Spain Trip May 2025 - Part 6 Gibraltar (2)

After spending time up on top of the rock, we came back down into the town to find somewhere to eat. We found a typical British pub with small garden selling all the usual British pub grub, including my favourite - scampi and chips! I haven't had scampi for years as it doesn't generally exist in foreign countries. I'm holding sachets of tartare sauce and even better, malt vinegar, for my chips. So British!

What do I spy? Oh, one of my favourite shops! 😁

Yes of course I went in, and anybody British will understand what I came out with - knickers and mint sauce! There was a tiny food section and I couldn't buy much as we had to carry whatever we bought around with us. But no way could I pass up on some nostalgia shopping in Marks' food hall and undies departments! (Mint sauce is not available in France, except in the British section of larger supermarkets, at vastly inflated prices). I can and do buy clothes from M&S France online, but it's not the same as going into the shop! Last time I was in England was Sept 2019 just before moving south, to scatter Mum's ashes. Haven't had much reason to go back since she died.

Main Street sums up just what it is.

A traditional British letter box.

However, the contrast between things like letter boxes and Marks and Spencers, with Mediterranean plantings was a little weird. Nice though! I could happily live in this part of the UK. 😀

The Royal Engineers Monument with a Jacaranda tree behind. The Engineers constructed tunnels through the rock during various sieges, including making openings where cannons could fire upon ships below.

We tried to get a bus to the other end of the rock to explore further but the first bus went sailing past as it was full - then the next bus did the same - I think they were full of school kids. So we gave up on that idea and just wandered around, finding ourselves in this pleasant park. Commonwealth Park was opened in 2014 and is surrounded by the city walls.

Looking up the hill from this angle makes the rock look quite small - yet that observatory was sitting on a tall pointy bit of rock and as you saw from my photos in the previous post, it was really quite high up.

We took a regular bus back to the airport and walked across the runway to the border control on the Spanish side. Lots of people were crossing this way.

I had to show you these tickets as they made us laugh! The bottom tickets are for the shuttle bus in the morning, and as two of us were over 65 they could get a senior discount. I was one year too young but the kind lady let me have the senior discount too. However taking a normal town bus back to the airport we just bought tickets on the bus from the driver, and it wasn't until later that I noticed he had given us senior tickets! I mean, do we really look that old? 😁😂😀

I really enjoyed our day out although it was a bit of a shame that we could not get a bus so that we could explore a little more. We will definitely come back again to see more and experience that slightly strange Britishness that the rock exudes. I totally recommend it!