Gibralter - view from the top

Location : The Atlantic -

 

After yesterdays postcard of Gibralter, here's another view of the rock. This image of Google earth is used with the same format as that of the image a few days back of my ship in Italy. In this image, my ship is the one on the bottom right. The waters off Gibralter are very deep, with depths going down to over 500 meters just a few miles off the land. As a result, most of the ships have to come quite close to the land to anchor.

 

In the picture above, if you match it with the postcard of yesterday, you can pretty much identify the landmarks. On the right of the rock (East), the three ships bunched close together are vessels anchored, most likely awaiting orders or waiting to bunker. The advantage of anchoring on the East of the rock is that you don't have to pay the port dues. So if you have a ship heading to Gibralter with a long anchorage, you know where to anchor now. :)

 

My ship, on the bottom right was waiting for the anchorage to get vacant in the Gibralter bay so that we could go in and bunker (take fuel). Gibralter bay is on the left of Gibralter and you can see a few ships on the left of the screen.  The Gibralter bay gets very crowded and its not uncommon to hear at odd times of the night, various captains telling other various captians how they have anchored too close to their ships.

 

 Thanks to dad again for sending this picture along.