MAIN ROAD CROSSES AIRPORT

By Bob Van Leer

  (GIBRALTAR, July 5, 1992) - This city and rock are a step back in time.

  The city has narrow, winding streets, some barely the width of a car, with sidewalks a foot or two wide.

  This is an old town, what the Arabs would call a Medina. Arab cities have their medinas but also have a new town where most of the people live and business is transacted.

  Gibraltar would probably have done likewise except there is no place for a new town. So the old town has to do and all the business is conducted on these narrow streets lined with ancient buildings.

  We arrived here today after a two hour drive from Malaga, Spain.

  Gibraltar has been British since the treaty of Utrecht in 1713. It has been fought over through the centuries dating back before the time of Christ.

Rock Small

  The rock is small, only 2.75 square miles, and is connected to the Spanish mainland by a narrow spit. At 426 meters high, Gibraltar dominates the area around it. It is a natural place to fortify and control the Strait of Gibraltar.

  For the British now it is one of the messy nuisances left over from the days of Empire. The Spanish would like the British out, but not enough to try to remove the British by force.

  Spain was trying to pressure the British by closing the border but dropped the harassment after the Falkland Island war when Argentina tried to take a British possession and was soundly trounced.

Border Now Open

  The border between Gibraltar and Spain was closed in 1969 and only fully opened in 1985.

  This rock is not the place for someone with claustrophobia.

  Everything gives us the feeling of being tiny and cramped. Space is at a real premium.

  There is an airstrip on the spit on the British side. Much of this is built on fill in the bay.

  It is a good size airport with daily jet service to London. The real clincher on how tight space is in this enclave is the main road. It goes right across the middle of the runway, not under, but across at runway level.

  Coming into Gibraltar we had to stop at a stoplight and wait for a British Army Hercules cargo plane to land. After it was on the ground, the light turned green and cars proceeded across the runway.

  Our hotel, The Bristol, is an old hotel somewhat modernized and right downtown. The desk was manned by a couple of very proper Britishers.

  The town is tightly-knit with nothing very far from anything else. Grandsons Rob and Chris Johnson went exploring and were gone too long to suit their mother, Molly Walker.

  So she, and husband Jim, looked around town and easily found them in a Pizza Hut.

  There is a tram to the top of the rock but, unfortunately, this was Sunday and the tram didn't run.

  Action starts late in the day here. Many restaurants didn't open for the day until 7:30 p.m.

Not Much New

  There is not much new construction around Gibraltar. The British may someday pull out and this creates uncertainty, worse than Hong Kong where there is a set date for the British pullout (1997).

  Real estate prices are high, but not out of reach. Ads we saw were for a studio apartment, 25,500 pounds, (a pound here is worth about $1.95). A condo was 37,500 pounds and a nice house, 200,000.

  The town is filled with British pubs and restaurants serving British beer and British food. A Safeway store advertises that it imports food from England.

  Although Gibraltar is British ruled, there are a lot of foreign nationalities on the street and in businesses.

  Tomorrow our schedule calls for us to move to Portugal. However, this won't be easy. We have to drive back to Malaga, take a plane to Madrid, then another to Lisbon, Portugal.

  From there we will rent a van and tour Portugal on our own.