I promised Nana that when she walked, I'd blog. We took Rajah for quite a long walk the other day so I owe her one.
Rajah wasn't sure how to interpret the words, "Nana and Papa are coming" but she got the point as soon as Papa stepped out of the truck. She was so excited she even gave Nana a huge kiss. From the day they got Rajah's been Papa's sidekick.
We let them rest for a day and then we headed out to Gibraltar the next day. Nana and Papa got to visit Spain and Gibraltar and see Africa all in three days.
Alexander figured he needed to see it a little closer so he checked out the binoculars.
Then he realized that you need money for these ones too, just like every other one we've seen. I had to give him the Euro.
They all shared because I didn't have enough to go around.
We saw the Pillars of Hercules. We tried to move our legs so the picture would show the writing at the bottom but no such luck. It was too dark.
These guys were awesome. I wanted to take one home, but couldn't.
Especially this guy. He was so cute!!
I had a bag of bananas and some grapes. After I gave the monkey on the railing a banana he decided it was a great idea to follow me. I continued to hand out the bananas and as I was working on getting the grapes, a monkey grabbed another banana from my hand and then another one grabbed the plastic bag from me. I tried to help him open it from the top but he was very impatient and decided it was more efficient to bite it open. Needless to say he won.
This guy had two bananas and the rest of the bananas that the guy above left after taking the biggest bunch of them and taking off.
This guy just looked like he wanted to be a model, so I made him one. :)
Ok, so I didn't get a model release for him but that's ok. He seemed to be the King of the Rock, but, I think the guy further up might have thought different.
The next few photos are from the caves of Gibraltar. The lights they had in here made them look even cooler than they did without them.
This is Monty. He was just hanging out at our next stop up the hill.
He wanted to be a Gibraltar model too. He made a pretty good one.
This guy......can you see him??? He's in the darkness, laying in wait, until some unsuspecting tourist comes by with a recently purchased bag of magnets and post cards to come along. That unsuspecting tourist happened to be me that day.
I was minding my own business, the business of taking pictures of this sweet mama and baby monkey. I decided I could get a better picture if I were to use my prime lens. I decided to reach into my purse and grab it. That "sleeping" monkey got up so fast I didn't know what was coming. He pushed Madison out of the way and grabbed my purse so fast thinking that souvenir bag was full of fruit and goodies but it wasn't. I tried to yell at him and tell him that it wasn't what he thought it was, it's not food for you, it's magnets! We were at a standstill for a moment when we made direct eye contact and all I could think about was, "you're not getting my purse with all of our passports and ID's in it. I'll fight you for it before you run down the side of the mountain with it." He decided that whatever I had in there wasn't worth the scuffle so he let go. He then proceeded to give me the stink eye and take a swipe at my leg before I took off to take a seat, laugh and shake a bit. The pictures were worth it though.
They should probably post this at the bottom of the hill or right before you get to the monkeys. Maybe they wouldn't make as much money from fines though. It's about 300-400 Gibraltar Pounds, AKA....a lot of money.
The view from the top of our tour. Right before we entered the tunnels.
We didn't walk through all of the tunnels but were able to see some of the holes that were blasted out so they could place their cannons.
After we were done with our tour we had the tour guide drop us off in the town center. We needed to find a restroom for a few of us in the group so we decided to stop here, and eventually decided to eat here. Big mistake, huge. Well, for those that got the bacon cheeseburger anyway. The burger was more like a hamburger you'd see in a play kitchen set, all nasty looking and crumbly, and the texture was way off. I still think it was monkey. I had the ham salad and Glenn had some Moroccan food, mainly because the guy seemed to be more Moroccan than British. His educated guess paid off because we both got a good meal. The bacon.....ended up being Canadian bacon, AKA.....ham....not cool. When one asks for a BACON burger, they want those fatty, deep fried strips of deliciousness on their actual hamburger, not a round slice of ham on something you consider to be a burger. We will stick to listening to the song about the Copacabana...and never eat there again.
