Gibraltar

Visiting Gibraltar with WeLoveSpain

Why visit Gibraltar with WeLoveSpain?

In 2018 I studied in Sevilla for 4 months. Most weekends I travelled with my friends to Cadiz, Granada, Málaga, and more. We visited many places together and had so much fun! 

One place on my list was Gibraltar. Unfortunately, reaching Gibraltar with public transport is not the easiest from Sevilla. 
So then I discovered WeLoveSpain.org. which offers trips mostly from Sevilla. This is super easy if you are staying in Sevilla for a longer period of time. 

So in October 2018, I decided to join a trip of WeLoveSpain to Morocco and Gibraltar. I really wanted to visit Morocco and Gibraltar was a plus 🙂 It were 3 hectic, but fun days! In this blog, I will write about my experience in Gibraltar. 

Gibraltar

What/where is Gibraltar?

On Friday I had to be at the starting place around 9 AM. After a 2.5 hours drive, we finally arrived in Gibraltar. Never heard of Gibraltar? I can imagine 😉

Gibraltar is a British territory located on the most southern tip of Spain. It has an area of only 6.7km² and 32.000 people live there. The most famous spot in Gibraltar is the Rock of Gibraltar. 
So you are actually in Spain, but once you cross the border, you are on British territory. The language is English, the people look British, the rules are British… It was so weird to experience!

Gibraltar
The view over Gibraltar. Picture from Michal Mrozek

Be aware of your visa
One year later I tried to visit Gibraltar again with my boyfriend. Mainly because he wanted to see it. Unfortunately, he was not able to visit it. The reason for this is because he is Indian and we did not buy a visa beforehand. We did expect it but did not want to buy a visa. 
Why? Well let´s be honest, visas are often expensive and I would rather make him spend the money for a visa for all of the UK, not just this 6.7km² of British territory. 
I also wrote about this, when we visited La Línea de la Concepción. This is a place next to Gibraltar and still on Spanish territory. 

Gibraltar

Read these posts as well:

Viewpoint

We went all the way up with a small bus, to have a great view over the ocean. You can imagine the view from the bus: incredible!
At the viewpoint, we also saw a mosque, out of the blue, which I found very funny and cool. I would have loved to visit it! 

I found it such a pity, that we did not go up more on the rock, to the very tip. I was looking forward to that so much. I guess that is the disadvantage of going with a tour company and not being able to plan your own trip.

Gibraltar
The Mosque close to the rock
Gibraltar
Gibraltar also has a light house

St. Michael´s Cave

Even though I did not like that we did not go to the tip of the rock of Gibraltar, we did other cool stuff.

We went to St. Michael´s Cave. This is a huge cave, that attracts over 1 million tourists every year. It is at a height of over 300 meters above sea level. 

It was pretty impressive to watch inside the cave and see all the colors. It was lightened up with clear blue and purple colors. I also met a very kind Finnish girl here, who I still talk to every now and then. I hope I will be able to meet her in Finland soon, once Corona is over.

Gibraltar

Monkeys
Once we got out of the caves, we again had a brilliant view over Gibraltar and the ocean. Next to that, we also saw monkeys! Monkeys in Spain Gibraltar, which is actually The United Kingdom. Interesting… 😉 
It was cool to witness, but after having a scary confrontation with a monkey at the Batu Caves in Malaysia (something with a monkey stealing a banana from me up the stairs :P), I was not that keen on petting one. 

Gibraltar
Awesome monkeys

Exploring

Lastly, we had 1 hour to explore Gibraltar for ourselves. This one hour I spend with the Finnish girl and an English girl. We wanted to have some food and buy some postcards. I even sent a postcard to one of the users on Postcrossing.com. I mean, how cool is it to get a postcard from Gibraltar! 

After these experiences, it was time to head to our boat, so we could cross to another new continent, Africa! We would be going to Morocco!

If you are interested in reading about my experience with WeLoveSpain in Morocco, you have to read this post. 

Gibraltar
The city center
Gibraltar
Bye Gibraltar!

Summary

If you are ever going to Gibraltar. You definitely have to do these things: 

  •  Visit the tip of the rock of Gibraltar 
  • Visit St. Michael´s Cave 
  • Watch the monkeys just outside the Cave 
  • Walk around and be amazed, that you were just in Morocco or Spain and now suddenly in British territory. 
  • If you can, try to visit the mosque and the lighthouse 

I do recommend you, to visit Gibraltar with WeLoveSpain. They take care of everything (transport, tickets, a bus to the viewpoint, and tickets for the cave).

If you want to have more time to explore it for yourself, I don´t recommend you to go. We only had one hour to explore and I would have loved to explore more, but I knew that was going to happen. 

Gibraltar

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