La Linea de la Conception

I must apologise for my lack of posts, its largely down to being lazy and also being again in a Bordertown. Doubly important and relevant due to the Brexit fiasco. So we spent a month at anchor in the bay of La Linea before moving into the marina for the winter. After the "Bandit country " of Newry or even the Basque country of Getxo,  this tideline of countries seemed to be quirky and amusing. The dividing line is about a 10 minute walk and unusually the way into Gibraltar crosses over a live runway. The only truly flat bit of ground also hosts the local football pitch. The planes duly land and take off to left and right dictated to by the prevailing west and east winds, the Poniente and Levanter respectively. In the photo below the wind is easterly (photo from Gibraltar) so British Airways lands from left to right

Its difficult to avoid but Gibraltar is a unique place, not unique as in special and precious just different to any place you have ever been. It has apes, for about two minutes they seem cute, but in actual fact they are despicable thieving parasites. I took this fellas picture just before he "mugged" a passing woman with a plastic bag of shopping, tearing her bag open and then calmly eating the contents. Not so very different from the local shopkeepers who will quite happily mug you for your money on the assumption that you believe you are getting a "duty free" bargain. think again.....its true that booze and tobacco are stupidly cheap, as is diesel. but everything else is designed to separate the cruise ships inmates from their cash as quickly as possible. Lynne and I fell for a couple of scams (£5 for two cups of tea?) but we quickly got wise.

Famously a notorious ape known as "Dracula" mugged a tourist on the Skywalk, an elevated glass bridge on the top of the rock throwing her money passports etc. Anything in other words inedible down the cliff, the passports were still visible weeks later. Another tourist complained to the local authorities that the response she received from the local police was less than satisfactory when she complained she had been sexually assaulted by an ape, the polices asked if she would like them to arrange an identity parade of the usual suspects, made me laugh anyway!

La Línea, literally "the Lines" indicating the border is a different kettle of fish from Gib. A slightly seedy run down but still vibrant town, famous for being the drug runners home turf. Not difficult to understand when unemployment in Gibraltar is about 2% whereas in La Línea it’s around 35%. It’s also to be fair not the most attractive town, however it does have its charms.

The anchorage is one, on a quiet evening as the sun sets it can be glorious.

There is also a legendary eatery that serves steaks cooked on a charcoal grill for very little money but be warned you will have to queue up for a place. We visited with some fellow Brits from other boats.I could tell you how to find it but I am not going to.........trust me it’s great!

One day we walked around to the east of Gibraltar, we discovered some small beach resorts we had been unaware of, they have a certain charm but suffer slightly from Gibs biggest problem which is available space, they are also a bit seedy and a bit down at heel..

Being on the east side they really only get sun in the morning and are gloomy in the evenings, Also a bit prone to rockfall, however you could always strike lucky with some holiday money and passports thrown from above by the Barbary ape mugging squad above...

At our lovely anchorage we avoided the hurricane forecast and merely got very high winds. The holding was good and apart from not going ashore for a week we were fine, however not all the boats in the anchorage fared as well and this wee fella fetched up on the beach, refloated a few days later she was back out in the bay snug at anchor.

At the beginning of November we moved into the marina at La Línea which would be our home for the winter months.

The marina is very well run however is quite expensive when the electricity bill is factored in for live aboard like ourselves. However you can see some amazing vessels including for us the Carrack Victoria, Ferdinand Magellan’s flagship and the first vessel to successfully circumnavigate the globe.

She looks quite spectacular at night.

It’s difficult to tell sometimes if the ceremonial and posturing side of Gibraltar is just for the tourists or just for Spain. We watched the "ceremony of the keys" involving keys to a non existent gate on a sea wall now a quarter of a mile from the sea. Lots of pomp and quite entertaining, but........

The yoemanry then march up "Main Street" whose main purpose is to separate cruise ship punters from their money.

We retired back to the marina to think about the Mediterranean and tried out our least used sail, the spinnaker, in the safety of our berth. We have been told there is either not enough or too much wind in the Med. so this is one of our low wind options.

We had a loook att the Christmas tableaux in the town hall in La Linea.

Then it was time to fly home for Christmas, luckily the airport being right next door this was really easy. It’s not exactly a busy airport.

We took off to the west and as we left the runway we got a good look at Dark Tarn in her berth at the marina.

the caves of Nerja

We took another bus and walked down through the town of Nerja in the drizzle and under overcast skys to discover the little train wasn’t running due to the rain. I was beginning to believe we were fated to never visit the caves of Nerja but it appeared that if we retraced our steps to the bus depot we could get a bus to the caves. So it was, and after a short couple of miles aboard a comfortable bus we duly joined the queues for tickets. It seemed the rain did not put off visitors. We lunched in the restaurant while we awaited our allotted time, the visits are strictly regulated.

We descended far easier than the original discovers of the cave in the 1950s, they descended through a hole known as "la Mina" The entrance we were using was dug in 1960, to allow tourists access to the cave system known as Nerja1, Nerja 2 is not open to the public and consists of upper galleries which contain amongst other things Neanderthal cave paintings.

The initial gallery is one that was used by early humans. This was opened out to allow access to the huge inner chamber of Nerja1

Some idea of scale, spot the people, by building ramps and staircases it’s possible to walk around the caverns with minimal disturbance.

This visit brought back fond memories of a friend of mine, Phil Jackson, ace caver and my sea kayaking partner for a few years. He also ontroduced Lynne to the underground realms.

I could almost hear his voice telling me of the flow stone and eons of time it would take to produce that formation, or the infitesimal air currents that produced that spiral stalagtite.

