The Rock

I like to travel. My family likes to travel too. In fact, my slight obsession with running off to different places for a change of scenery and some fresh air more often than is probably normal has most likely stemmed from my family's equal love for seeing and experiencing new places. Fortunately for me, this means that when I spend months and months overseas in other countries, it's usually not too hard to convince my family to come visit me ;)

As I mentioned in my last blog, my dad and sister came during my last week at G42 to see a little of what my life is like here in Spain and to travel a bit with me once I finished the program. During the week, I was in class and didn't have too much time to travel far, but Shawna and my dad certainly enjoyed several day trips to places like Granada and Morocco.

Once classes and graduation were over however, we got a chance to take a trip to the famous Rock of Gibraltar all together before Shawna had to leave the next day. We set out early in the morning (much earlier than my own preferred start time... which might not really be considered morning anymore), and drove just a few hours away to the interesting lump of British land in the middle of the Mediterranean, only a few hundred meters from the shore of the Costa del Sol.

If you don't know much about Gibraltar, it's a highly envied piece of land due to its strategic military and defense position. Consequently, the Africans, Spaniards, British (and most likely another people group I can't remember) have fought over the Rock for years. Needless to say, the Brits won, and now there's an unquenchable rivalry between the land's rightful inhabitants and those who logically want the land to be part of their country.

Driving straight across the airport runway to enter the city!

Since Gibraltar is technically the UK, we expected it to have quite a British feel. It didn't. It felt just like Spain, except we were actually able to communicate with people (residents of Gibraltar grow up speaking both English and Spanish). I found it to be quite a curious country. For some reason I never quite felt settled while we were there, perhaps due to the mesh of cultures that never seemed to arrive at a defining conclusion but rather uncomfortably floated somewhere in the middle... or maybe due to the unique landscape of the country that enclosed the inhabitants onto the island with access by only a single road, which conveniently (please note sarcasm here) runs right through the country's one airport runway, thus closing five times a day, prohibiting entrance and exit from the country, to let the daily scheduled flights land and take off.

Whatever it was, it ensured a fascinating and entertaining trip. Because of wind, the cable cars that normally take visitors to the top of the rock were closed for the day. Instead, we found a company that offers complete tours of the island and hopped in a van for a slightly perilous journey up the steep and jagged cliffs of Gibraltar's rock.

At the windy top we saw three things. Our first stop was at St. Michael's Cave, an incredible cavern that granted us access to the inside of the Rock, allowing us to observe the intricacies of the earth's natural formation of such a magnificent landscape. The cave has been utilized for centuries, having been occupied by military forces and ammunition in previous times when war remained a constant threat to mainland Spain. Now, however, the cave is decorated with colorful lights and strobes that illuminate a unique setting for classical concerts and prestigious events like the Miss World competition. It's a bit musty and dank inside the cave, with drops of water dripping every so often onto the dark floor, but I must admit a concert there seems like a fabulous experience, and one would be more than fortunate to be able to attend such an event.

Our next destination was by far the most popular and definitely the most enjoyable part for our tour group an travel companions. Apparently when the British began to occupy Gibraltar, they also brought with them monkeys (or is it apes? Forgive me... I can never remember the difference), so now the country is well known for its abundance of curious and knivving little creatures roaming around the hills. Oftentimes, these monkeys end up wandering out of their habitats and into human territory, where they have no qualms in rummaging through your belongings in order to confiscate whatever they might want. In fact, it's well known among inhabitants and visitors that if you don't watch your things, they might get stolen... By a monkey!

Photographic proof of my dad always pushing the limits!! ;-)

We laughed at the thought of such thieving little animals until we realized the reality of the situation when my dad bought an ice cream cone. We can't say he wasn't warned, because the shop he purchased it in had more than a sufficient amount of signs warning visitors of aggressive monkeys. Being my dad, however, he thought it would be funny to test out the theory and see what the monkeys would actually do. Of course, the signs and shop owner were right, and the moment my dad stepped out of the shop with ice cream in hand, at least two monkeys sprung at him, aiming for the delicious treat. My dad managed to protect his ice cream (and himself) by hiding behind a gate for the next few minutes while he ate, but my sister wasn't so lucky.

Being the less risky one of the bunch, Shawna decided to wait until we got back in the van, safely away from the monkeys, before opening her Snickers bar. What she didn't consider though, was that she wouldn't finish it completely before we reached our next stop - the monkeys' habitat area. Without thinking much about it, I opened the car door and jumped out to be greeted by a swarm of monkeys all around me, including a crazy monkey that jumped down from on top of the van and onto my sister as she was getting out of the car!

Maybe the most epic picture ever. Caught by my dad seconds before the stealthy attack.

I have to admit, even though it startled me for a minute, it was a hilarious scene to watch. The monkey scrambled all over Shawna trying to snatch her last bite of Snickers. Not the least not concerned about the candy bar, she threw the rest of it on the ground in hopes that the monkey might go after it instead of her. Unfortunately the monkey wasn't too smart so he proudly snatched the Snickers wrapper out of Shawna's hand, only to be left in grave disappointment after finding it empty.

After our scintillating introduction to the monkeys, we each snapped a few pictures holding a monkey (or three in some cases) before loading back up in the van to head to the Great Siege Tunnels. The tunnels are actually man made pathways carved out inside the rock for the use of military advances and protection. Throughout the long, dark, windy tunnels were numerous caves and niches that had been created to store weapons and resources. There were also rooms used as offices, where the generals worked and called orders from. Every so often we'd come across an opening in the rock wall that allowed us to peer out to the sparkling sea and even the coast of Spain hundreds of feet below. We were informed that these openings were used both as windows to keep watch on the seas for intruders and also for slots to places guns and cannons to shoot anyone who tried to invade or attack. Considering the abundance of openings and the strategic placement of them on all sides of the rock, it's a wonder how anyone ever survived an invasion!

After our van tour was over, we sat down to eat at a cute little Italian restaurant back down at the bottom of the rock. Over the week that my family was in Spain, we ate out almost every single meal and discovered something quite clear about Spain: the food is just not that great. It's not only that I don't exactly prefer greasy tapas, seafood dishes, and the traditional Paella that Spaniards eat so often, but we also found that the quality of the food (at least in the restaurants we went to) was not very good. I realized by the end of the week that I actually preferred staying at home and eating whatever we cooked that night instead of going out because it was simply way better than what is served at the restaurants in our area.

All that being said, we finally sat down to a quality meal with excellent food and delicious flavors, served at the little Italian restaurant we ate at. Honestly I did not expect it to be more than a Sbarro or something of the sort, but it ended up being one of the best meals we had that whole week!

Stuffed to the brim from focaccia, pizza, salad, and calzones, we got back in the car to head home, but not without stopping in the ritzy Puerto Banus, a section of the high class city of Marbella where you can't find a shirt for under two hundred euros and any given car on the street most likely costs more than your entire house.

We quite enjoyed our brief little tour of the Costa del Sol and the unique country of Gibraltar, but unfortunately it was Shawna's last day before she had to head home to the U.S. I was very sad to see her go, but at least I still had some exciting adventures ahead planned with my dad as we continued our tour around southern Spain.