{"id":21695,"date":"2023-03-30T13:18:04","date_gmt":"2023-03-30T20:18:04","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/exhaustnotes.us\/blog\/?p=21695"},"modified":"2023-03-20T13:18:17","modified_gmt":"2023-03-20T20:18:17","slug":"gibraltar","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/exhaustnotes.us\/blog\/index.php\/2023\/03\/30\/gibraltar\/","title":{"rendered":"Gibraltar"},"content":{"rendered":"
By Mike Huber<\/strong><\/h6>\n

Needing another vacation and a break from the day-to-day boring humdrum of life (I usually ensure that doesn\u2019t go on for very long) my girlfriend and I decided to head to Portugal and Spain.\u00a0 It was coming up on my 50th<\/sup> birthday and wanted to do something unique to celebrate this milestone. As we traversed and meandered through both countries I was still trying to come up with that unique idea when a friend had texted me to go to Gibraltar and summit the rock.\u00a0 That was an outstanding idea. Next stop: Gibraltar!<\/p>\n

I Know What I Don\u2019t Know<\/strong><\/p>\n

I only knew two things about Gibraltar: It was an island between Spain and Morocco, and they drive on the opposite side of the road since it is a Territory of Britain.\u00a0 Both these things I \u201cknew\u201d were incorrect. Gibraltar is a peninsula, not an island, and although it is indeed a British Territory they do not drive on the opposite side of the road as in other British Territories.\u00a0 The peninsula is just 3 miles long and not even 1 mile wide and most of the peninsula consisted of the giant Gibraltar rock with a lot of narrow winding roads that meander as far as they can go up around that Gibraltar Rock.\u00a0 Which had me wondering why there was a Ferrari dealership on the peninsula (I am certain it has to do with less taxes there than in their England motherland).<\/p>\n

Entering The Territory<\/strong><\/p>\n

Crossing into Gibraltar from Spain was more of a formality and simply consisted of showing our passports at the border, a quick stamp by the immigration officer, and walking into the Territory.\u00a0 Once leaving immigration we walked across the Gibraltar Airport tarmac. It felt like we were trespassing, other than the traffic lights to alert you when a plane was taking off or landing. Those were not traffic lights you\u2019d want to run.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Once across the tarmac it was a short quarter mile walk to our AirBnB, which happened to be a 30-foot boat in the Gibraltar Marina.\u00a0 I thought this would be a distinctive place to stay instead of some high-rise hotel where you would be disconnected from the heartbeat of the Territory. This choice turned out to be perfect and we slept great that night with the boat rocking us to sleep in the gentle marina waters.<\/p>\n

The Rock<\/strong><\/p>\n

The next day we made our way towards the base of the Gibraltar Rock.\u00a0 Sadly, you cannot climb to the top of it as it is a military installation.\u00a0 Disappointed, we took the gondola instead of hiking to the highest point we were allowed to go.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

I had read there were some monkeys that lived up on top of the rock that made their way from Morocco via a network of underground caves that went under the Strait of Gibraltar. We were told not to pet or touch them as they are wild animals. Of course, me being one to always follow rules it took under two minutes to befriend one of these little guys and I walked around with him on my shoulder on the observation deck. Clearly, my maturity hadn\u2019t caught up with my now being 50 years old. It didn\u2019t take long before one of the rangers scolded me and stated that they would bite me.\u00a0 Why would he bite me? We were friends. Ugh. People are always trying to ruin my fun.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

We opted to walk down the path instead of taking the gondola back.\u00a0 This was a wise choice as there were a lot of hidden bunkers from WWI along the way and a really interesting stop called St. Michael\u2019s Cave.\u00a0 This is a huge, impressive cave that ultimately led down to the Strait.\u00a0 We only walked in the upper portion of this maze for about 20-minutes since the longer tunnels are closed to the public.\u00a0 As we toured the cave there was a light and sound show to provide more entertainment and the history of this hidden gem. It was a fun detour to take.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Once we wrapped up the cave experience, we continued down the two-mile path looking over magnificent views as monkeys leaped from trees onto the tops of passing cars to hitch a free ride.\u00a0 Every time one leaped it would create the loudest \u201cboom\u201d as they carelessly but somehow successfully landed on a car\u2019s roof.\u00a0 This made for great entertainment for us, but I can\u2019t imagine what the people inside the vehicles thought hearing that noise. Once back at the marina we were hungry and it wasn\u2019t difficult to find a waterside restaurant, an order of fish n\u2019 chips, and a cold beer to wrap the day up in style.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Overall Gibraltar was worth going to visit as we were in the neighborhood.\u00a0 The territory is more of a winter getaway for the British than a destination one would otherwise visit.\u00a0 This Territory did indeed make for a fun two days, a unique experience, and a few entertaining stories that I am happy to be sharing with you.<\/p>\n

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By Mike Huber Needing another vacation and a break from the day-to-day boring humdrum of life (I usually ensure that doesn\u2019t go on for very long) my girlfriend and I decided to head to Portugal and Spain.\u00a0 It was coming up on my 50th birthday and wanted to do something unique to celebrate this milestone. … Continue reading “Gibraltar”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":21699,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":true,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[96,1],"tags":[3455,3312,3454,3310],"class_list":["post-21695","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-feel-good-stuff","category-uncategorized","tag-monkeys","tag-portugal","tag-rock-of-gibraltar","tag-spain"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/exhaustnotes.us\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/03\/Gibraltar_Rock900.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"post_mailing_queue_ids":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/exhaustnotes.us\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21695","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/exhaustnotes.us\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/exhaustnotes.us\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/exhaustnotes.us\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/exhaustnotes.us\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=21695"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/exhaustnotes.us\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21695\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":21705,"href":"https:\/\/exhaustnotes.us\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21695\/revisions\/21705"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/exhaustnotes.us\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/21699"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/exhaustnotes.us\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=21695"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/exhaustnotes.us\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=21695"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/exhaustnotes.us\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=21695"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}