Wednesday 21^st May 2014

Woke this morning to an overcast cloudy sky with light rain. Temperature is expected to be a maximum of 21°.

We sailed into Gibraltar harbour and docked at 8:00am.

After breakfast in our Stateroom we met our tour group at 9:00am for a short bus trip into the centre of the city where we boarded the cable car for the steep ride to the top of the Rock. On the way up the guide explained about the Barbary Apes, (tailless monkeys which live on Gibraltar) and that we were not to feed them. 

 A Barbary Ape

Also to keep any bags and backpacks closed, as they like to forage inside looking for food. I had to dispose of the apples we had packed as the guide said they would be able to smell the fruit. Apparently the Apes are also very fond of sunglasses and jewellery.  

View fro the top of The Rock

Despite the cloud and light drizzle the views from the top were spectacular so the cameras got a workout. One of the amazing views from the top is the airport and runway. The runway is listed as one of the 5 most dangerous in the world and pilots have to be specially trained and qualified to fly in and out of Gibraltar.  The runway is very short with water at both ends and savage cross winds so it is not able to take large planes. Amazingly, though, the runway has the main Gibraltar – Spain road running across the middle of it, so when planes are landing boom gates are lowered on each side to stop the traffic. We actually saw a plane land while we were at the top. 

Gibraltar Airport

 Also from the top we were able to see the continent of North Africa, which is 9 miles across the water.

We then walked along the pathways to St Michael’s Cave, passing many of the famous Barbary Apes which are quite happy to have their photo taken. Legend has it that if the Apes leave Gibraltar, British sovereignty will cease. During WWII the numbers reduced significantly to a point where Churchill issued an order for more were to be found and brought to the "Rock”.

Between 280 & 300 Apes currently live on Gibraltar and the numbers have been gradually increasing over the last few years. The Apes have no fear of humans and when we arrived at the entrance to St Michael’s Cave there were a number of them sitting on the cars, one was actually perched on the external rear vision mirror and only reluctantly moved when the driver shoved him off.

St Michael’s cave is part of a limestone formation (similar to the Jenolan caves) in the Rock. It is set up with sound and light shows and they hold concerts in there as it has excellent acoustics.

St Michaels Cave - main cavern

We continued walking and made our way to the Great Siege Tunnel, constructed by the British Royal Engineers in 1782 by blasting through the rock during the Great Siege of 1779-1783 when Spain was trying to bombard the British from ships anchored in the bay as well as blocking supply ships getting through in an endeavor to starve the Garrison into surrender.

The tunnels are very small and in places we had to duck so as not to hit our heads on the ceiling.

Great Siege Tunnel

 These tunnels are very different to those dug during WWII, again by British Royal Engineers, but we did not have time to do the tour of these. The guide said there are actually 57 miles of tunnels dug into the rock and in fact there are more roads inside the Rock that on the outside.

The tour ended at 1:00pm so we stayed in the Grand Casemates Square where we had a lovely lunch of swordfish cutlets in a tomato sauce with muscles and prawns. We knew we were back in a British area as lunch also came with a plate of chips.

After lunch we walked through the main shopping street before returning to the ship about 2:30pm for a 4:15 departure from Gibraltar Harbour. The sun was out and it was quite warm by the time we slipped the mooring cables and sailed out.

Gibraltar is a very interesting place and we would have liked more time to explore it.

Our wonderful day in Gibraltar concluded with dinner in the dining room with Glen  & Joanne.