Blog Post #197 - Tuesday, November 28, 2023
Posted by Denny Hatch
http://dennyhatch.blogspot.com/2023/11/197-gibraltar.html
How Dozens of Splendid YouTube Travel Adventures Kept Me Sane, Safe and Happy In the Bleak Years of COVID-19.
A Brief Backgrounder. Remember January 30, 2020?
COVID-19 Arrived that week. The ferocious pandemic began killing people in the tens of thousands. (Total tally worldwide so far: 6.9 million dead.) Peggy and I — devout travelers — went cold turkey on all trips and reluctantly hunkered down. Three years later we booked a cruise on the Great Lakes.
Saved from Serious
Depression
And Cabin Fever by Steve Marsh.
Have you ever come across the chap in photo above? Steve Marsh is one of a kind — a fun, funny low key Scotsman, exuberant docent, world-class photographer and superb film editor. His unique business model is escorting his flock of armchair followers on splendid impromptu YouTube adventures around Scotland, the British Isles, Northern Europe and the USA — (Amtrak, Mystic, Connecticut and a splendid quickie tour of Seattle!) On my 55" LG screen Steve's photography is professional cinema quality. He has gifted me with glorious videos and memories of trips I never would have taken in real life.
“Impromptu” YouTube Adventures?
“Done without being planned, organized, or rehearsed.”
—Oxford
Dictionary
Steve picks a destination, researches the history, the photo ops and directions for getting there and back — by road, rail, bus, air (jets to puddle jumpers), funky ferries, cruise ships and, oh yes, long walks (his favorite form of transportation).
Whereupon he invites his followers to join him as he heads out. Sometimes he’s been there. Sometimes not. You haven’t a clue what the hell is coming next. Neither does Steve. Maybe terrible weather closes in or sudden cancellations knock his schedule galley-west. Whatever happens, Steve deals with it. And always he is fun, funny and a folksy conversationalist who ad libs totally unscripted commentary in a delightful Scottish accent.
Above all, whenever Steve Marsh is in my life, the kalaidoscope of terrible news disappears: the mass shootings, wars, world hunger, whining and lying politicians, the plight and desperation of ragtag refugees, hurricanes, floods, vaccine deniers and the daily diet of nasty nattering nabobs dominating the news and social media.
Of the
Many Journeys with Steve I
Especially Loved His Tour of Gibraltar!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YxKvlbfERs4&t=20s
In 50 years of world travels I’ve flown over Gib a number of times, passed by it on cruise ships, we even spent a couple of hours there on a quickie stopover while driving through Spain. But I never spent quality time there. What’s more, as a lifelong anglophile and history nut I read all the Horatio Hornblower and Patrick O’Brian Aubrey-Maturin novels about the British Navy in the Napoleonic Wars where Gibraltar figured heavily in the action. The teensy 2.6 square miles of Gibraltar is the U.K.'s only footprint on the Continent and a linchpin of the U.K.'s foreign real estate since this outpost was ceded to Britain in 1713.
Under Steve Marsh’s enthusiastic and energetic editing we flew into Gibraltar International Airport. Its main runway doubles as the dangerous and bizarre main highway across the island. Fifteen times a day lines of pedestrians and vehicles are halted so planes of all stripes and sizes can land and take off. It's nuts!
If you join Steve's tour of Gibraltar, you'll start to climb the 1,398 feet to the top of this supercolossal half-British/half- Spanish Rock. A series of magnificent views of harbors, ships and Spain in the distance unfold as you go higher. Steve — totally winded and wiped — gives up and splurges for the cable car ride on the remainder of the way to the top. (We all earned it! After all we huffed and puffed walking up hundreds of steps!)
Along the way we met some of the island's 300 wild Barbary
Apes heavily protected by the authorities."
“Legend says if the monkeys disappear from Gibraltar so will the British. This is why during the Second World War, with the numbers dwindling, Winston Churchill sent to North Africa for replacements. Churchill's plan worked, and the colony thrives to this day.” —Google
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YxKvlbfERs4&t=20s
I’d Like to Share with You Another
Marvelous YouTube Expedition
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q2SUC4IMH4g&t=20s
At some point Steve Marsh connected with Alicja, his upbeat and captivating assistant and travel companion who matches him stride-for-stride in his walking marathons. They sometimes log in an exhausting 20 miles a day or more and finish up smiling and exhilarated! In the very north of coastal Scotland you will be dazzled by the massive rock caves and prehistoric rock formations unlike anything I have seen before.
Enjoy!
(1) No packing and unpacking.
(2) No gawdawful crowds and long waiting lines in airports and tourist hot spots.
(3) Magnificent still photographs and video footage you can download for your memory collections and send to friends, associates and family.
(4) No lugging cameras around or fumbling for the iPhone and time wasted positioning yourself for “just the right shot" and right spot.
(5) Knowledgeable upbeat, fun, friendly and
information-packed narration — while you're there — filled with humor, history and inside
stories about the great sites of the world that make you an expert.
(6) No drivers, guides, cabin crew or wait staff hanging around hoping for tips.
(7) You never leave the comforts of your home.
(8) No four- and five-digit bank-breaking costs for transportation, entrance fees, meals, drinks and lodging.
.
(9) No debilitating jet lag and sleep pattern screw-ups when you get home.
(10) You see the world ABSOLUTELY FREE.
(11) And you can return and repeat as often as you like!
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