Day Twenty-four:
Sixteen Kilometers.
One hour across the water.
A completely different world.
Hola, España! We walk off the ferry and through passport control:
WHACK!
About five minutes walk from the port, up a little alley, and here is our place for the next two nights, Hostal Africa. And sure enough, from the rooftop terrace you can see Africa, right there across the water.
The place is pretty basic, this is a hostel after all, but we do have a private room with bath and enough room to move around.
We had a little trouble finding it at first, but NO ONE TRIED TO HELP US! And that was such a relief. We just had fun being a little lost, and searching around for an extra five minutes. Plus, we know the neighborhood now.
There is a two hour time change forward coming out of Morocco. Think about this for a moment. Two hours, and we came straight south, nine miles. One hour is the difference between Central and Western European time zones, and the other hour is the Ramadan hour set back. So we suddenly jump from 15:00 to 17:00.
The first change we notice is that we have suddenly gone from being the most under-dressed people around, to being the most over-dressed people we can see. I mean, in comparison to Morocco, the people here are walking around practically naked.
The streets of Tarifa are lined with cafes, and the little squares have three, four cafes each. The tables are mostly filled; everyone is drinking and smoking and relaxing, just talking, and there are women around!
In Morocco, the cafes would be full of people just sitting. Not drinking or talking, just sitting out the day. Here it is a hive of activity.
In fact, it looks like a fifty-fifty mix of men to women. There are actual women out and about.
Cathedral bells toll the hour, no one is moaning from a minaret to remind you how guilty you are.
All this is so refreshing, I guess the best way to put it is that it is like coming home.
To celebrate we pop into a chair at the first tapas bar we see and order un vino tinto y un vino blanco and one beef tapa. Then we just sit a bit.
Taking in the curved street lined by three story building, graced with wrought iron railings and small balconies, cafés spilling out into the street, people walking, sitting, eating, drinking, working. Music playing, from a street musician and a good soundtrack at the bar across the street. It is so good to be back in Europe again.
Eventually the shock wears off, and we start to wander the streets, checking out the little squares and alleys choked with stores and places to eat. We find a better Tapas Bar, Casa Juan Luis, with a really great red wine and better tapas based on pork. Yes, pork. I can get pig here! Yea!
It is funny how much you can miss something like pork when you can’t get it.
We find a big building, larger than the others, kind of imposing… what is this thing? We wander inside and there are statues of our American friend, Jesus.
Hey, where have you been the last three weeks? and there is Jesus tile work and Jesus with gold shooting out of his head and Jesus getting married (it looks like it, based on the shock carved into his face) and this place, this place…
It’s an honest to Allah cathedral. St. Matthews, as a mater of fact, the largest in Tarifa.
Sometime around 22:00, after walking to the beach and through the town, we end up at a little Italian place where I have gnocchi and Gail has a pizza, and we split a bottle of good red cheap Spanish table wine.
Gail wants a gelato, so we stop on the way through town. The streets are lit and alive.
With this time change we could stay out all night, but we linger just long enough to hear the bells toll twelve times, then head in to bed.
Tarifa is really a pretty small town, with a castle and a wall built around most of it. Streets go here and there, exiting about four gates or down to the dock. There is a wide, golden sand beach that stretches five kilometers up the coast, a causeway to a little island and lighthouse, which is the “real” Southern most point in Europe if you are keeping score.
Even with the time change I am showered and out the door by 6:00, hitting the streets until I find it: that one cafe that opens early to provide coffee to all the regular workers. Sure enough, around a corner on a side street, there it is, bar packed with coffee cups ready to fill. I order a café con leche and sit outside to watch people come and go.
The paper napkin says, “Gracias por su visita.”
De nada.
I walk out through one gate heading along the waterfront, across the causeway to the lighthouse. It is windy and cool, a statue at the mouth of the harbor keeps an eye on those Moors, Africa visible across the water. The air is clear and there is no trash.
In fact, the no trash issue slaps me across the face. There is a line of six men just starting to sweep down the beach collecting garbage. When I was drinking coffee the street sweepers came by, later I see some guys with steam cleaners hosing down the sidewalks and street. There are garbage cans and recycle places everywhere. See, this is the difference 16KM makes between an (almost) third world trashy nation, and Europe.
No trash.
I am honestly surprised it doesn’t blow across the water from Morocco.
Back into town, past the castle. Back hundreds of years ago, Spain was invaded my the Moors, and they had the people of Tarifa surrounded, trapped in the castle. The Moors held the leader’s son captive and said they would kill him if he didn’t surrender.
His answer: he threw his own knife down to them to slit the boy’s throat. They held off the Moors and eventually fought them off. The Moors retreated to Africa, and the Spanish kept their freedom. The leader became a hero. His name was Guzmán.
I am guessing my own son, Jeff, wishes I had set such a great example for him.
Sorry, Jeff, my son. I am no Guzmán.
And I have no castle.
Out the gate into the main town to the bus station, to check times for tomorrow’s bus trip to Gibraltar.
Back to the room, and it is almost 10:00. Gail is up, almost ready to head out for breakfast.
We find a small sidewalk place for breakfast, coffee, orange juice and ham and cheese sandwich for me, the same drinks and muesli for Gail.
We put a bottle of water into a plastic bag, ditch everything else, and set out for the beach. There are no umbrellas and beds for rent (as in Italy) and we don’t have our own, so we decide to just walk in the waves as far as we can get. About three kilometers down the beach there is a river entering the ocean, it is too deep for us to wade, so we are forced to turn back.
About 14:00 we stop at a beachside bar to rehydrate with a cold beer, wine and water.
The beach is wide, like the ones in Southern California, warm but breezy which attracts a lot of kite surfers. Like most European beaches, it is topless and clothing optional; everyone is so relaxed, reading and swimming and sleeping in the sun. Gail and I wish we had an umbrella or even a towel to join them.
It is so nice to see hoards of people walking around without a care in the world, totally oblivious to any kind of body issues, just feeling free and alive.
Consider this fair warning: I took a couple beach photos but I cannot guarantee that they are safe for you to view, so to speak. If that is going to bother you, then skip the beach photos, my friend.
So we look forward to our beach days ahead in Nerja, San Jose and Portugal. Hopefully they will have the things we need to rent, otherwise we will have to buy some.
We make it back into town, stop by the room, grab our computer and sit in Babel cafe for an hour drinking and blogging as Gail emails her friends and updates Facebook. For tapas I have the local mussels, Gail has some great stuffed eggplant.
Next up is Bar El Frances where I had fresh caught red tuna, and Gail had more eggplant, along with red and white wines. We happened to get here just as it opened and snagged a table out front; the bar filled almost immediately and we stayed for two hours just people watching from our primo location.
The street sweepers come through yet again, keeping everything tidy and clean.
It turns out that tonight and tomorrow night is a special celebration: Noche en Blanco, the “White Nights.” Everybody wears white, and they decorate the town in white. Bands play and the stores are open late.
We set out again through the town, eventually ending up back at the bar from yesterday, Casa Juan Luis, for their excellent wine and some more pork.
About midnight I am just stuffed, even though we never actually ate a dinner. Just tapas and wine. Gail grabs some gelato, but I am just ready to pop.
We are loving Spain.
We return to our room and pretty much collapse.