The Port of Algeciras is a major container transhipment hub that handled 4.35 million TEU of containers and 91.1 million tonnes of cargo during 2013. There are ten kilometres of quays with two huge container terminals, one for Maersk Line of Denmark and the other being the new TTI terminal opened in 2010. There are daily ferry crossings to Ceuta and Tangier, with the Autoridad Portuaria de la Bahia de Algeciras (APBA) also controlling the Port of Tarifa with shorter, faster ferry links by fast craft to Tangier. The port is located at latitude 36° 13′ North, longitude 5° 44′ West and is the largest port in Spain in terms of cargo handled. The reasons for this rapid rise as a port are its strategic location on the main shipping routes linking the Mediterranean with North and South America, Northern Europe and West and South Africa, as well as the deep water of the Bay of Gibraltar and good rail and road links throughout Spain. 

History of the Port 

Algeciras has been the crossing point of the Strait of Gibraltar from Africa from the earliest recorded history, with Gibel Tariq crossing in AD 710 to begin the Moorish conquest of Spain and also to give his name to Gibraltar. A settlement at Algeciras was built three years later by the Moors as the nearby roman settlement had been destroyed by the vandals. The settlement was called Green Island (al- Jazirah al-Khadra) by the Moor from which the name of Algeciras is derived. Algeciras became part of the Moorish Kingdom of Granada. The town was retaken by Alfonzo Xi of Castile in 1364, but was recaptured by the Moors in 1368 and then destroyed on the orders of Sultan Mohammed v of Granada.

Just outside the gates of the Port of Tarifa is a statue of Alonso Perez de Guzman (1256-1309), known as ‘Guzman the good’. He was a Spanish nobleman and hero, who successfully defended Tarifa in 1296 against a siege by the Moors. In return, he was given all of the tuna fishing rights on this coast and built tuna processing facilities at Zahara de los Atunes, further along the Costa de la Luz from Tarifa.

In 1492, Sultan Boabdil was forced to humbly surrender Granada to the Reconquista forces of Christian Northern Spain. Boabdil was the twentieth and last Sultan, and he was given 30,000 gold coins and a slice of the high Alpujarras region of the Sierra Nevada Mountains of southern Spain for those Moors who did not wish to leave Spain. After leaving Granada for the last time on his way down to the port of Motril, Boabdil looked back at his lost Kingdom of Granada and uttered the ‘Last Sigh of the Moors’ for having given up Granada without a fight. The Moors left in the high Alpujarras region were also forced to flee the country for North Africa during their expulsion in 1609 as they had stubbornly clung to their customs with frequent uprisings and marches of protest down to Granada. The conquest of Gibraltar by the British in 1704 forced many of its local Spanish inhabitants to flee ‘The rock’ and establish several settlements along the Bay e.g. Algeciras, San Roque, Los Barrios and La Linea de la Concepcion. A port facility was not created at Algeciras until 1894 when a wooden jetty was created at the mouth of the Rio de la Miel at the northern end of the long Reconcillo Beach of Algeciras. This was in connection with the building of a railway by British engineers from Algeciras to Ronda to enable British garrison officers and their families to escape the stifling claustrophobic atmosphere of Gibraltar and enjoy the surrounding countryside.

The British engineer, John Morrison, backed by his friend and wealthy financier Sir Alexander Henderson (later Lord Faringdon) completed the first railway from Algeciras to link up with the main Spanish line to Madrid in 1890. A section of line of length 42 kilometres was inaugurated from Algeciras to Jimena on 6th October 1890, followed by a further section of line from Jimena to Ronda of 64 kilometres on 24th November 1892. The Algeciras Gibraltar railway Company Ltd. (AGRC) authorised the construction of a wooden and steel jetty on 19th March 1893 at Algeciras. A connecting railway along the banks of the river Miel was then completed, and a regular ‘Elvira’ packet steamer service to Gibraltar was inaugurated with two steamers on 16th December 1893. The steamer service was named after a female member of the Henderson family. The ‘Sur Express’ fast train from Paris to Madrid crossing the border between the two countries in the Basque region extended its weekly service to Algeciras from Madrid in 1907.

The opening of the large and impressive Reina Cristina Hotel in 1902 was a major step forward in the development of Algeciras. The hotel was designed by the eminent British architect Thomas Edward Colcutt in the British colonial style and was funded by Alexander Henderson, builder of railway to Algeciras. It was the setting for a major international conference in 1906 to settle the future of Morocco by twelve nations during a French and Spanish dispute over the North African country. The hotel has a magnificent internal plaza and covered courtyard, with large and well manicured gardens. The upper rooms were used by German spies during World War II to report the movements of British naval forces into Gibraltar and convoys through the Strait of Gibraltar by radio to Berlin. German bomber squadrons in Sicily and Sardinia were then put on alert by German High Command.

