When Is A Holiday Not A Holiday ?

It was Friday 3rd January, we had done the first part of our morning walk and so were sat having our coffee at one of our usual seafront Cafe/Bar’s. It was sunny and warm, barely a cloud in the sky and, finally, the wind had changed direction from the much chillier and blustery Easterlies, which had been with us for nearly two weeks, into a gentle Westerly with more of a light breeze than a wind. It was still only 17 degrees(c), these sort of temperatures are pretty much normal for this time of year and, although there may be the odd one or two degree variations, these daytime temperatures generally remain much the same throughout the majority of January, with the occasional day, here and there, of light rain. However the temperatures drop rapidly to around 8 degrees almost as soon as the sun begins to drop in the sky, but now, even the sunset is getting to be a little later each day with darkness not arriving until nearly 7pm. With the icy chill now gone, we basked in the warming rays of the morning sunshine and remained a little longer than unusual, sitting and enjoying a bit of an extended period of people watching, well it seemed rude not to. Being a Friday morning, the weekly market was in full swing and that, and the sunshine, had brought lots of people out from their winter hibernations, so the seafront felt vibrant and alive once more.

The Christmas and New Year celebrations, in most other Countries, are generally all over and done with by this first weekend of the New Year but, here in Spain, this particular weekend is the real main festive event, ‘Three Kings Day’, although officially it is on Monday 6th, which is a Bank Holiday, however the main parades and celebrations are held on the weekend before. Many of the Spanish, as well as some Winter sun tourists, are still on their extended festive holiday’s, apart from the shop workers and many of the Cafes/Bars and Restaurants of course, although some, in the more touristy areas will have closed at the end of the tourist season and would not open again until February or March. In almost every single village, town and city throughout Spain, the streets will be crammed full of people in a carnival like atmosphere and, in the larger cities, it is quite a large and Spectacular event, starting at lunchtime and going on until late into the evening.

Many of the Spanish that had travelled down to our area, from further inland, either from up in the mountains, or from Spanish regions further North, have holiday homes here too, so some of them were still here on their extended winter vacations and that does actually serve as a bit of a bonus for Shazza and myself 🤔 We are, slowly but surely, beginning to distinguish some of the varying dialects of those who do not originate from this part of the Andalusian region, although the differences are not always as obvious as many of the much stronger differing dialects that there are within different regions in the UK, here they are a little more subtle. In our particular area of southern Andalusia they tend to not sound the ‘s’ at the end of ‘some’ words e.g. Buenos Dias (Good Day) is pronounced ‘Buen Dia’ here and, words and sentences are ‘generally’ spoken at a much slower pace, as opposed to the much faster ‘machine gun’ Spanish spoken elsewhere in Spain. Also, and just to add to our understanding difficulties when trying to discreetly listen in to conversations of the local community here 🤭 is that they often abbreviate sentences and words in their normal day to day conversations, the normal street language, unlike the more proper ‘formal’ structured sentences that you get taught from the language tutorial programmes which, when you start to practice them in the real world scenarios, do serve to make you stand out as a ‘foreigner’ and non-native speaker. However, that said, most of the locals do appreciate it when you at least attempt to speak in Spanish, they generally understand what you are saying, or trying to say, and will often try to help you with the right words, or the pronunciations of those words. Sometimes we will even ask them “What is the word for that ?” Or “How do you say……?” and they are very happy to help, although we wouldn’t do it if we were at the front of a long queue at the check-out in a supermarket 😲 But just by way of giving you a brief example on how things can vary, ‘formally’ we would say “Que tenga un buen dia” (Have a good day), but here they just say ‘Tenga buen dia’, and, the ‘formal’ response to that would be ‘Et Tu’ (and you) but actually, the locals here respond generally with “Igualmente” (Likewise) and, although the use of either is correct, they do tend to look slightly impressed and give a smile when you answer with the more local ‘informal’ version. But I guess it is very much the same for foreign visitor’s who have used language courses to speak English, where the formal teaching methods do not reflect the ‘real world’ day to day spoken version in different Regions, so we can imagine the difficulties a foreigner visitor would have, if they went to Cornwall, Birmingham, Merseyside, Newcastle, Scotland, Wales or Ireland, I mean where in the English language course would you learn, “Hey wack, scud dat” 😲 😂