At the end of the day it’s a showcave and possibly the best I have seen, it’s very well presented and truly spectacular.

It is also a credit to those early explorers who risked all by wriggling in to a black expanse.

It has to be one of the best managed underground spaces.....

However my wife is a veteran of Easedale master cave and a 15 mile system straggling Lancashire and Yorkshire. If only it were possible to access that without a six hour trip in and if only it could be lit like this.......

This by the way is the biggest pillar underground in the world, and beautifully lit!

It is easy to see how early man could have drawn parallels between the earth as mother and a spiritual thing and this wondrous underground landscape. Apart from the practical problem of how did they see it?

But lucky us we can and it’s glorious.....

Nature is the greatest architect without a doubt.

Some of the formations are familiar some not so......

My favourites are the ones combining an organic form with a well known object, in this case drapes of curtains.

These caverns are stunning and should not be missed if you are ever in the area....................

There is something about these spaces that echo in some sort of primeval remnant in your memories. They are spiritual and familiar in some sort of collective history before we invented Gods and Politics.

I don’t think Lynne will mind me saying she is possibly more comfortable underground than at sea,

I think that may have to do with our collective memories, places of safety and spirituality maybe, Earth Air and Water. Those simple elements.

And when as a young race we felt safe enough to dream we created art. Surrounded by the earth we began like this.......

A truly amazing place...............

Don’t sail by if you get the chance to visit......

leaving Gibraltar

After a bit of tidal stream study we set off at an appropriate time to have a fair tide around Europa point, not too difficult it’s usually going west that can be a headache. There is an almost constant easterly current due to the Med evaporating quickly, there is almost a metre difference in sea level between Gibraltar and Tarifa. 

It’s not in this picture but there is a prominent bungalow with a flagpole flying a large Union Jack Just in case you were unsure what part of Spain you were looking at.

The winds were light but in our favour and we made good progress through the many anchored ships on the east of the Rock. We saw a lot of dolphins but they were proving to be elusive when I attempted to photograph them. But I got a nice shot of Lynne watching for them to breach.

The sea was as flat as a stamp and the winds light, we ghosted along at a modest 3-4 knots towards Malaga and the Costa del Crime....

Soon we were well offshore and the distinct profile of Gibraltar melted into the Spanish mainland.

The light winds eventually died away and we were forced to resort to our engine and the words of our friends who had sailed here before us returned, " there is either too much wind , or not enough in the Med" we would discover how true this was. Slowly we approached our first port of call a short way past Marbella and our first Mediterranean mooring of the season. Normal practise in the Med is to moor "stern too" that is, attached by your stern to a wall or pontoon and  after retrieving a sunken line pull the boat out from this to allow for a small tidal rise and fall. Essentially tied to a wall and an anchor with no finger or alongside pontoon.

It makes getting on and off the boat a little harder and as we have a wind and self steering gear hanging off our stern , more so for us so we tend to moor "bows on" In other words bows towards the wall or pontoon. This accomplished we settled down to pass the night in a very busy and a bit tatty fishing harbour, not really what we expected from the rich mans playground of Marbella! We left early next morning finding no temptation to explore further and a pleasant day sail of 40 miles or so saw us approaching the busy but quite pleasant port of  Caleta de Velez, about 5 miles past Malaga. Most of the afternoon had been spent watching aircraft take off from the busy airport as we crossed the wide bay known as the Ensenada de Malaga. The town of Caleta was low key touristy being mainly concerned with fishing, however it was obvious that the Brit’s has discovered it and property and gated communities were in evidence, the cheaper end of Malaga for the ex-pat community. Nonetheless it was a pleasant town with friendly people and we enjoyed our stay for a few days. The marina is however subject to surge and in future I would use shock absorbing springs on the bow lines, as it was we got very bad abrasion on ours due to the violent motion. I had wanted to visit the caves of Nerja a little way up the coast so Lynne had looked up the bus times and we had great help from the ladies in the marina office. We duly availed ourselves of the excellent local transport and hopped on a bus to Nerja.

A very pretty and seemingly popular destination for the package holiday tourists from Malaga. It’s a bit of a walk from the bus terminal to the town centre but once you arrive at the plazas near to the Balcon de Europa.

The church of ElSalvador is in a commanding position looking towards the Balco ( balcony) de Europa, from which you can get lovely views of the coastline and beaches around the town.

However we had come for the fantastic Cuevas de Nerja, the caves outside of town and we had decided to use the wee train that leaves from the town square regularly to get there. We bought our tickets and boarded the train, and waited, and waited......it seemed a builders lorry was blocking a vital street in the town centre and a land train with a half dozen carriages is almost impossible to reverse.

 We were offered a refund or return trip , being in no particular hurry we decided to return on the morrow.

As we had already dined we decided to walk around and look at the town a bit more closely, starting with the church which is very beautiful but somewhat plain for a aspanish church, however it does have some great art.

The interior is rather understated but the richness of the alter and side chapels are typical. It also has serviced in English and Spanish which was another reminder we were in the Costas.

Back on the Balcon de Europa we walked along the town beaches, this one adjacent to the Balcon had a rather interesting "Cave house " it can be seen in the cliff at the end of the beach,

The Balco de Europa was opened by the King of Spain , Juan Carlos, and here he is with Lynne.

I am more of a canon man myself.

The palms above were, to our surprise alive with Parakeets which are native to Andalucía. I didn’t manage to photograph one but they are a vivid green colour and very noisy!

Nerja has some fabulous coves and beaches and in my opinion is the prettiest place to visit on the Costa del Sol. It also has some spectacular caves which we planned to visit the day after..........to be continued.