Giving in the keys to our home at Edinburgh House was hard; all of a sudden it was all real, we were now officially homeless in Gibraltar and technically in transit. The Navy had booked us into a really small back street hotel somewhere up either on Main Street or up a side street near there; I thought it was called the Montague but through the course of writing these memoirs readers have suggested it may have been the Montarik? During my recent visit to the Rock (May 2016) I did search to try and find it but wasn’t very successful; if it was the Montarik that establishment is no longer a hotel and if it was the Montague its vanished beyond trace. Whatever it was it wasn’t a pleasant experience for us but then we weren’t really feeling on top of the world.
(Montarik. Once a hotel? If not where then is Montague Hotel?)

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There’s something very surreal about being at a ‘party’ that you don’t want to be at – especially if it’s been thrown for you – but by the same token it’s also very touching when a group of people who are really close to you get together to wish you well.

(1977 Fleet Pav ‘do’. Close friend Sandy facing camera with black rimmed glasses)

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Although I haven’t laboured our social life much during these memoirs we certainly had a good one even though we were very much a family couple; we knew a lot of people and had many a shin-dig around the town calling in at all of Gibraltar’s well known establishments of the day. I’ve talked about the Buccaneer but others included Tivoli, Hole in the Wall and of course the Fleet Pav which is where we had our leaving do just a couple of days before our flight.

(1977 With Carol at our Fleet Pav ‘do’)

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Having a drink problem it was very rare for me to really let go but as I recall I had something of a skinful at our thrash; so did Carol now I think about it. It was the least we could do given the effort that everyone had gone to and to be fair although it was typically raucous (as every evening out with a group of service personnel off the leash is) it was also a cracking night. Given the strain we were both under it was quite a nice relief to put the worries to one side even if it was for just a few hours. These days I don’t drink alcohol and haven’t done since 1995 but I can still remember the blinding hangover I had from this thrash.

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As the hangover gradually subsided so too did our spirits as we finally arrived at the point where we could say we were leaving tomorrow. During our last full day on the Rock we (naturally) had a walk up and down Main Street and of course through Alameda Gardens where we spent some time watching the children play in the little playground they had come so used to know and love. As night-time fell, we got the children back to the hotel, bathed and tucked up into bed and then had an early night ourselves. We didn’t do anything because there was nothing we wanted to do; we didn’t say anything because there was nothing left to say.

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