Distance Traveled: 33,425 kms (BNE-MEL-SYD-BKK-PKT-BKK-CNX-BKK-PP-SR-BB-PP-HCMC-NC-TH-HA-H-L-MR-AG-SV-TF-AC-LL-ML)
Time Difference: -9 hours (from Brisbane)
Soundtrack: Nothing really at the moment
Currently Inspired by: As above. Taking a break to be a tourist for a little while.
Words written: 50,168
As pretty as Tarifa was, it was a relief to go somewhere a
little larger and more happening (although not much more happening). Algeciras - pronounced Ahl-heh-THEER-ahs - is
a port town, and its huge bustling docks are the major feature of it. I haven’t been to many port cities, but they
seem to have a reputation for being a bit rough and this was no exception. Dirty streets, dirty folks, air of repressed violence, but very impressive
docks. My hotel was a lovely grand dame
about a twenty five minute walk out of the town centre, faded around the edges
and with her glory days most definitely behind her, but still retaining an air
of her former gentility. The grounds
were extensive and immaculately kept, and deserved a stroll of their very
own. The best feature was an indoor
swimming pool that was built outside in enclosed glass patio. I spent a morning, in European winter,
completely protected and sunbaking behind the glass. I even went for a swim! Such a mood lifter. My first room reeked of filthy cigarettes and
neither the phone nor wifi worked, but they moved me with no fuss. The staff were excellent and all spoke
virtually flawless English, so it was a wonderful relief after the last few
weeks of struggling with the language barrier.
I’m sick of saying “no comprendo”.
Algeciras is where I hit 50,000 words, hence why most of the photos are
of the hotel.
After two nights in Algeciras I treated myself to a taxi to
my next destination. It would have been
5 euro to the bus station, 5 euro on the bus and then probably another 5 euro
from the other bus station to my hotel, or just 20 euro in a cab, with the
convenience of not having to lug my hideous suitcase about. Not being able to go out and eat much due to
just about the entire Mediterranean being closed down, I’ve been saving some
money so I thought “why not?” I got
dropped off at La Linea de Concepcion, another grubby port town, famous and I
imagine visited by tourists only due to its proximity to Gibraltar. On my first afternoon I went for a long walk
and stumbled across some markets run by... Spanish carnies, is the only way to
describe them. This was the first time I
noticed that Spanish female mannequins, like Spanish women, all have nice big,
round bottoms! It got me thinking. If the average Australia woman is a size 14,
why don’t we also have realistic mannequins in stores? Also on the walk I discovered Cream of Brie
and Cream of Camembert cheese spreads, the World’s Greatest Idea and my latest
addiction. (NB: these are not fake cheese
things that sit on the shelf. They are
made from the real deal and require refrigeration). No wonder the mannequins have big bums. My new favourite thing is a fresh crusty multigrain
roll, with Cream of Brie spread, smoked salmon and asparagus. Drool. Who says you can’t improvise a nice meal when
you have no cooking facilities?
 |
| The Rock from La Linea |
I originally attempted to book accommodation in Gibraltar itself
but the hotels were all closed for bookings in January and February. I had visions of this cold, rainy, brooding
rock jutting out into the ocean, with a few dark and spooky hotels with peeling
paint and a tiny little tourist office staffed by a cackling old man with one
eye who gives out damp maps and dire warnings to the few mad tourists who dare
climb the rock in winter. Err, I don’t
know where I got that from, but Gibraltar is massive and super busy, has a
large town of 28,000 pax, a whole bunch of OPEN hotels (wtf?), a large sunny
square, a central business district, red double decker buses and red telephone
boxes, and a main street that resembles nothing more than a small, thriving
English town full of Marks and Spencer and Top Shop and pubs selling “London
Fish and Chips”. As it is an English territory, a passport was required to get
in, although they barely glanced at it, and the woman in front of me walked
past them with it closed and just flashed the front cover. It could have been anyone’s! I can honestly say that I have never walked ten
minutes from my hotel into another country before, it was very strange, and the
other thing that amazed me was how DIFFERENT it was. Really.
Almost as different as England and Spain are, except more like England
with just a lot of Spanish tourists.
The
main drag was absolutely packed and thrumming with shoppers and lunchers and
boozers. After the ghost towns I’ve been
in it was quite a shock to my senses! I
heard posh English accents chatting to their friends and then asking waiters
for “dos cervezas, por favor” (two beers, please) and people who looked and
sounded perfectly Spanish, turning around and shouting out to another friend in
clipped British tones. For some reason
every second shop was a liquor store, with huge window displays of litre
bottles of spirits for less than ten euros.
Some signs were in pounds, some signs were in euros, although all shops
took both. It was kind of annoying that
I’m not drinking at the moment and also that I have a “no carrying alcohol
around” policy because I’m sure some of those bottles would have come in handy
at the Tenerife festival, which is no doubt going to have massively inflated
booze prices. On the way out of
Gibraltar you have to show your passport again but there was no bag checking or customs or immigration. Gibraltar is also a huge port
as well, so if you were wondering how drugs gets from Africa to mainland
Europe, I’d be guessing that’s the way.
Of course the rock is the main feature of Gibraltar, and I
walked around the town for a good 2 hours before I finally figured out how to
get onto the damn thing (my map was useless).
By this time it was afternoon and I was concerned about timing because
it’s a 2.5 – 3 hour walk to the top and I didn’t want to be walking back down
in the dark. Fortunately, I found a tour
guide who offered to take me up there in his van with another group. I didn’t bring enough cash to pay the whole
amount and I don’t walk around with my bank cards on me, so he took what I had
in my wallet which was about half the price.