This language learning and speaking business, even after eighteen months of living here, is still very much a work in progress for us, but we do not beat ourselves up about our slow progress and we continue to self-teach ourselves, using several ‘free’ on-line linguistic programmes and, if we are going somewhere where we know we may need to use a specific Spanish word, phrase or sentence, perhaps on the rare occasions we may visit or phone the car dealership to book a service, or go to a large DIY store for plumbing parts or decorating materials etc. then we tend to look it up on ‘Google Translate’ and then try to memorise it, which to be honest sometimes works and sometimes it doesn’t 🤷‍♂️ It is quite important though not to be afraid, or even embarrassed, at trying to speak the language and even to be able to laugh at yourself when you do get it wrong, the frown on their face is usually the clue that they haven’t understood you and believe me, just saying it much slower and much louder does not help one little bit 🤭 But it can get quite comical when, on occasions, I do sometimes revert to playing ‘Charades’, to attempt to visually inform them of what it is that we are looking for, although, in truth that doesn’t always help, especially when trying to imitate using an electric drill, I see the horror come across their face, then they shake their heads from side to side, before telling me in no uncertain terms that they are not permitted to sell ‘over the counter’ Machine Guns, well to be honest I was never very good at ‘Charades’ but it did make me wonder whether they sold under the counter one’s 😲 However, that apart, the actual biggest disadvantage that we happen to have, in our corner of Spain, is that we are in a popular tourist area, all the way along this coastline, from Malaga down to Gibraltar, so a lot of the Spanish population do actually speak and understand English and so, whilst we may prefer to try and practice our Spanish speaking skills on them, ‘they’ inevitably also want to practice their English speaking skills on us 🤷‍♂️ I guess that is why we enjoy it so much when we go on road trips elsewhere within Spain, to some of the areas where English is not generally spoken or understood and, so far, we have managed to survive quite well for 18 months, mainly without any major issues, so we are quite happy to just continue to keep improving, little by little at our own pace.

Anyway, I digressed again didn’t I, so where was I 🤔…………… Oh yes ! With the sea being as flat and calm as a millpond, the sun sparkling off the surface of the emerald green and blue water, the paddle boarders were out in force, along with some kayakers, small leisure boats doing a spot of sea fishing, there were even swimmers braving, what are still chilly Winter waters, and even a handful were laying on the beach sunbathing 😲 We sat and smiled as we watched them enjoying the warmth on this part of the Costa del Sol, although like many of the other more permanent residents of this area, we were dressed in our now more normal Winter attire, jeans, long-sleeved shirts, Shazza wearing a warm hoodie top, me with my sleeveless but padded body warmer, confirming beyond any doubt that we had now become well and truly acclimatised to the Spanish seasonal weather in this, our little corner of the Costa del Sol. Of course, we also smiled when we thought how, in the UK, 17 degrees(c) would be considered almost tropical at this time of year 😂

After our coffee, people watching and listening session, we walked up into the main town, which again was full of both shoppers and people, some enjoying Cafe and ‘Churros’, or Tostado’s, at the pavement Cafe’s, other’s scurrying in and out of shops, well okay, not actually scurrying, as that would intimate that they were moving at a faster pace than normal, this is Spain after all, so probably fairer to say that it was more of an ‘ambling’ pace 🤭 Shazza wanted to take the opportunity to stock up on a few more fruit and vegetable items, seeing as the shops would be shut over the Bank Holiday period, we were now back on to the ‘healthier’ plant based dietary regime after our week of over indulgence on, well let’s just call them the less healthy food options, which I confess we had ‘both’ enjoyed to the full, possibly a little more than we should have done but hey, come on, it had been Christmas after all 🤷‍♂️ In theory, I would now have to wait until we returned to the UK at Easter, so that I could try to entice the Grandchildren into sharing some of their Easter Eggs, or any other of their illicit sweet treats, with me and no, I don’t feel guilty, they have more than what is good for them so, as I see it, it is just a case of Grandad saving them from themselves 🤭 Although, but don’t tell Shazza this, for I will neither confirm, nor deny, that I may just have secreted some of the unopened illicit Christmas left over treasures to eat by myself, once the food police had retired to bed that is 😂

