The Rock

It's the Rock of Gibraltar! 

For those of you who gave a "guess" as to where our next passport stamp was going to be on a day trip from Spain ~ congratulations!  It was the British territory of Gibraltar. 


If you're like me, I didn't do that well in history class.  All those sterile facts and meaningless dates just didn't stick.

But, as I heard a Trip Advisor reviewer say recently, "I travel because.....experience is the best education".   I agree!   First-hand information is such a different experience than trying to memorize facts.

So I was surprised to learn, in our preparation for our trip to Spain, that this land mass, while on the Spanish map, is actually British territory.  (Just look at a map, it's really weird!)

Which involves such details as:  We can't drive our rental car across the "border", because our rental agreement says we won't take the car out of the country.  And technically, Gibraltarar is a different country.  So we have to park on the Spanish side and walk across to the British side.  Really???

We have to go through a customs gate.  I actually get a new stamp in my passport.  (These are like little trophy's for me, I won't lie).

And the currency is now Pounds instead of Euro.  Man, I'm still hauling around US dollars, I'm two countries behind.

So here it is.  The actual "Rock of Gibraltar".  There's some important military history here, because of the strategic location to the Mediterranean Sea.  More on that later, though.

And this is my personal Rock of Gibraltar.   And there's some good history here, too.  



There's some fun to be had up-top, wild monkeys & caves & what-not ~ I'll be sharing that later.

 

But for now, thanks for traveling with us!