This guy had some sort of rope gadget he was dipping in a big bucket of bubbles and then spreading out and letting the wind do the work. Rajah would have loved this thing! I may have to try to recreate something like this one day for her.
After the "lunch" we had we still had room for ice cream, so we went for some Gelato. Mmmmmm, chocolate fondant flavor!
This guy got the same thing sans the cone.
He decided to get one scoop of the awesomeness from above and then coconut. Like a Mounds bar on a cone!
This guy finds a beat in pretty much any sound he hears. He was bee-boppin down the road to the sound of the drill across the street.
We took a slightly wrong turn, had to ask for directions and were able to get back on track before we strayed very far.
Yep, they have these phone booths down here too, because it's British. :)
A view of the rock as we walked across the royal air strip to the border back to La Linea. On the way, Papa told me he learned that the air strip was built using the rocks they blasted out of the holes in the mountain. I thought that was pretty cool.
I found my next ride. It's got quite a bit of room in there too. I wasn't sure if I would be able to get it across the border though so I didn't inquire about the price.
Obviously no caption is necessary for this picture.
Glenn was taking a quick break after having some fun pool time with Christopher.
Nana, was not having the most fun "pool time" with Glenn. Papa thought it was pretty funny though.
We were working on trying to get Rajah used to the pool. I really think she'd love it if she'd just get in and cool off. We'll keep working on it.
Rajah was working hard playing Nana's bodyguard. She was trying to block the shots from Glenn to Nana.
Rajah loves the water!!!
She thinks it's so funny!!
I had to test out my floatie again. It still works great, just not when the kids are in the pool. It tends to capsize when they are near. Must be like the Bermuda Triangle or something.
She's got mad hops.
She also has amazing dance skills.
Did I mention that she also does karate? Hi-Ya!
Papa's got some great sitting in the shade skills. Notice the water around his feet? Yeah, Christopher thought it was a great idea to spray him....which made him look like he had an accident.
He thought it was pretty darn hilarious, along with everyone else here. Papa was a pretty good sport.
The next day, the 20th, was Alexander's 11th birthday. Nana, Madison and I went to pick up a bathing suit for Madison (which I forgot because we somehow got sidetracked) and came home to this grueling match of Uno going on. No, they didn't let him win just because he was turning 11 either.
On the 21st we headed up to the Zoo de Castellar. There's a small hill you have to walk up to get to the entrance and I thought it was very nice of Papa to walk alongside Nana to make sure her hips were ok.
Entrance picture!
The peacocks were out and about! They were all over the first area we walked to.
Madison had a brilliant idea to see if they would eat from her hand, and they did!
Nana decided to try to get one to trust her and it worked too! These were some very skeptical but trusting peacocks.
I tried to get a cool picture of one eating from my hand.
Then they lead the way to the ostriches and we followed along.
We had to make a pit stop at the birdies and give them a little food first.
He was a fast favorite because he looked so sweet and innocent!
One of them talked when we walked away but we couldn't figure out which one it was, little stinkers.
I wanted to feed these guys so bad!!! It said not to on a sign so I followed the rules.
One of the employees let us into the bat cage (I said cage, not cave, so no getting excited) and it was pretty cool. Bats aren't as scary as I initially thought they were.
We got to hold a tiny hedgehog!! Yes, I wanted to take one of these guys home too.
Madison liked this cute little guy too.
So did Christopher.
This next stop was one of my favorites from last time. If you hold a sunflower seed out of this tube a tiny bit, the adorable little monkey on the other side will stick his arm all the way through to take it from you. His hands are so soft!!!
Nana got to feel how soft his hands were too when she held out the sunflower seed. If you hand him some of the other food from the bag he will drop it and wait for the good stuff.
High five through the glass.
Yep, he got one of the good ones.
These giant parrots were so gentle when they took the sunflower seeds from her. It's amazing how easily and quickly they can crack those shells open.
She made sure each of them got some.
He climbed over to the branch closer to me so he could get some of my food. This branch was not as supportive as the last one but he kept making his way down to me.
Madison opened up her bag and gave this little guy the opportunity to pick whatever he wanted.
