52 - Just when we thought it was safe to go back in the water......

No, we're not talking about all the Orca's that are reportedly "interacting" and damaging sailboats along the coasts of Spain and Portugal.  We're talking about the fact that we got the boat all fixed up and ready to go sailing and now have found out that our engine needs to be replaced.  

As we told you, we're in La Linea de la Conception, Spain just outside of Gibraltar.  We blissfully sailed into the Mediterranean and had planned to spend a couple of nights at anchor just relaxing.  We dropped our anchor and settled in with our welcome toast of Champagne.  A few hours later, Pedro started routinely checking on things and noticed water in our oil.  Not good!  We pulled up anchor and headed into the marina to see what was going on.  Well, really long story short, the last boat yard we were in replaced our driveshaft seal and vented it improperly such that sea water back fed into our engine via the exhaust system.  As you can imagine, the engine didn't like this very much.  Truthfully, we're completely amazed that she got us safely into this town, into this marina and into a slip with all of this going on!  The next morning, the mechanic determined that our engine was completely locked up and gave us the news that our only real option was to re-power the boat (with the current situation of lack of available parts, it would be more expensive and take longer to try to rebuild it). While we were, needless to say upset, we were in a great marina with a great boatyard and within just a few days, they had already found a brand-new replacement engine located a couple of hours away.  Not exactly what we wanted to deal with on our first month back sailing in over a year, but as Pedro said "The boat's still afloat, no one got hurt and we're still in love!"

So, while we awaited information on logistics and schedules, we decided to do some exploring.   We spent a couple of days getting to know La Linea.  The town has a great "downtown" area with adorable pedestrian streets and of course great tapas restaurants. We're pretty close to town and as you can see have a great view of Gibraltar.  We are on the Bay of Gibraltar and are just a few blocks from the Mediterranean.  Both have large beaches but the water is a little too cold for my taste.

Next, we decided to head over to Gibraltar.  To get to Gibraltar from Spain, you go through customs and then literally walk across the airport's runway.  We had to wait for a small plane to take off before we were allowed to cross which I thought was cool.

First up was a walk into Casemates Square.  This is the main part of town filled with shops and restaurants.  We walked around a bit and found a great restaurant for a delicious fish and chips lunch. 

Fortified, we started walking up the rock.  We'd gotten advice to take a taxi rather than the chairlift because it limits you to one specific area.  Then another friend said if you can walk, then you can walk up.  So, we decided to walk.  We were huffing and puffing when we reached the Moorish Castle marking the entrance to the park area.  We were so excited that we'd done it until we realized that we weren't even half way up the rock!!   I'm being melodramatic but it was a really long walk.  We explored the castle and then one of the numerous caves that were dug out during WWII for protection from bombers - one interesting fact was that the rock excavated during the building of the caves was used to fill in the ocean and expand that area that is now the Gibraltar Airport.   

We continued our uphill hike and toured a few other exhibits and former gun batteries before heading to Apes Den to see the world-famous Barbary Macaques.  We were so excited to see the "monkeys"!!!  We'd been warned that they were super sneaky so we kept our distance but still got in a few great pictures of them.                                                              

We then found the Charles V Wall.  This was a series of about a million steps (it seriously felt like it anyways).  We later found out that it was "in excess of 600 steps up a steep 45-degree slope".  This took us up to the sky walk!  When we finally got up there, we treated to more amazing views and few more monkeys!  I walked out on the skywalk while Pedro decided that the solid concrete structure was more to his liking.

We'd almost gone as far up as we could so we started making our descent.  On the way down, our first stop was Saint Michael's Cave.  WOW!  This is a huge cavern with numerous rock formations that was just spectacular.  It was once believed that the cave was bottomless and that there was a subterranean passage connecting the 2 continents which was allowed the monkeys to travel into Gibraltar.  Not sure about any of that but the cave was amazing. 

   

We continued back down heading to Windsor Suspension Bridge.  Pedro surprised me by walking (albeit somewhat briskly) over the bridge - not that there was much choice as to go around would have meant a considerable detour.  Anyway, this bridge had great views and was super fun to walk across.

From there, we continued our way down to the Library steps (they are painted with the Union Jack Flag) and back towards Cathedral Square.  We thought about stopping for a beer but decided we were just too tired.  We drug ourselves back to the boat and absolutely crashed for the night but it was a great day.

A couple of days later, we decided to go back to Gibraltar for an overnight stay so that we could visit the rest of the island.  This time, we bought a day pass for the city bus and rode the bus or walked over just about every inch of the country.  Our first stop was the Europa Point Lighthouse at the southernmost point of the island.  From there we walked over to the Gorham's Cave Complex.  While we weren't able to go into the Cave's, we did arrange to have archaeologist to give us a tour.  The area is considered to be one of the last known habitats of the Neanderthals over 50,000 years ago and is Gibraltar's only UNESCO Heritage Site.   

We then headed back into town and walked all through town and around the marina areas.  We headed to the east side of the island so we could both see the beaches - no the water's way too cold for me - and glance up at the skywalk that we'd seen when we went up the rock.  We thoroughly enjoyed our stay with a meal each of Indian food and fish and chips!!!

We took a lot of pictures so here's a link if you want to see more:

 Gibraltar Photos

We're back in La Linea trying to get the schedule together for the new engine before we can make any definitive future plans.  But we'll fill you in on that next time.

Until next post!