Nice fella, and a real Gibraltarian (isn't that awkward? I would call them Gibraltans) as his father was Engligh and his mother was Spanish. There were three main
stops. One to check out St Michael’s
cave, which is a beautiful in a creepy, Gothic sort of way. There
is a large cavern in the cave that forms kind of a natural ampitheatre, so
they built some steps / seating in there and a stage, and they actually have
orchestra concerts and other performances in there. Can you imagine going to see a concert, in a
huge natural cave, in the rock of Gibraltar?
The thing is 200 million years old and made of Jurassic limestone. I mean... wow. The second stop was the peak of the rock, and
the third stop was some siege tunnels.
Kilometres of them, carved rather impressively, with hand tools.
 |
| The thieving one |
All of those things
were well and good but really, everyone goes there for the apes. It is the only place in Europe where they live,
and in fact, although they are known as Barbary Apes, they are not apes at all,
they are monkeys. Macaques, to be
precise. There is a saying that when the
apes leave the rock, so will the British.
Apparently Winston Churchill had some more brought in from Africa when
their numbers were dwindling, that’s how paranoid he was about it. They are really thriving now, although if
people ever leave the rock I don’t know what they’ll do because they are fed by
the humans every day. Tourists are not
allowed to feed them though in case it makes them obese and there are hefty
fines for doing so, or for touching them with your hands as they bite. They are allowed to touch you if they want to
however, and it would seem that they all wanted to touch me. I had three jump on me to go for a ride on my
head / shoulders, and they climbed up and down me like a bloody playground in a
park whenever they felt like it. It was
cool and fun at first, until I got a whiff of them. WOOF!
They stink. And I only have one
jacket. Also the third one took my CK
sunnies right off my face and pissed off with them. A nice man got them back for me, but not
before the monkey had scraped them along the ground and scratched my left
lens. Is anything I own allowed to
remain a. With me and b. Undamaged? I’m
not asking for much, everything I own is in my damn suitcase! What’s the deal? Anyway, they were super cute, and I got HEAPS
of photos of them and the simply spectacular view from the top of the rock. Click here to see all the photos from Algeciras and Gibraltar.
 |
| One of the many views from Alcazabar |
Malaga was the next stop, and I’m really glad I came
here. You can’t walk three metres
without bumping into a ruin, a church or a museum. I got here yesterday afternoon and will leave
tomorrow, but really I could spend another three or four days here seeing
everything. There are about 60
attractions, according to the incredibly helpful city council tourist
information, and about 30 of them are museums.
They also use the word museum for gallery here, so basically you just
take pot luck and see what you end up looking at once you’re in there. When I arrived yesterday I had a headache and
decided that a long walk in the fresh air might be the ticket to get rid of it. I got to the bottom of a very large hill and
saw some people quite high above at a lookout.
“That will fix me right up”, I thought.
Ha. Ha. Ha. Oh, man. Of course once I started I didn’t want to
give up, but WOW. I finally arrived,
panting and sweating, but I must say the view was absolutely worth it. Stunning.
I noticed that the road continued up, so I braved it and was rewarded
with an absolutely giant and ancient (11th century) fort and castle
called the Alcazabar of Malaga. I have
absolutely NFI how they brought up the stones and materials to build that
place, but however they did it, it’s incredibly impressive.
I only made it to three of the museums unfortunately. One was a free, and very strange mix of old
and modern art. I really hate most modern
art, I have to say. It’s just stupid. Why would anyone buy something that looks
like something a kid could do at pre-school?
I was the only visitor, and the security guard was clearly wetting-her-pants
excited to have something to do finally, and she followed me around as I was
looking at all the exhibits. My trainers
make a terrible squeak on polished stone floors, and her shoes made sort of a
swishing sound. So in the deathly
silence of the museum, I would look at one piece with my discerning art face
on, go “hmmm” intelligently, and then move to the next one. Squeak, squeak, squeak. Swish-swish-swish. “Hmmm.”
Next piece. Squeak, squeak,
squeak. Swish-swish-swish. I have to say
I became incredibly self conscious in there after a while! It was a great collection though, particularly the older stuff.
 |
| First records |
Speaking of art that a child could do, Picasso was born and
raised here in Malaga, so of course they have a huge collection of his. I dragged myself to it, in the hope that
seeing more than just half a dozen of his paintings that I saw years ago in Amsterdam
might kindle some kind of appreciation within me. I remain unimpressed. I think, especially later in life, he was
just an undiagnosed mental case who got popular for some reason. If that’s really how he “saw” the world... I
mean come on! It’s like those ink blots
tests. He was actively trying to TELL
people he was crazy. The third museum I went to was fantabulasticous. I mean, really. It was an interactive museum of musical
instruments throughout time. It had a
massive collection of instruments, some crazy modern ones that you were allowed
to play with, this one where you dropped stones into water and some tubes and
other weird stuff. Also they had your
classical instruments on display through the ages and from the countries in
which they originated, and well as lots of percussion instruments that you
could bang on, and some digital instruments and sound booths and the earliest
versions of records and pianos and pianolas and many other exciting and fandangled doodads. I had a field day, and made so much
noise. They even had guitar-like instruments made out of
animal shells?! (I don’t condone that of
course, but they were very old). Click here to see all the pics from Malaga.
This blog is super long, and I haven’t even finished what I’ve
done in Malaga so I’ll be short. Visited street carnival,
ate tapas, swung in the kid's playground, walked on the beach, listened to some street singers, met some French tourists, looked unsuccessfully for a laundry. There you go.
Tomorrow is Cadiz for one night, then two nights on the boat to Tenerife
for paaarrrtaaaayyy time woohoo!
Til Next We Speak
*LOVE*
N
No comments:
Post a Comment