Friday, 22 December -- Gibraltar

It was another early morning... but at least we got to sleep into 6:30am! We went to Gibraltar with a different tour company than Thomson, and at 7:00am went out to wait for the bus to pick us up in front of the hotel. This double-decker bus finally came down the road at the appointed time of 7:10am. Mike handed the lady our tickets and she told us to get on the bus. At this time I noticed the name of the tour company and didn't think it was the same as the one with booked with, but the lady had looked at our tickets and told us to get on the bus. We were really excited too because we got to sit on the top level right up front! Such great seats! Well, I imagine you know where this is going. We got off the bus in Gibraltar to find out we had been on the wrong tour bus. Interestingly enough she didn't find this out until we were almost to Gibraltar and she looked at every one's tickets. We watched her do this at every stop and she actually looked at other's tickets and directed them to the correct company. But, such is life, we didn't have to change companies and no harm was done.
This is Gibraltar. For those of you who don't know its history... The Rock of Gibraltar has been a much contested piece of land for many years. The Spanish, Moors, English, and others have occupied it at various times throughout history. The English have had it in their possession since the 1700's. Of course there were many battles over the possession of Gibraltar since then, and Franco, one of Spain's leaders, demanded it back the mid 1950's when Spain joined the UN. There was a vote and a high majority wanted to stay British. Now it is claimed that Tony Blair is trying to sell it for the money. Many tourists visit the Rock because of the duty free prices. Alcohol and cigarettes are incredibly cheap there. Also, there are the Barbary Apes, St Michael's Caves, and the World War II tunnels. The city is also very beautiful. Every time the local government tries to tear down one of the historic buildings, the Heritage Society jumps in and stops them. Therefore, many of the old buildings have been renovated and the city has retained its old charm. A lot of the old military barracks have been renovated and are now incredibly expensive apartments.

This is at one of the observation points. Across the Straits of Gibraltar is Africa.

This is at the same point as above. Of course, there is also a lighthouse here. This is Ibrahim-al-Ibrahim Mosque, and is the only mosque on Gibraltar. It was built as a gift from the King of Saudi Arabia. It was closed, but we were told it is very beautiful on the inside was well as the outside.

This is a photo from the inside of St. Michael's Caves. They were used during World War II as well as the tunnels that were dug out. The formations were lovely and there are still parts of the caves that have yet to be explored. One theory of how the Barbary Apes came to the island is through these tunnels. Some think that they may go under the Straits of Gibraltar and into Africa where the Apes originate from. In these caves there is a concert hall of sorts. It would be amazing to see something there, but according to our guide in the summer you need an umbrella during the concert because of the water dripping off the ceiling.

The Barbary Apes were wonderful. There are about 300 apes on the island in 6 different packs. This one was right outside the caves. It is illegal to feed the apes, and of course you cannot leave the van with any food or they will rip it from your hands. People on the bus trip told us of the trip they took to see the apes 3 years ago -- someone had left a window on the van open and the apes got in and opened every one's bags looking for food. They are fed by the city everyday, but that doesn't stop them.

Every ape that is born on the island is tattooed so that they know it is part of the Gibraltar population. Each one also has its own name and the residents know just about all of them. The apes are tattooed because there is a black market for the baby apes. When the authorities find a baby ape dead or dying in a box somewhere in the world, Gibraltar is able to tell the authorities that the ape is/is not part of their population by the tattoo.

After our tour we were dropped off for shopping. Not exactly Mike and my favorite pastime, but it was nice to walk through the streets and window shop for a while and see all the beautiful buildings.

When we went down for dinner we were astonished. All week we had been served British food. Its not bad, but we went to Spain to experience Spain, not the UK. But we went down to dinner that night and found Spanish food!! There was all sorts of seafood and tapas. It was great and we were really excited. Of course, many weren't and opted for the usual British meal of fried fish and fries. Its amazing how many people go on vacation to foreign lands and never want to experience the country. Many people at our hotel never left the grounds and the hotel was just like a little slice of the UK in Spain. Quite sad, but its their loss.

Then the entertainment for the night was Flamenco Dancing. It was amazing to see the four dancers for the hour they preformed. It would have been nicer if it had been longer, but it was Christmas Carol night for the hotel reps and we had to sit through their horrid singing before we could actually see the dancing.

Mike and I had never been to a resort before that actually had entertainment and activities throughout the day and had no idea what to expect. Grandpa and Grandma VanderVoord have been on many cruises where there is entertainment and it has always looked wonderful. We went to a pretty low class resort, and the entertainment mirrored that. Lots of lounge singers and bingo every night. I took a video clip of the cult like bingo, but have no idea how to upload it. Every time someone yelled out "bingo!" there would be music and some sort of dance accompanied it. Mike and I were frightened and never returned for the bingo portion of the night.

