Sun Sept 27- Fri Oct 9 As we reported earlier, we arrived in Gibraltar after a very calm overnight passage from Aguadulce. As we approached "The Rock", as Gibraltar is called, the view was exactly as the guidebooks described - a cloud hanging over the area. It was picturesque, but also reminded us that Gibraltar is known to have its own weather due to its unique location at the entrance to the Mediterranean. As we rounded Europa Point it was an exhilarating feeling - we had now crossed the Med from east to west, visiting 8 countries by boat (Turkey, Greece, Croatia, Italy, Malta, France, Spain, and now Gibraltar) and 6 by land (France, Belgium, Netherlands, Germany, Portugal, Spain). We headed to Queensway Quay marina, the closest to the point, where we had a reservation. Aboard s/v Bebe we toasted the occasion.

Always maintenance tasks to do such as laundry, provisioning, and boat projects. But we made time for fun. Gibraltar has grown in size by dumping fill onto the ocean shelves near shore. Evidently all the flat land at the base of the rock is fill. Gibraltar borders Spain and it is obvious that Spain likes to think that Gibraltar is still theirs. When we were searching on the internet to rent a car, there was no choice of Gibraltar under countries; we had to select Spain with Gibraltar as the 'city'. One day we took the cable car from town up to the "Upper Rock" to visit the sites. At some of the exhibits there we learned about Spain's last big effort to take Gibraltar back from the British. They chose to do it around the time of the American Revolution, thinking the British would be all strung out and tired from their war with America...but that effort failed. We visited the Great Siege Tunnels, as this conflict is known, to see the defense system devised by military engineers and built with simple tools and gunpowder. In fact, the tunnel building did not end with the Great Siege. The tunneling continued into WWII and as late as 1968 turning Gibraltar into a honeycomb of 34 miles of tunnels.

Dennis split from the group to walk to where the Mediterranean Steps end to see what condition they were in -he planned to scale them but never found the time. The day was quite warm and we were getting our exercise walking all over the rock. St. Michael's Cave is a beautiful natural grotto which was used as a hospital during WWII and now is used as an auditorium for concerts. It was also a cool break from the heat of the day and we took our time exploring. Colorful lights highlighted the stalagmite and stalactite formations. Our last stop was the Moorish Castle. Only the tower portion still stands as it was renovated and reinforced over the years while being used for military defense but the foundations of the walls and other structures gave an indication of the original size. And of course the Barbary macaque monkeys were everywhere. The first record of monkeys in Gibraltar dates back to the 18th century; it is still unknown how the macaques originally came here. We read reviews of some tourists being attacked or confronted by aggressive monkeys but our experience was that they were quite sedate and fun to be among.

There were of course good views down over Gibraltar from the Upper Rock. The Gibraltar airport runway is at the border of Gibraltar and Spain. The road that connects Gibraltar and La Linea Spain passes right over the runway. When a plane is landing or departing, traffic is stopped. We saw this happen as a plane landed.

Being British, there were an abundance of fish and chip restaurants so we went out one night to indulge. The portions were huge but the flavor was bland -British food, oh well. The town isn't that big and we walked everywhere. The residents acknowledge the limitations of the town as when we couldn't find something we needed, the vendor would raise his hands and remark, "It's Gibraltar!" We only took the bus a couple times - on those occasions where we were doing some advance provisioning (heavy canned goods) for our Atlantic crossing and our trips to and from the airport. In town we saw the American War Memorial, an arch built into the city wall in 1932 to commemorate the achievements and comradeship of the US Navy and the Royal Navy during WWI. Dennis took a bus one day over to Nelson's Anchorage to see the 100 Ton Gun, a Victorian 'super-gun' installed on the Rock in the late 19th century. Weapon technology moves quickly and the gun was obsolete before it ever was fired in a conflict. The only other 100 ton gun remaining is in Malta.

We had been wanting to take a land tour to Seville. We stopped at three different places along the southern Spain coast where it was about 2.5 hours to Seville, but hadn't made time for the trip. This was our last chance. We rode the bus across the airport runway and across the border into Spain with Judy and Bill and picked up our rental car there for our Seville adventure....which we will blog about separately.

We had been checking the weather forecasts daily looking for a good weather window - ideally wind from the east, but at least no strong wind coming in from the west. Friday looked good. We returned from Seville on Wed, so we had just one day to get ready, but no problem, we didn't want to miss this opportunity.