Christopher thought that was a pretty slick idea, so he did it too.
I figured these sweet, gentle giants should get their fair share of choices too.
This little cutie landed on my head not 5 minutes before this! He thought Christopher's back looked pretty comfy so he gave it a try.
They let kids hold the honey bear this time!!! He was so cute! Right when he was handed over he'd wrap his tail right around your arm! He's nocturnal so he sleeps around 16-20 hours a day.
After leaving the cage of awesomeness, aka, the cage filled with all of these animals, the birdies talked us into giving them a few more seeds.
Lemurs!! Believe it or not, these guys loved the dog food that was in the mixed food bags.
They were so cute! The kids kept putting pieces of food in this guys hand while he was looking away. They got three pieces in there before he realized what was going on and let them go.
King Julian over here doesn't like to get his hands dirty, he likes to be fed directly.
More dog food for the other lemurs.
Their little hands were so cute and his fingers were so soft! I want a lemur too.
This lioness wanted to be friends with Alexander.
Or maybe she wanted a snack.
Christopher got to hold the hawk and pet him a bit.
Then Nana got to hold it and she told it how handsome it was.
Alexander did not want to pet this guy, holding it was enough for him.
Tony the 7 month old panther was out and about. We didn't get to pet him this time, but we got to later on.
We were able to pet this cute little guy. His name is Skipper
You know Madison had to get a picture for her instagram account.
Christopher said he smelled like fish.
Alexander just thought he was pretty cool.
I realized that I want a penguin as well.
Christopher got to pet him but I couldn't get a picture before he sneezed a little and scared Christopher away. Alexander wasn't too scared to try at least once either.
Neither was Madison.
Right before we were about to leave, after visiting Thor the Ocelot again, there was this tiny little guy hanging out, literally, climbing on people, and hanging on them. Nana got to hold him before he jumped back onto his handler to get some more goodies.
Madison and I grew this big guy from a seed! This one is actually taller than I am.
Wednesday we went to Arcos to get some cookies from the nuns at the convent. I really really really love this picture. It was a cool little stairway in Arcos De La Frontera and we had to stop for some pictures.
We added a few kids to the mix and got another awesome picture.
We needed to hold the walls apart since they were so close together.
They did a pretty good job.
One of the cathedrals up there. These buildings are so big and so beautifully carved.
After checking to see if the door was unlocked he wasn't aware that I got a shot of his cool dismount from the stairs.
We weren't sure if these were the bells we heard ringing just a little bit before getting here.
Another one of the buildings just a few feet away. Maybe it was the other side of the other building, I'm not sure, but it was pretty.
Another overlook we needed to check out.
I'm glad we did because there was a guy with a bunch of birds up there that he was letting people hold.
This guy was cool looking! His big red eyes and his ungroomed mustache looked pretty good on him. He sure knew how to pull them off.
A little prairie dog was hanging around on a leash and loved it when I was petting him. He was cute too!!
This owl looked like a grumpy old guy telling me to get off of his lawn.
This guy was showing off! He looks like he's trying to surf and his feathers are gorgeous. He did chew off one of my shirt buttons, thank goodness it was only one on the top of my sleeve.
He liked flinging himself around and acting silly.
Another one of the narrow roads in Arcos.
These roads were pretty slippery. Some of the marble was so worn down there was hardly any traction. After all of this trekking around, we didn't make it to the convent before they closed. We stopped to eat first because I make bad suggestions.
On Thursday we went to see the Andalusian Dancing horses. We were able to get there a little early and see some of the horses training outside.
This guy was lonely, just hanging out in his area by himself.
The pretty fountain in the middle of their walking area.
I was getting all prepared to get some amazing pictures of the show, until they told us we weren't allowed to take pictures during the show. They actually had people keeping an eye out for people sneaking pictures. It was ridiculous.
So at the end of the show I covertly tried to take a picture of the horses and their riders. It obviously didn't work out too well.
We have plans for this weekend but I'll write about where and how it was in my next post. We're enjoying Nana and Papa's visit and I'm pretty sure they are too. Have a great day everyone.
