The loot.

The trip . . .

Carmen picked us up outside the bullring early this morning (8 o’clock) just as the sun was rising and we headed out on our trip. The plan was to stop for brekky along the way but the first two petrol station cafeterias we passed looked pretty awful, so we kept going for about an hour until we found a nice place just off the main road in a village Carmen knows. After some toasted country bread and lovely hot coffee we got back on the road, promptly getting lost in Algeciras (just like what happened the first time I tried going to Gibraltar) and finally arriving at our destination around 10.30.

Some of you may recall that my second attempt at going to Gibraltar (when our friend zoomer was visiting in July 2006) was stymied when I discovered my passport had expired two weeks previously. So imagine my annoyance today when we walked through passport control and I handed the officer my passport … and he didn’t even look at it!

Anyhow, I was in! At last!

The first thing we did was leg it over to Main Street and look for Marks & Spencer. In retropect this was kind of the wrong order to do things as we missed some rather cool-looking artesan galleries (that closed at 2pm) and frankly, after we were loaded down with all the M&S shopping, there wasn’t a lot more we could do other than go for a pub lunch and stroll around a bit more.

This also put the kibosh on any notion of going up to the caves to see the famous Gibraltar monkeys, but to be honest, we weren’t very keen on getting that touristy. And besides, we’d left the car parked in La Linea, so it would have meant paying for a taxi tour. Maybe next time.

And so, after trying to get to Gibraltar (well, M&S) for just over three years now, it ended up being quite an easy and relaxed day and didn’t even feel like too much driving. The trip home, which didn’t include stopping for brekky nor getting lost in Algeciras, only took 1 3/4 hours. So we were home again by 6pm, feeling quite pleased about the day.

And yes, I did get my knickers! And lots of socks (normal ones and short ‘yoga socks’), and a lovely red wool cardy (though I’ll have to change the hideous gold buttons for nice mother of pearl ones), a Twiggy M&S cotton bag, and mince pies . . . oh, and I also found some sparkly red slippers at Next, which somehow didn’t make it into the photo.

Nog got some flannel pj’s and undies and chocolate (orange flavoured Kitkats).

And together we got a few nice sauces, some snacky crunchy stuff, biscuits, crackers, Christmas cards and also a very large bottle of Absolut vodka for just 8 euros. And some fresh cheese twist pastries which are going to be dinner.

So, a special thank you to Carmen for taking us there and back again. It really was a lovely day.

You can see more photos here…

Gibraltar