Then there were the activities. Some were normal, such as lawn bowling. And archery is even okay. But there was also pistol shooting, rifle shooting, and radical shooting nearly every day. Seemed quite odd to us and again, we never participated.

Saturday, November 11th

On Saturday we headed to the Atlantic Coast. We started out going to a private beach of a huge estate. The owners allow the public on the beach every weekend and one day out of the week as long as they don't have any need for it. The beach was great. The Earth Scientist came out in me and I took pictures of just about everything. The other guys with us were even picking up rocks for me and pointing things out for me to take pictures of. It was wonderful! Mike was not really excited about all the rocks I grabbed for souvenirs, but at least it was a small bag. We spent quite a bit of time on this beach looking in at the rocks, climbing them, and looking in the tide pools. We even saw very tiny sea anemones!

Then we drove over to the town of Dartmouth which is another fairly small town (but much larger than Modbury.) Dartmouth harbor actually docked the Mayflower before it headed to America. Apparently it needed repairs and there is a plaque commemorating this event. There is also a pub that dates back to 1380 called The Cherub. Since I was there with three history geeks, we went. The bar still had a lot of the original interior, complete with low ceilings and doorways (for Mike, not me -- although I am 5' 3'', not 3' 5'', Steve!!) And of course, there was a fireplace. Both Mike and I enjoyed these small pubs a lot. The atmosphere in them alone could tempt you to stay in them all day and just watch the people. We then headed over to Dartmouth Castle. Unfortunately, it had just closed, but we were able to walk around outside the castle. The Graveyard was beautiful with all the celtic crosses and the views across the river and over to Dartmouth were stunning. The view was especially great as we were walking back and all the lights were starting to come on across the river (it was already getting dark.) We did stop at yet another beach so that James, Justin and Mike could through stones into the ocean. I have no idea what it is with grown men that makes them ast so young when they all get together, but it always makes me laugh.

Pictures of Beach

These boys were playing rugby on the beach. Not something you see much at home...

This is the size of one of the little country roads we were driving down in England. And most of the time the hedges were even taller. James is standing next to Mike and I.

Pictures of Dartmouth

The traditional red telephone booths of the United Kingdom dotted the countryside. Even in the smallest of towns there would be a telephone, complete with e-mail and text!

The plaque to the Mayflower.

Houses down by the harbour. I love all the different colors.


The Dartmouth Castle

Friday, November 10th

Our friends, James and Julia, live in a very small town outside of Plymouth called Modbury in Devon County. It was a picturesque England town. I loved it. You had to drive down very small lanes with huge hedges running along each side of the road. And when you met another car in the lane, serious maneuvering was in order. If we ever move to the UK, I want to live in one of these small towns.

On Friday we got around and headed over to Dartmoor National Park for a hike. We took the scenic route there and ended up in the little town of Meavy. We stopped there for lunch before we hiked and it was spectacular. The bar dates back to the 15th century and still has a fireplace in the bar for heating. Most of the people there seemed to be 'regulars' and knew everybody. One older man even showed up with his dog and a huge head of lettuce. There was also a Normandy style church is Meavy. There are many of this style of church doting the landscape across Southern England. We were also able to walk into this church. It was very small, but the stained glass windows were still amazing along with the rest of the interior.

The National Park was great. Its a lot different from ours at home. There are many functioning towns in the Park, and there was a maximum security prision. Apparently the moor is a great place to build a jail becuase its hard for excape. The landscape looks similar throughout and when the fog rolls in its hard to see anything and it can be easy to lose all sense of direction. Knowing that, we set off for or hike in fog. We started at this 'car park' in light fog. Luckily, these were the only trees for miles so it was easy to see where the car was. We hiked to the top of this tor. The view was not all that great, but at one time there was an iron age settlement here. All that is left now are piles of rocks and indentations on the ground where a building may have been. By the time we hiked to the top of the tor, and came back down again the ground had become very, very saturated and when we got back to the car we were soaked! Without it even raining. This walk is also supposed to include a loop through more or Dartmoor bringing you to stone rows and a stone circle, but given the mist, we decided that we would probably get quite lost. Already the 'car park' had disappeared from sight at the tor and you had to walk down it to see the shadows of the trees. We drove by the road in which the stones were supposed to be near and couldn't even see them. But, there is always a next time and we were able to see this...

Pictures of Dartmoor

This is part of the rubble that is left of the settlement.

There are also wild ponies that roam the moor along with the sheep. They did not mind at all that we were there unlike the sheep.

Mike, Justin, and James on top of the tor.

