Going bananas in the Straits

Saturday brought me to the Straits of Gibraltar. It's a particularly weird place, starting with passport control, or lack thereof. Rushing through and having a guard simply glance at my photo reminded me of security in the Czech Republic a few years back, as at that airport I had to run through a metal detector with a duffel bag without even stopping for them to search my, you know, really dangerous bag.


The airport in Gibraltar is one of the most dangerous in the world, considering planes have a tiny landing strip and face having to circle Gibraltar's famous 200 million year old rock (see below) and wind blowing in two different directions. The runway is also part of a major thoroughfare, thus car traffic is frequent when planes are landing. It's quite silly actually. 


Gibraltar's streets were constructed for buggies and horses, so we had the pleasure of going up the rock in a "mini-bus," or a stick shift Mercedes safari-like bus for 20 people. Our guide was very knowledgeable. Quite vulgar too. But more of that later. 


There are 33,000 Gibraltarians. There are more students at UW than Gibraltarians. British, Moroccans, Indians and Spanish people inhabit this tiny bit of land, which is linked to Spain by a narrow isthmus. The real estate there is crazy expensive - some of the ritziest apartments cost up to 2 million euro, and some other extravagant amount in GBP (eff the GBP). 


Our guide (who never told us his real name, but rather just to call him Ivan the Terrible), explained that Spain tried to regain the Rock from the British in the 18th century, but grossly failed, making the Rock of Gibraltar an impressive beacon of British pride. 


Technically speaking, the Rock is an ancient sea bed. As it is slab of limestone composed of deceased shelled animals, some people consider the Rock to be an island, but it's really a peninsula. I hate typing rock over and over again. Here's the Rock:

Just kidding. I'm hilarious, yeah?

For a little ooing and ahhing, Ivan the Terrible let us off first at Europa Point, where you can see all the Straits, including Algericas (or Al-Jazeera if you're feeling lazy), Gibraltar and mountains of Morocco. The photos speak for themselves.

Adi gawking.

Heading up the Rock with Ivan, we went to St. Michael's Cave, a Cathedral Cave believed to be bottomless. Walking through I felt just like Don Quijote did in his caves (not quite). Today it's actually a theater. Fun fact: people used to believe that Gibraltar was linked to the African continent by a subterranean passage over 25 kilmeters long under the Straits. Hence, bottomless cave. Anyhoo, the cave can keep 10,000 soliders alive for a year. Well, not the cave itself, but it has the capacity to house 10,000 soliders and their necessities for a year. Apparently if the water falls from the rocks onto your head or body, it's good luck. Just like when bird droppings land on you?

Poor Yorick.

My sophomore year I took an advanced psychology class about animal behavior, focusing on primates (between Naomi taking horticulture and me in monkey class, we had quite the slew of random information constantly filling apartment conversations). Knowing all of this before I came, I was reminded that the Barbary Macaques were brought to Gibraltar by the Moorish royalty as pets. They lack tails, hence they are apes. There are about 300 of them living in Gibraltar, being the only free-living monkeys in Europe today. They are controlled and fed by the local government, even sporting tattoos in their groin with an ID number. Ivan kindly offered to show us his tattoo. Foul. Here are da monos:

Thumbs and nails.

Ivan, have you ever run over an ape? "Rubbish." 

Playing with baby macaques is just like babysitting, apparently.

Other than that, Gibraltar isn't much. Most of the people that live there work for banks and live lavishly on the coast. But, because Gibraltar is a territory of the UK, I found dark chocolate Toblerone (because Spain really only raves over milk and white) and Cadbury Crunchies. Successful, silly day.