Day 4 - 6 May, 2006: Costa del Sol, Gibraltar, Ceuta
Good lord! Today was a long day.
Our plan was to drive down the Costa del Sol to Algeciras, and then hop the ferry to Ceuta, a Spanish city on the African continent. It was a good plan, to be sure.
The drive down was simply spectacular. We drove generally within site of the water the whole way, and when we got a little further south, we noticed all these plastic tarps covering acres and acres of land. After consulting the books, we learned that the tarps exist to trap the very last but of residual moisture released by the soil at night. It looked like the whole landscape was paved over. We ate breakfast in the town of Almeria, on the seawall right on the beach. It was lovely.
We made a couple of unscheduled stops as we saw unique rock formations or interesting "coves" with secluded beaches. Consequently, it was already 4pm before we got to Gibraltar. We parked in La Linea de la Concepcion, the small border town on the Spanish side, and walked into the UK. It was serendipitous that we missed the last gondola to the top of "The Rock," since we were able to hire a private van tour for just 2 euros more. After buying some peanuts to feed the Barbary Apes (they're not actually apes per se, they're really tailless monkeys), we headed out on our tour of Gibraltar. Our guide was very personable and we learned a fair bit about the history of, and current situation in Gibraltar. Our experience with the monkeys was priceless. Our guide warned against keeping the peanut bags visible, but Angela scoffed at that and within 10 seconds of getting out of the van, she was "assaulted" by a monkey who made short work of stealing the whole bag. We all got a good laugh out of that, and spent about 30 minutes or so feeding the monkeys and taking pictures from the top of the rock. The air was clear enough to see the African continent across the strait, so that was pretty cool.
We left Gibraltar around 7:30; feeling slightly concerned that we might not be able to make the last ferry from Algeciras to Ceuta. Now, Algeciras is just across the bay from Gibraltar, so it didn't take any time to get there.
Until we got to the ferry terminal, there really hadn't been any drama today, unless you consider the monkey that climbed up onto Carlisle's head, or the hot, topless sunbather we saw on the way down. Turns out I grossly underestimated the price of the ferry ride, so we huddled while we considered our options. We ended up completely unpacking Patsy and leaving her in the lighted parking lot at the ferry terminal. That was fun; muscling all of our luggage up the gangway and onto the ferry. It was 11:30 before we checked into our parador in Ceuta, and we barely made it in time for dinner. Ultimately, we decided to spend the morning in Ceuta, partially to be able to get _some_ sleep tonight, and partially because Ceuta looks like a pretty cool town.
Now, Angela really wants to see a Bull Fight in Seville tomorrow (they only have them on Sundays), so I had to take our cell phone down to the front desk and have the receptionist listen to message at the ticket center to tell us the details of tomorrow's fights. Tickets go on sale at 10am, and the fight is at 7:30 at the "Maestranza" bullring.
Like I said; it's been a very long day.
Our plan was to drive down the Costa del Sol to Algeciras, and then hop the ferry to Ceuta, a Spanish city on the African continent. It was a good plan, to be sure.
The drive down was simply spectacular. We drove generally within site of the water the whole way, and when we got a little further south, we noticed all these plastic tarps covering acres and acres of land. After consulting the books, we learned that the tarps exist to trap the very last but of residual moisture released by the soil at night. It looked like the whole landscape was paved over. We ate breakfast in the town of Almeria, on the seawall right on the beach. It was lovely.
We made a couple of unscheduled stops as we saw unique rock formations or interesting "coves" with secluded beaches. Consequently, it was already 4pm before we got to Gibraltar. We parked in La Linea de la Concepcion, the small border town on the Spanish side, and walked into the UK. It was serendipitous that we missed the last gondola to the top of "The Rock," since we were able to hire a private van tour for just 2 euros more. After buying some peanuts to feed the Barbary Apes (they're not actually apes per se, they're really tailless monkeys), we headed out on our tour of Gibraltar. Our guide was very personable and we learned a fair bit about the history of, and current situation in Gibraltar. Our experience with the monkeys was priceless. Our guide warned against keeping the peanut bags visible, but Angela scoffed at that and within 10 seconds of getting out of the van, she was "assaulted" by a monkey who made short work of stealing the whole bag. We all got a good laugh out of that, and spent about 30 minutes or so feeding the monkeys and taking pictures from the top of the rock. The air was clear enough to see the African continent across the strait, so that was pretty cool.
We left Gibraltar around 7:30; feeling slightly concerned that we might not be able to make the last ferry from Algeciras to Ceuta. Now, Algeciras is just across the bay from Gibraltar, so it didn't take any time to get there.
Until we got to the ferry terminal, there really hadn't been any drama today, unless you consider the monkey that climbed up onto Carlisle's head, or the hot, topless sunbather we saw on the way down. Turns out I grossly underestimated the price of the ferry ride, so we huddled while we considered our options. We ended up completely unpacking Patsy and leaving her in the lighted parking lot at the ferry terminal. That was fun; muscling all of our luggage up the gangway and onto the ferry. It was 11:30 before we checked into our parador in Ceuta, and we barely made it in time for dinner. Ultimately, we decided to spend the morning in Ceuta, partially to be able to get _some_ sleep tonight, and partially because Ceuta looks like a pretty cool town.
Now, Angela really wants to see a Bull Fight in Seville tomorrow (they only have them on Sundays), so I had to take our cell phone down to the front desk and have the receptionist listen to message at the ticket center to tell us the details of tomorrow's fights. Tickets go on sale at 10am, and the fight is at 7:30 at the "Maestranza" bullring.
Like I said; it's been a very long day.
posted by Matthew Belk at 12:38 AM
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