Whether it was the delightful warmth of the sunshine, the sounds of the sea gently rippling up onto the shoreline, or the volume of happy looking people we passed on the seafront promenade, for some reason, as we were walking back to the car with our shopping bags, we started to discuss what trips we may perhaps elect to do this coming year, although the word ‘discuss’ may imply a deep and meaningful conversation, so let’s just call it a brief dialogue 🤔 Back in our more conventional lives, prior to retirement and before commencing our Motor Home full-timing adventures, when we both had careers and had to work for a living, probably much like lots of other people in the same situation, we had to plan, and pre-book, our annual holidays well in advance, especially with Shazza being in the teaching profession, which tended to limit the periods in which we could take our annual holidays. Back in those days we used to divide our different holiday periods between those that we would take, either within the UK or in mainland Europe, touring in our Motorhome during the Easter period and the warmer Summer months, in late July we would generally do a road trip for several consecutive weeks before Shazza had to return for pre-term ‘Teacher Training Days’ or, with her being an Assistant Head Teacher, ‘Management Meetings’, so we were usually restricted to no more than four weeks, then, once a year, usually in the Autumn or Early Spring, outside of the ‘Cyclone & Hurricane’ seasons, we would go on a luxury ‘All-Inclusive’ hotel style holiday somewhere hot, and much further afield, but again, those hotel holiday’s also had to be pre-booked months in advance, however, now that we can be a lot more flexible, booking way in advance is no longer necessary which is actually quite nice, well it would be if one of us didn’t have an OCD Buddy 🤔

Although we are now retired and it would seem that, the ‘World is our Oyster’ as the saying goes, we do still have some, not necessarily restrictions as such, let’s call them ‘considerations’, when planning our own holiday periods 🤔 We have family member’s who, for obvious reasons, want to come out to visit us during the hotter Summer months, then other’s, who are not fans of the excessive Spanish heat, who prefer to visit during the Spring or Autumn and, as we are not that inclined to want to go back to the UK every year, then we try to accommodate visitor’s dates when they want to come to us, above our own travel requirements. But even when it does come to our own, more Northerly or Easterly European wish list destinations, Autumn and Winter months are not ideal, as Shazza is less tolerant than me of colder temperatures, so it isn’t as if we can just close our eyes and stick a pin in the calendar to decide when to go on our travels 🤷‍♂️ But, there is also a lot more of Central and Northern Spain that we both want to visit and explore, as well as some areas in neighbouring Portugal so, at the end of the day, we are spoilt for choice and so can balance our travel destinations out.

But it is a little strange because even the type of travel destinations have now changed, from the locations that we once used to select as a priority, for the sunny beachfront destinations offer no more than what we already currently have here, which comes with the added bonus of having no travel and accommodation costs, so we are already in a perfect holiday location 🤷‍♂️ Anyway, over the following few days our conversations turned from the subject of ‘destinations’ to more about what we actually preferred from our holiday locations, by way of a change of scenery, or perhaps even some different cultural attractions, I mean we both like wine and food, but we have never done ‘specific’ wine or culinary tour’s, if you don’t count eating and drinking in Bar’s and Restaurant’s 🤭

In the days before, and also during our Motor Home adventures, the excitement and thrill of travelling and visiting new places was our primary motivation, we had a strong sense of Wanderlust, we had permanent ‘Itchy Feet Syndrome’. Even when we first thought about living here in Spain, the advantages and the opportunities to travel were uppermost in our minds. We do both agree that we still want to see new places, new regions within new countries, but the urgency, and our severe lack of motivation to actually go and do any of those things does seem to be diminishing, to be of less importance than it was 🤷‍♂️

We both agree that we are probably now in a much better financial situation than we ever have been, not rich by any stretch of the imagination, but whereas before we would religiously put an agreed specified amount of money aside each month, to cover our annual holiday plans, and that would be the maximum total budget that we would have to work within, now, fortunately, we do not have such ‘tight’ constraints, albeit it is certainly not a moneyless pit, but we do have a little more budget flexibility these days.

