For one, Gibraltar is a much smaller place

. A pleasant European small town rather than an Asian megacity. A few square kilometers dominated by The Rock rather than a sprawling archipelago
. An offshore tax haven rather than a trading hub and crossroads.

Then again, I didn’t come here to compare Gibraltar to Hong Kong. I came because these tine British Overseas Territory – which is the rather prosaic term for this and a few other remnants of The Empire – is an anomaly. Once a toehold surrounded by enemy territory, this little spit of land jutting out from the Spanish coast no longer has any strategic significance. It remains British as a matter of principle – I suppose the Spanish might even call it spite.

And all of the above is what makes Gibraltar attractive to me, the fact that there really is no modern, logical reason it should exist. I don’t long for the long faded glory of Empire, but some of these little anomalies help make the world that much more interesting.
And there is a lot of charm and character crammed into this little strip of land, such as Europe’s only wild apes and the airport squeezed in on the only flat bit of real estate.  And of course the place is steeped in history, Spanish and Moorish as well as British. The name itself is a bastardisation of Jebel Tariq – Tariq’s mountain, named in honor of the Moor who first crossed the straits to begin the centuries og Islamic rule on the Iberian peninsula.
The Rock, as it is affectionately known, stands across the The Straits from Jebel Musa on the Moroccan coast, clearly visible from Europa Point, weather permitting. Together these two mountains were known to the Greeks as The Pillars of Hercules and formed the gateway to the Mediterranean.
Walk or take a local bus to Europa Point where a Saudi sponsored mosque, a Catholic(?) church and a lighthouse operated bye Trinity House provide guidance both spiritual and temporal to lost souls and lost ships

. Climb or catch the cable car – or a taxi tour – to the top of the rock and walk down past battlements and fortifications spanning the centuries. Pop in to St. Michael’s Cave, they sometimes doubles as a concert hall. Spend the afternoon duty-free shopping on main street or taking in the Liliputian government and administrative buildings. Outside the governor’s headquarters in The Convent there’s even a formal changing of the guards, involving a single officer and two soldiers, the relief and the one being relieved.

When the daytrippers queue up to cross the runway and head back to Spain with their cheap booze, you can duck into a traditional pub for fish & chips or follow the cruise crowd and the yachts down to one of the new seafront developments.

You can easily cover the main sights in a single day, but one of the best parts of my visit was being rocked gently to sleep on the Con Dios, a boat turned bed & breakfast in the marina. And next time, I’ll be sure to catch a morning bus round to the east side and have my breakfast coffee watching the sun rise over the beaches of Catalan Bay.