TravelingArtista.com: 2016 Europe * Gibraltar * September 10

“The wind is in from Africa, last night I couldn’t sleep ...”

~ Joni Mitchell

I spend a few hours on the highest deck of the ship under the stars. Pleiades keeps me company. A bit later to the solarium to sleep in the big clamshell chaise. Sleep is not exactly the correct word. Rested is better. Only two to four hours tops. By 8:15 I was heading to my tour in Gibraltar.

The Rock, a lighthouse and minaret on the point, the limestone caverns, the Barbary monkeys. International banking, rental properties, casinos and tourism support the area. 80% of the landmass is reclaimed, the fill coming from excavating tunnels in the mountains.

On southern tip of Spain, this spit of land originally protected Spain from pirates. Layers of fortifications include the remains of a 14th-century Moorish Castle and the 18th century Great Siege Tunnels, which were expanded in WW2. I’ve heard a rumor that if the Barbary monkeys die off, then the land returns to Spain. A huge waterfall flowing from the 1400-foot mountain is man-made and overrun from an efficient desalination plant.

The mountain easily seen across the Strait of Gibraltar is in Morocco, only eight miles south: Jebel Moussa meaning Mount Moses. Geological history indicates that after a major tectonic event about 5.3 million years ago, a much smaller, ancient land-locked sea was filled in less than two years from the Atlantic Ocean, thus creating the Mediterranean Sea.

Gibraltar is now under British sovereignty since the 1700s. The Gibraltarians earnestly guard their independence. It’s the national holiday – everyone and everything is dressed in red and white.