Perhaps, our previous wanderlust was due to the ease of being able to travel whilst taking our home with us, our Motorhome, which we no longer have and I have resigned myself to the fact that we will not get another, even a smaller camper style van 🤷‍♂️ But I also remember when we used to travel wider afield, the long-haul holidays, which for me would commence when we left home for the Airport. In those days I actually enjoyed all aspects of Air Travel, even the chaos at the airports, looking down out of the aircraft window through white clouds, upon mountain tops with green emerald coloured lakes, or wide stretches of ocean with unknown small Islands and Lagoons, at night I would look down over vast areas of lights and wonder what places we were flying over, then their was the descents and approaches to our arrival airport, yes for me that was all part of the holiday excitement and the whole part of the holiday experience. However, these days I dislike that whole process, the driving to the airport, the mandatory two hour pre-departure process, queuing and checking-in, the queue at the security scanners and then the long wait before boarding, often with flight’s delayed. Then their is the ‘pot luck’ of whether you get a disruptive child sat beside you, or worse, a wider bodied person who doesn’t just occupy their own allocated seat space 🙄 The person sat behind and constantly kicking your seat, or the person with the constant barking cough or sneezing, spreading whatever contagious bacteria they have with everyone else, sat tightly packed together in that narrow forced air metal tube, yes it’s true, even now, several year’s after the Pandemic, it has still left an invisible scar upon us when it comes to travelling with hoards of stranger’s 😲 The flight’s themselves I now find quite boring and uncomfortable, my eyes growing tired if I strain them for too long looking out of the window at the views below, my bum, thighs and legs suffering pins and needles or numbness with being sat stationery for so long, although, in truth, although I do not enjoy the airport terminal process, I will just about tolerate flight’s if they are no longer than 3-4 hours, I just put in my ear pods, close my eyes and listen to music. So, the truth about all of this is in my realisation that this is just another sign of old age creeping up on me 🫣 I hope not, as it is too far to drive to an over-water bungalow in the Maldives, one of the long haul places on my ‘Bucket List 😲

I have to be honest though, these days I do much prefer going on trips where we can drive ourselves, that hasn’t actually changed as I really enjoyed our Motor Home lifestyle and I still thoroughly enjoy driving, although I have to share it a lot more these days, with Luis Hamilton’s doppelgänger (Shazza), but more so only on the longer road trips, but I shouldn’t complain as I do also enjoy being in the passenger seat at times, where I am able to look out of the windows, for much longer periods of time than when I am at the wheel, looking out upon the changing scenery and being the passenger enables me to take photo’s.

I do also still enjoy the ferry crossings to, and from, the UK, the one’s from Santander or Bilbao which can take between 24-36 hours. Previously, we would make the 12 hour drive from home to the ferry terminal, or vice versa, all in one go, as we were usually within the ‘Schengen Shuffle’ time constraints, although the novelty of that long drive has since worn off 🙄 But now, being under no time constraints, we have the freedom to travel a few days in advance of our ferry departures, stopping overnight at different locations en-route, before then reporting to board our ferry. Now of course, the sea crossing dictates our freedom of movements on-board, the Bay of Biscay is notorious for being a little lumpy at the best of times and that can mean that Shazza has to remain horizontal, in the cabin and throughout the whole trip 🤢🤮 However, on a good crossing, and we have had several of them, we can both go and eat breakfast, lunch and/or dinner in one of the on-board eateries, have a stroll around the gift shops, have an Anti-Covid Vaccine, or two, at one of the on-board bars. We can stroll around the outside decks, dolphin, whale and boat watching and, they even provide outside seating if the weather is nice, alternatively we can sit in one of the lounges with our iPads, watch a film in the on-board cinema or just watch TV back in the cabin, or even have an impromptu ‘Siesta’, so what is there not to to like, so yes I like being on ferries and so who knows, I may yet get Shazza one of these days to relent somewhat on her aversion to taking a cruise ship holiday 🤗 However, that is still very much a work in progress, I continue to feed her little snippets of articles and ‘You Tube’ documentaries on Scandinavian and Caribbean Cruises and, whilst she is making some murmurings in the right direction, I think that in reality I am still too far away from getting her to actually commit to saying ‘Yes, go and book one’ ☹️

So, we have certainly not lost our Wanderlust, but I think that we have the disadvantage of now already living permanently in a sunny seaside location, the disadvantage being, that we now tend to question our decisions on why we would spend money going to a different sunny seaside location to sit around a pool, or on the beach, when we can already do that here 🤷‍♂️ I don’t think that we have completely ruled it out, it’s just not one of the choices at the top of our priority list. We have also got out of the habit of planning, or pre-booking, any holiday too far ahead, as due to modern day technologies we can now book hotel accommodations, ferries and flight’s on-line and just at a moments notice and, we have the freedom to opt to stay for as little, or as long, as we like and not have to commit in advance to 7, 10 or 14 night’s as you have to do with ‘package holidays’ 🤷‍♂️

Shazza is now much more focused on shorter trips, those that are less than a week, but I have also observed that she no longer refers to these as ‘Holidays’, but as ‘Mini-Breaks’, so I have started to ask myself, is their a proper definition of “When Is A Holiday Not A Holiday ?”, or is this just an excuse so that when she gets fed up of the mini-breaks, she can still turn around to me and say, “Do you realise that we haven’t had a holiday this year so I was thinking of booking a couple of weeks somewhere…………” 😲

