Take The Long Way Home

We spent yesterday on British soil once more! Being this close, we felt the need for a visit to Gibraltar. We caught the first bus out of Monda to Marbella, then another to La Linea. Watching the sun rise during the journey, the big rock came into view. As we got closer the Atlas mountains of north Africa also became visible. Once in La Linea, we walked over the border and across the runway of Gibraltar airport into the territory. We then walked through the town to the cable car which took us to the top of the rock.

For an extra £1.50 (yes, that is good old sterling) we also got an audiotour which gave us a very interesting potted history of Gibraltar. Most importantly however we got to see the monkeys! The Barbary Macaques are famously the only wild monkeys found in Europe, and they were very entertaining. We particularly enjoyed one small ape tucking into a pineapple, and tried not to laugh too much when another stole a tourist's bag, took it out of reach and studiously unzipped all the compartments before leaving it when no food was discovered inside.

Back in the town, we had a pub lunch before hopping on some of the local buses to guide ourselves to the southernmost tip. We alighted at the 100 ton gun where we had the museum all to ourselves to investigate. We then continued south to Europa Point. Unfortunately the weather had really turned against us at this point and we could only just make out Africa across the surprisingly narrow strait of water.

We used our remaining time to peruse the many "duty free" shops on Main Street before walking back over the frontier into Spain. Then we discovered that - once more - we had misread the bus timetable and missed our planned bus back to Marbella. By the time we had gone to Estepona and then to Marbella the last bus to Monda had long since departed. A taxi worked out cheaper than a hotel or hostel would have done, so another €20 taxi fare was spent. I think I'm going to start taking photos of all these bus timetables...