Hey Look! I'm still alive and well. Sorry all, I'll try to get up to date as soon as possible.
At 6am I woke up with my hosts and shoved everything in my backpack and then slept the one hour car ride down to Gibralter.
Gibralter is a little tiny sorta country on the tip of Spain. What ammounts to one of England's few remaining colonies. You have to flash your passport as you drive past the border and the only way from Spain to Gibralter is to cross the Gibralter airline runway which begins and ends in the ocean. I watched a plane take off and land while traffic waited meters away behind a flimsy wooden gate. It was amazing but I am quite positive that eventually the precentages of the universe are going to make that airport go very very wrong.
Because Gibralter is British territory, despite being surrounded on one side by ocean and further along, Morocco and on the other three sides by Spain, they speak only English and use the British Pound for currency.
The city is small. I started at one of the furthest most points at the hotel that Gina and Mario worked at. I had coffee in the lounge as the sun rose over the ocean. I don't remember much about the first hour or so, its been a long time since I've woken up that early and I remmeber more of a fuzzy contented sleepy blearry buzz until the caffine started working.
Upon awakening enough energy to move I left my backpack in the hotel baggage room and started walking into downtown. I found out later there was a nice bus system around the town but so early in the morning I didn't mind the fourty-five minute walk into the city center where I had a more complete breakfast and some more coffee than another thirty minute walk to the trolly station that took people up to the top of the Rock of Gibralter.
The Rock of Gibralter is the only big tourist attraction. Legand has it that it was placed where it is by Herculese durring his trials. It rises out of the ground so tall that it shades the entire east side of the peninsula by five or six in the evening. Leaving hopeful sunbathers quite in the dark.
At the top of the rock are troops of wild monkeys. Many tourists visit the rock to see the 'adorable monkeys' in the hour I was at the top of the rock nothing I saw about these creatures could be deemed adorable.
One woman had her makup bag stolen and ripped to pieces, one woman was bitten and I had a money walk right up to my leg and try to grab my bag out of my hand. I am no ashamed to say I hissed at the little bugger and kicked at him. These monkeys are very wild animals but they have absolutely no fear of people at all. They are fed daily in an attempt to keep them at the top of the rock and to discourage them from wandering down into the city but it is still not uncommon to hear about small troops of them down in the city.
For me though, by 11:00 am I was quite finished with Gibralter and ready to head out.
I took a 30 minute bus back to Algeciras where I had originally arrived in Spain and then booked my bus all the way to Barcelona... a full eighteen hour bus trip from 18:30 - 12:30 the following day.
Random note, I don't know if I've mentioned this but they use twentyfour hour clocks everywhere in Europe. It takes some getting used to but after that it makes telling time much clearer.
At 6am I woke up with my hosts and shoved everything in my backpack and then slept the one hour car ride down to Gibralter.
Gibralter is a little tiny sorta country on the tip of Spain. What ammounts to one of England's few remaining colonies. You have to flash your passport as you drive past the border and the only way from Spain to Gibralter is to cross the Gibralter airline runway which begins and ends in the ocean. I watched a plane take off and land while traffic waited meters away behind a flimsy wooden gate. It was amazing but I am quite positive that eventually the precentages of the universe are going to make that airport go very very wrong.
Because Gibralter is British territory, despite being surrounded on one side by ocean and further along, Morocco and on the other three sides by Spain, they speak only English and use the British Pound for currency.
The city is small. I started at one of the furthest most points at the hotel that Gina and Mario worked at. I had coffee in the lounge as the sun rose over the ocean. I don't remember much about the first hour or so, its been a long time since I've woken up that early and I remmeber more of a fuzzy contented sleepy blearry buzz until the caffine started working.
Upon awakening enough energy to move I left my backpack in the hotel baggage room and started walking into downtown. I found out later there was a nice bus system around the town but so early in the morning I didn't mind the fourty-five minute walk into the city center where I had a more complete breakfast and some more coffee than another thirty minute walk to the trolly station that took people up to the top of the Rock of Gibralter.
The Rock of Gibralter is the only big tourist attraction. Legand has it that it was placed where it is by Herculese durring his trials. It rises out of the ground so tall that it shades the entire east side of the peninsula by five or six in the evening. Leaving hopeful sunbathers quite in the dark.
At the top of the rock are troops of wild monkeys. Many tourists visit the rock to see the 'adorable monkeys' in the hour I was at the top of the rock nothing I saw about these creatures could be deemed adorable.
One woman had her makup bag stolen and ripped to pieces, one woman was bitten and I had a money walk right up to my leg and try to grab my bag out of my hand. I am no ashamed to say I hissed at the little bugger and kicked at him. These monkeys are very wild animals but they have absolutely no fear of people at all. They are fed daily in an attempt to keep them at the top of the rock and to discourage them from wandering down into the city but it is still not uncommon to hear about small troops of them down in the city.
For me though, by 11:00 am I was quite finished with Gibralter and ready to head out.
I took a 30 minute bus back to Algeciras where I had originally arrived in Spain and then booked my bus all the way to Barcelona... a full eighteen hour bus trip from 18:30 - 12:30 the following day.
Random note, I don't know if I've mentioned this but they use twentyfour hour clocks everywhere in Europe. It takes some getting used to but after that it makes telling time much clearer.
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