We didn’t really get any further forward with our discussions, we ended up at exactly the same place as we were at before, just listing all the places we would ‘like’ to go to, but not actually selecting any for this coming year 😤😤 We do have our upcoming self-drive trip to the UK around Easter, that will take care of a little over 3 weeks, but that was already pre-booked towards the latter half of last year and I have been reliably informed, by you know who, that this is not ‘a holiday’ as such, but more of just a visit to our respective families 🤷‍♂️ You may also recall from my ramblings last year, that after completing Project One on the upgrading of our twenty-year old apartment, which was the complete re-modelling and installation of the Kitchen, that I mentioned Project Two, the complete renovation of our en-suite bathroom. We were toying with the idea of having both done last year but, in the end, we both agreed that it would have been a lot of mess and upheaval to do both at the same time, so I have just re-contacted the bathroom Installation company to see when they can now come and do our bathroom, so that will be something else to build into our planning calendar 🙄 Fortunately we do not have the burden of renewing our Residency Permit this year, that is not due until June 2026 and, once again, if successful, will be for another two years until 2028 at which point, we will then have completed the 5 year ‘Temporary Residence’ period and can then apply for ‘Permanent Residency Status’ 🤗

We do know that we will have our Mini-Breaks this year, but who knows where they will be to, I am favouring some ‘mini-breaks’ to Madrid, Lisbon and Vienna, whilst Shazza is still considering her preferred options 🤷‍♂️ “There is no rush, we have all year in front of us to decide” she says, and I guess in a way she is right, but it doesn’t half create havoc with me, my OCD buddy and my calendar planner for 2025 🙄🤭

Now, let me ask you a question 🤔 Have you ever had a pre-conceived conception about a place, a town or city, a country, or even a region in a particular country, something that prevents you from wanting to visit it ? Well we had that aversion to the small border down of ‘La Línea’, which is a mere thirty minute drive from us but, according to most of the local media publications, it is made out to be the crime capital of Southern Spain, Drug Gangs, People Smuggling, Other Contraband smuggling and of course all of the associated violence that exists in such environments 😲🫣 It is the town that is literally located immediately opposite the Gibraltar frontier crossing, we have been to Gibraltar numerous times over the last nine years or so, sometimes driving across on to the Island itself and, other times parking in the large car park, on the Spanish side, just across the main road that divides La Linea from Gibraltar, and which is just a few minutes walk to the border crossing. So there I was, sat on the balcony enjoying my morning coffee, basking in the sunshine when Shazza, out of the blue, says, “Do you fancy going to La Linea this morning ?” I gave her one of my flabbergasted sort of looks before providing my one word reply, “No”, which I believed to be a straightforward and totally unambiguous response which required no further clarification or explanation 🤷‍♂️. “Why Not ?” she then asked, “Well for one thing, I don’t need a re-stock of any of my recreational drugs at the moment, but thank you for asking, and I don’t fancy being violently mugged today either” I responded sarcastically. But she wasn’t going to let the subject matter drop, and informed me that apparently she had recently been reading, on one of her Social Media platforms, about a tourist who had visited and had said that it was a charming place to visit. “Was it one of the local drug barons ?” I said, followed by a little chuckle, but she didn’t laugh, even though I thought it was really quite humorous 🤷‍♂️ So there it was, my first, and probably my only opportunity, to be able to put my foot down in this brand new year, actually it was my secret ‘New Year’s Resolution’, so let’s see how long this one lasts 🙄

It was a nice bright sunny morning as we headed down the A7 towards Gibraltar 🤭 Although I tend to do most of the driving when we are in our local area, Shazza (Or my own little ‘Gangsters Moll’ as I have now renamed her), had volunteered to drive on this particular occasion, she probably knew where the drug dealers and other criminals hung out, so she knew the bad areas to stay away from 😂 We parked in the large car park just outside the frontier crossing, which is enclosed behind tall chainlink fencing, although I don’t know why, there are several open access gates from the roadside so it cannot be for security reasons 🤷‍♂️ We crossed the road and headed towards what we believed was the main town centre. Surprisingly, well to me at least, it all looked rather pleasant, we fist walked down a long avenue market style affair, lined on both sides were permanent stalls, small but each had those roll down type metal doors. I was quite surprised by the amount of ‘butcher’s’ stalls, each positioned next to each other but with different names above them, fresh meat of every variety on display, as of course you would expect to see in a butcher’s shop, but very much more than you would ever see on the supermarket shelves, pity that we don’t eat ‘red meat’ at home anymore I could have had a field day here ☹️ As well as the butcher’s stalls there were ‘Panaderias’ (bread stalls), ‘Pastelerias’ (Cake stalls), an array of ‘Tourist Tat’ stalls, Tobacconists and several Cafe’s.

