Monday, December 3, 2018

Cartagena to Gibraltar

We spent a lovely few days in Cartagena, working on boat jobs and exploring the town. We toured the ancient amphitheater and museum, artifacts, underwater history museum, and marveled at the architecture in every aspect of the town. From metallic inlays amongst the cobblestoned streets to the statues sprinkled every few meters, there is always something to admire.

The sail from Cartagena to Gibraltar was about 2 nights. Escorted by dolphins in the bioluminescence for several hours, was the highlight of the voyage! It was simply magical watching the glittering trails in the water.

We dropped anchor in the Bay of Gibraltar, next to La Linea (Alcaidesa Marina) around 4am. A few small fishing boats were setting up lines in the anchorage, so after dodging those, speaking with one in Spanish (he was worried we would mess up his nets), we settled in and got some much needed rest.

Following morning found us at the fuel dock to check in to Marina Alcaidesa and secure our spot for the next month or so. We met some new friends and reunited with old. At one point, we had 35 kids running around the place! We organized some Halloween games and trick-or-treating and had lots of fun. There is a skate park next to the marina, so the kids were there pretty much every day. We managed to find 15 days to rent a motor home and go on a road trip into inland Spain, France, Luxembourg, and Germany! More on that trip in another post.

The border of Gibraltar is about a 5-10 minute walk from the marina, and it is a super easy crossing. You basically hold up your passport and maybe the official will glance up at you. We were anticipating a long line as they looked over each passport, but in our 5 weeks there, they never did. So many people cross back and forth each day, it just isn't feasible. Sometimes they will stop people to look inside a backpack, which they have good reason to. If you glance inside the bus stop shelters, you will see people frantically plastic wrapping and taping cigarettes and alcohol to their bodies, shoving stuff inside strollers, diaper bags, under hair extensions, hats, and all sorts of creative ways to smuggle in the duty free goods.

We spent a lot of time touring around the tiny country, exploring Gibraltar Rock and its secrets. Definitely take the time tour the tunnels (there are 2 sets), walk around the top with the apes, and immerse yourself in the history.  On one of our hikes, an ape grabbed Jared's backpack and would not let go! It was quite the struggle until the ape finally managed to pull the mini chocolate bar Zach had stuck inside the pocket.

La Linea, back on the Spanish side is the best for provisioning and sourcing boat parts. While Gibraltar is VAT free, the prices are quite expensive, so you don't really save much money. We did most of our shopping in Spain and only went into Gibraltar for a few hard to source English food items. The grocery stores in La Linea deliver directly to the boat, which is fantastic and saves having to rent a car. The local bus system is great.

We left La Linea for the Gibraltar marina (Marina Bay) on Friday the 9th for a fuel top-up (duty free) and spent the remainder of the afternoon retrieving our new jib sail and lazy-bag from customs, as well as visiting with friends before we set off for the Canaries.

The quick and dirty story on getting our new sail and sail bag VAT free:

**We ordered our new sail and lazy bag from Greece in August with a promised delivery date of October 24th. All well and good, as we had booked the marina for all of October. Well, due to several delays (the shop didn't fill out the customs paperwork correctly, TNT had other delays and lost the parcel several times... not a fun experience to say the least), we didn't get our parcel until November 9th. This was all due to Stef calling every day and finally going to the Spanish customs office at Fed-Ex/TNT. She took a chair and waited for the guys to locate the parcel for her before leaving their office. Tenacity pays off! Speaking Spanish also helps a lot.
Then, she had to go into Gibraltar and locate the warehouse--no one seemed to know where it was exactly. An hour walk later, she found it and fortunately, as it was a Friday and the guys wanted to close early for the day, they found the parcel, loaded it into a truck and delivered Stef and the parcel directly to the boat. Whew! We were finally able to get on our way to the Canary Islands!!

***Apologies for lack of photos, but I am desperately working to update the blog before we cross the Atlantic in a few days!***


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