6/9 It was another scenic bus trip with lots of sunflower, wheat, grape, olive and wind farms. Yes, wind farms. There were hundreds and hundreds of windmills as Lee and I headed south. Since Tarifa is the windsurfing capital of the world it only makes sense to have windmills there. We saw a couple of the famous white hill towns which are small towns of white houses perched incredibly on the sides of mountaintops along the way.

Tarifa appeared suddenly with us right on the beach with dozens of kitesurfers . Kitesurfing is a very cool, in sport these days. It looked quite difficult to me especially since the wind was so strong. After leaving the bus we walked up the main drag which was full of kitesurfing and windsurfing stores. The town had a definite hip vibe to it with lots of young people and backpackers. We at least had backpacks.:-) We found a hostel nearby which was quite spartan (a trend).

After walking through town to the port we could see the many ships lined up to enter the Straight of Gibraltar to enter the Mediterranean. Despite some haze Lee and I were able to clearly see the Atlas Mountains of north Africa. Tarifa is the southernmost point in continental Europe as we continue to visit the geographic superlatives of southwest Europe.

There were many tapas restaurants here as in the rest of Spain. We passed on them since they were expensive and would not fill us up. Tarifa reminded me of the surf towns of southern California or Hawaii . Whale watching tours were also highly promoted in town.

Lee and I went down and bought our tour tickets to Morocco for tomorrow which were a deal at 56€. We then had dinner at the Coyote Cafe which caught our attention with a super cactus theme. The restaurant had been designed in a modern style and looked quite new. The colorful decor was terrific and belonged in Texas. The owner was Italian as was most of the menu. Lee tried the chicken fajitas which were OK and my lasagna was tasty but not very filling.

Our hostel night started immediately with slamming doors (mainly due to the wind), screaming kids, and a water pump that came on every 5 seconds that sounded like a blow dryer. Lee went downstairs to ask about the strange noise and was told that the water pump would make that noise until about 11 pm. The kids at the hostel were yelling up and down the hallways taking me back to RA days at UH. I wasn sure Lee and I could take 2 nights of this .

6/10 Took ferry to Tangier, Morocco (see separate entry). It had been a long day with Lee and I wanting dinner and some sleep. We found another pseudo-Mexican place called Tijuana Tex-Mex. It sounded promising but could they do Tex-Mex in Tarifa, Spain? We ordered fajitas with black beans and rice. We watched a big group in the back get their sizzling platters and thought optimistically. We waited and waited and waited. What could be taking so long? After an interminable wait we were finally brought black beans and white rice (how long does it take to open a can and make Minute Rice?). After another wait our fajitas showed up and the platters looked pretty good. There were no onions which was a bummer but the fajitas tasted OK. We were just happy to get food. Lee and I figured out that the restaurant looked busy because each table took more than an hour to get their food! Back to the hostel to pack again for a trip to Gibraltar.

6/11 It was an easy downhill walk to the Tarifa bus station (OK, it was a shack with a man working in it). He told us that we bought our tickets onboard for Algeciras where we would then change busses to La Linea. We would miss the youthful spirit and energy of Tarifa and Lee said he´d like to take kitesurfing next time. We saw where lessons were around $295 including all of the equipment. Ouch!