We walked the full length, crossed another road and arrived in a large Plaza which was still occupied with lots of fairground rides and the associated side stalls that had been here for the ‘Three Kings Day’ celebrations. On the opposite end of the Plaza we came to another road, we just looked where the majority of people seemed to be heading, the one’s that didn’t look drugged up or battered and beaten from their daylight muggings 🤭 It turned out to be the correct decision as they led us into the main shopping streets, a maze of broad modern pedestrianised walkways. What was nice to see, or in this case, not to see, was the usual array of global corporate retailers that seem to have infected most towns and cities these days, here they were all Spanish medium sized retailers and small family owned businesses, of course their were the usual high street Spanish Banking Institutions but here, it felt authentically Spanish, we both liked the charm of the place, it was reasonably busy but not crowded and we did not feel out of place or uncomfortable. We adopted our usual ploy of not having any general direction in mind, we walked down what looked like the central sort of boulevard of shops, turned down side streets, laden with a mixture of shops and street cafe/bars, wandered into several nice Plazas until it was time to stop for a Coffee.

We didn’t actually stop for coffee in the Plaza’s as the ones that had the pavement seating areas were in the shade, and it still felt quite chilly out of the sunshine, instead we headed back into the central maze like streets where the pavement cafe’s had those gas heater’s going. It was a slightly unique experience, there was waiter service at the tables for drinks, but if you wanted something to eat, a sandwich, tostado, churro or pastry then you had to go into one of the adjacent establishments, make your choice and pay for it separately. Shazza had, as usual, eaten breakfast so she wasn’t hungry so I wandered off to see what tantalised my tastebuds and I came back with a large sticky glazed cinnamon bun, stuffed full of mixed pieces of candied fruit, and delicious it was too, I of course did the gentlemanly thing and offered Shazza a piece, but when she declined I didn’t make the mistake of asking her again 😂😋😋

We had seen the bulk of the town so started to wander back towards the market stalls, however, we were reluctant to return home, it felt warm in the sun and we just felt so relaxed so we found a large park, adjacent to the main town area and directly opposite the Gibraltar Air Terminal Building. We imagined that in the Summer months this park, with it’s large open grassed areas, sheltered under swathes of trees, with several separate children’s play areas would see families, with their picnics spread out on blankets on the ground, just enjoying themselves, watching the aircraft taking off and landing at the small airport, or going for walks along the seafront and looking at the boats and ships in the large bay, on one side the Port of Gibraltar with it’s marina and, on the other side the Spanish Port of Algeciras and departure point of the Ferries to Morocco.

We had both enjoyed our little local sightseeing tour, and it served as a reminder to sometimes just take a chance on a place, for we had never visited here before due to our own misconceptions, created by adverse media reports, but it really is a very nice town and if you ever find yourselves down this way, perhaps intending to visit Gibraltar, then it is worthwhile spending a little time here too. For us, ‘La Linea’ is just as convenient for us to drive to as ‘Estepona’, so now, when we do find ourselves getting a little bored with the same walking routines in our own marina and town, we now have two alternative locations on our doorstep, one a twenty minute drive along the Northern Coast, and the other, a thirty minute drive to the South 👍 Worth just adding that there are plenty of 24 hour ‘Payed’ parking options for even the largest of Motorhomes, albeit they do not have any Motorhome service facilities so, provided you arrive with full/empty on-board tanks, as appropriate, you could stay for two or three days and see both Gibraltar and La Linea, either on route to, or from ‘Tarifa’, the popular town, beach and surfing area, which is also just thirty minutes drive away, on the South West coast of Spain. This part of Southern Spain, with its Western and Southern Atlantic Coastline, Eastern Mediterranean Coastline and the inland mountain towns, villages and National Parks, is a real haven for visitor’s, and for the more adventurous, it is just a very short ferry ride across to Morocco, either just as a day visitor on a ferry trip to Tangier, or for longer adventures with the Car, Caravan or Motorhome 👍

That is all from me for now, so until my next ramble…………….

Hasta Luego mi Amigos, La Vida Es Buena