We found this sheep skeleton on top of the tor. It was picked clean and a pile of white fluff was off to the side of it... Sheep roam along the moor and many a time we came up to one trying to cross the road.

Thursday, November 9th

We woke up at the horrid hour of 4:30am so that we could make it to the airport in time. I hate waking up this early and apparently so do other since a walk that would normally take up 20 minutes took us 10. But, we got into London Standsted airport at 10am and waited for our friend, Justin, to fly in from Dublin before heading into London. It took us a little over an hour to travel what felt like 40 miles. It seemed like everyone was driving, even though people actually have to pay a fine for driving in the city. Cameras take pictures of people's license plates as they enter the city and are charged £10 and if its not paid until midnight, it goes up to £50 (to try to cut down on congestion and pollution.)
We took the subway over to Westminster, and walked out of the station to Big Ben and the Parliament Buildings. We were able to have a 'picinic' lunch right outside Big Ben and Westminster Abbey too! I unfortunately do not have any great pictures of the entire Abbey, but the building was beautiful. The windows and facade are very ornate and you could probably spend a good portion of the day just looking at all the statues, windows, and general exterior of the building. We would have liked to go into the church, but there was a charge of £10. Since we only had a limited amount of time we could spend poking around, we decided to come back a different day when we could spend more time wandering through the church. We went to see London right before Rememberance Sunday, so the yard in front of the church was covered with crosses. A lot of veterans were walking through the square and through the city in suits adorned with their medals. It was beautiful. We then headed down Parliment Street. We walked past 10 Downing Street where the Prime Minister lives. Of course it was heavily gaurded, but apparently not that long ago you could walk right up Downing Street. Not anymore.
Then we went to the Horse Guards. I was excited because I wanted a picture with one of the guards that could not move at all (very touristy -- but I was okay with it.) There were 2 guards that we could see. One out front and one tucked away in the pedestrian area. Well, the guy out front was getting his picture taken by hoards of people and we would have had to wait forever for me to get a picture with him, so we ventured over to guard number 2. BIG mistake. He was tucked underneath some arches, (which did not indicate that you could not walk under.) Justin grabbed the camera, I walked under the arches, and chaos ensued. The guard stomped his foot, wielded his sword thing and yelled 'Be warned, you have entered through her Majesty's Arches.' We had no idea what it meant he meant (as again there were no signs), but we left him alone with no pictures taken. At one point in time this was the official entrance to Buckingham Palace... maybe that is why... We headed to Trafalgar Square next. You walk down the end of Parliment Street to a view of a Nelson's Column with two gorgeous fountains and the National Gallery in the background. We walked down to Buckingham Palace, which was beautiful but the gates were more impressive. After seeing all the castles and palaces around here, Buckingham seemed rather bland. But the gates were incredibly oppulent. I was disappointed that no formal guards were outside the huge baricades, so again I could not get a picture. I didn't think that walking through the gates would be a good idea since all the security guards had uzis.
We walked over to Piccadilly Circus which is a little like Time's Square with the wall of TV advertisments, but much less neon. Piccadilly Circus has also thankfully retained much of the original facades of the buildings and is quite eleganat. After all the hiking over London, we were ready for the bus ride down to Exeter, England. Again, it took us about an hour and a half to get out of London. I cannot image ever driving in that city. Blogger stopped letting me upload pictures... so the rest are on Flickr.

More Pictures of London

This is the entrance to the Horse Guards. Under these arches is the pedestrian way where the guard stomped his feet and yelled at me.

Piccadilly Circus

This is Buckingham Palace. Like I said below, its not all that impressive from the outside. I am sure that if you were able to walk around the building, or walk up to it, the Palace would be stunning. But those security officers with the uzis really deter that.

The church in the background is St. Martin's in the Field. It was really pretty and we were able to walk in and look around (free of charge.) In the basement is a gift shop and restuarant. Its a little odd to walk into church basements and see this, but the original architecture is still in tact.

The Menacing Blimp

As I mentioned before, Mike and I were visiting friends in Devon County, England. We flew into London first, met a friend of ours there and walked around for a few hours to see the sites before we caught a bus down to Modbury. As we were walking down The Mall next to St James Park we noticed this blimp flying through the air. The blimp itself wasn't that interesting other than it was fairly large. The interesting bit was the camouflaged helicopters complete with HUGE guns were surrounding it and maneuvering around it. We just thought it was funny at first until we got up to Buckingham Palace and noticed that more military helicopters with more HUGE guns had surrounded the outside parimeter of the palace. All of sudden the Blimp very quickly flew out of the air space and miraculously the helicopters flew away. We are sure the pilot was just not paying attention and all of a sudden found himself in serious trouble.
More of our adventures in England and photos will follow...