Daniele Somenzi's Gibraltar

Gibraltar Even from afar you can see that Gibraltar is tiny, an English enclave inside Spain; but how was it possible that Spain accepted having a piece of the enemy inside itself; perhaps because Spain too has its own enclave in Morocco a few dozen km away?

As soon as I touch Gibraltarian territory, I notice that the airport runway is right up against the border, which has no real customs, since both are countries of the European Community. Here, though, ferries leave for the Moroccan coast just beyond the Strait of Gibraltar; many run-down cars crammed with stuff are waiting to make the crossing and return home.

Walking around Gibraltar, I see that it's full of little shops with everything; here too, like Andorra, everything is tax-free; the cruise ships disembark thousands of tourists who invade the little state. A cable car takes you to the top of the small mountain, from where you get a nice view; it looks like a photocopy of Rio's Sugarloaf.

The few houses here cost an arm and a leg; once again a state concentrated like Monte Carlo. The only anomaly is that there are very few roads and consequently many inhabitants are forced to park their car far away and reach their home on foot, as the Venetians do.

I buy a Knockando whisky for Vanni; here it costs less than 50 thousand lire. There's a clown on the promenade entertaining the children by making animals out of balloons.

Later I board the ship that takes me away