono got married. They are huge botanical gardens and it was nice to enjoy the break in the rain in such a pretty place.
Near the Alameda Gardens is the One Hundred Tonne Gun. It wasn't on either of our lists to see it, but since we were in the neighbourhood and exhausted from hiking up a rock all day, and it only cost one euro, we figured, why not? It was built in 1870 and took thirty-five men to fire it. A missile weighed over two thousand pounds! Our favourite part about the gun is that by the time it was built and ready for use, so many more advances in technology had happened that it was essentially obsolete before it had ever been fired. It started pouring rain again about the time we made it to the gun so we didn't stay to look at the gun as long as we may have. It was still pretty cool!
We really enjoyed Gibraltar and even though it poured rain on us and made us a tiny bit miserable, it was so much fun! It's such a unique place and was a once in a lifetime adventure. But of all the things I saw and liked in Gibraltar, the best thing was finding real life Diet Coke!! I was dying. Nathan only let me buy two bottles. It was so good. I drank one that night and saved the other one for the next day. Which meant Nathan spent the next twenty-four hours listening to how Diet Coke is my soulmate and if I could, I'd marry it.
We took a bus back to Malaga and spent another few hours wandering around. We visited the Alcazba, which was beautiful. It was built in the tenth century and is one of the best preserved examples of this type of architecture. Just outside the Alcazba is a Roman amphitheatre built in the first century. We also visited the Picasso Museum, which we thought would be really good since Picasso was actually born in Malaga, but it really wasn't that great. We visited the Malaga Cathedral, which was gorgeous, and then on to the Contemporary Art Museum. I was actually quite impressed with it. I don't usually like contemporary art but it was really well done.
It was a busy weekend but so much fun! Despite the rain, hail and hiking, Gibraltar was great!
