Barcelona, Tarifa, and Gibraltar

Barcelona
Lowell and I landed in Barcelona at 7am, with a 6 hour layover until our flight to Jerez (southern Spain). We left our luggage at the consigna at the airport and hopped on the A1 bus for a 45 minute ride into central Barcelona. The bus dropped us off at Placa de Catalunya at the end of La Rambla and we walked around for a few hours.

Tarifa
The Vueling flight to Jerez was uneventful (big nap) and we got our little rental Fiat and drove down to Tarifa. The town is the windsurfing capital of Europe and maybe the world. Unfortunately we didn't see too many kitesurfers, but the highlight for me was seeing the rows and rows of windmills along the highway and on the mountains. Literally hundreds of them were powering the region, which is pretty cool. They are enormous too--we saw a caravan of trucks carrying one blade which was the size of a pre-fab house.

So we stayed at Hotel Dos Mares about 4km from Tarifa center in a little bungalow. The town itself has an old castle (unfortunately closed) and ferries to Tangier, Morocco. We walked around a bit, then settled at a little cafe where we had this awesome huevos con aioli tapas and two beers all for €9.60. We had a great seafood dinner outside on the patio of the hotel restaurant of a scallop and shrimp avocado salad and I had an amazingly meaty grouper.

Gibraltar
We had breakfast at the hotel and a nice walk on the beach, before heading off to Gibraltar. It's a UK state on the little tip of a peninsula in southern Spain. We parked the car at La Linea on the Spanish side and walked across the border crossing. There are British police officers and use sterling. We saw the Gibraltar Museum which was surprisingly good, and stopped in to get a hotel for the night in Ronda. Had a chicken shwarma kebob lunch at an awesome hole-in-the-wall Middle Eastern place--this area of Spain has great food influenced by North Africa.

We head up to the top of the Rock of Gibraltar on cable cars next. Gibraltar is home to the only non-African macaques, which hang out at the various sites on the Rock. They are used to people, as one jumped off of me on his way up a rail. Gorgeous view of the harbor and Africa from the top, easy to see why this Rock was important strategically for all of the countries that have warred over it. We walked down to the Great Siege Tunnels, which were pretty cool, and then the Moorish Castle before heading back across the border.

Click here for more pictures on ofoto.

Notes on Gibraltar:
**Do not drive into Gibraltar! The car line to get in and out of the border was a mess. Park on the street before the border and walk the few kms. You can get a bus pass to get to and from city center for €2
**The cable car fee does not include entry into Tunnels or Moorish Castle, they took an additional €13... Don't need round trip cable car--it was hot but we easily walked down the few km to the bottom