The Reina Cristina Hotel has had many famous guests including Winston Churchill, Charles de Gaulle, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, Federico Garcia Lorca, W. B. Yeats, Cole Porter and Orson Welles. It was marketed by a British travel company in post-war years to the British public, and my good friend Duncan Haws was Marketing Director and stayed there on short business visits, usually four days at a time. Duncan is now 93 years young and very well, and I myself have also stayed at this beautiful hotel on several occasions. It is a wonderful throwback to the grand Tours of Europe, and in this case for travellers to Tangier, with its big artist colony, and also south into the great cities of Morocco.

The Algeciras Port Works Board was established in 1906, and seven years later work on the Alfonzo XIII wharf was started, later renamed the La Galera wharf. a small ferry port was built on the opposite side of the harbour road from the Reina Cristina Hotel for the North African steam ferries of Compania Trasmediterranea, which in 1920 had a fleet of 59 steamers in that year ranging from 200 grt to 3,300 grt for its services from Barcelona, Seville, Cadiz, Malaga, as well as Algeciras to Ceuta and Melilla in North Africa, and to the Canary islands, and Santa Isabel on the West African island of Fernando Po. In 1927/28, two motor ferries with Krupp diesels were completed by the Union Naval de Levante yard at Valencia as Ciudad de Algeciras and Ciudad de Ceuta, and together with other motor ferries served the North African Spanish enclaves of Melilla and Ceuta from Malaga and Algeciras until the 1960s.

On Sunday 19th July 1936, a detachment of Moroccan troops and the Spanish Foreign Legion loyal to Franco landed at Algeciras, and marched on to take the garrison at San Roque without a shot being fired. Arrangements were then made to fly the 30,000 men of the Spanish Moroccan army at the end of July and throughout august in twenty German Junkers 52 transport planes escorted by six Heinkel 51 fighters to Algeciras. Franco himself landed by plane at Seville to take command of his forces on 6th august to begin a very bloody three year war between the Nationalists of Franco and the republicans.

The Italian tanker Olterra of 8,082 dwt was scuttled by her own crew near Algeciras on 10th June 1940, but was later raised and towed into and moored in the port of Algeciras. Italian midget submariners cut a sliding hatch in her hull six feet below the waterline so that their craft could be launched from the flooded bilge area. Three attacks between December 1942 and august 1943 involved Italian midget submarines moving unobserved out of the port to attack British ships with limpet mines off Gibraltar. Two of these daring raids were successful in sinking six allied merchant ships of 43,000 dwt. Olterra had been built in 1913 at Jarrow by Palmers as Osage, and resumed trading at the end of the war for her Italian owner until she was broken up at Vado Ligure in 1961.

During the post-war Franco dictatorship, the Port of Algeciras enjoyed a great deal of industrial development, attracting many workers, as well as the former Spanish workers in the British naval dockyards on Gibraltar, who were absorbed here in 1969 when Franco sealed the border between Spain and Gibraltar.

The Modern Port 

Building of a Spanish operated container quay was begun in 1982 as an extension of the ferry terminal at the landward end. On 1st December 1984, Lica Maersk became the first Maersk Line container ship to dock there, to inaugurate new U.S.A./West Africa, U.S.A./Spain and U.S.A./Middle East services using Algeciras as a transhipment port for feeder vessels to the full range of West African ports. Maersk Espana S.A. was set up to store and assemble cargo into containers at Algeciras to or from these destinations with overland containers from Cadiz, Valencia, Barcelona, Alicante, Madrid and Bilbao.

Construction of a dedicated APM Terminals Maersk Line container terminal was then begun with a long quay for container ships plus a corner berth at the seaward end. The first stage was completed in March 1986 when Christian Maersk inaugurated this new Maersk Line terminal on arrival from Bremerhaven en route to Jeddah. Container throughput increased by 15% per annum throughout the 1990s rising to 2.2 million TEU in 2002, of which 40% was West African traffic. The remainder was to South Africa, the Caribbean and South America, as well as stop-off trade between North America and the Far East for mainland Spain. There were five container ship berths served by a total of nine container gantry cranes on the inauguration of the Juan Carlos I terminal in March 1995. The APM Terminals base today has nineteen quay gantry cranes including ten for ‘Super Post Panamax’ container ships, plus 64 rubber tired cranes.

The Isla Verde (Green Island) Quay handles containers and ro-ro cargoes as well as the Acciona Trasmediterranea terminal, plus a reefer terminal with a capacity of 20,000 cubic feet of refrigerated products. Marmedsa (Maritima del Mediterraneo S.A. founded in 1963) has an agency on Isla Verde Quay for the import of reefer and logistics cargo. In July 2008, a concession was awarded by the port authority to Hanjin Shipping of Korea to build and operate a second big container terminal on the Isla Verde (Green Island) Exterior Expansion area. The company TTI Algeciras S.A. (Total Terminal international Algeciras) was set up in Phase A of the expansion area, and eight large gantry cranes were erected on the seaward side of this Isla Verde Exterior area. Containers are loaded and unloaded on the North and East sides of Isla Verde, as well as on quays attached to the breakwaters. Operations began by TTI Algeciras in May 2010 with an initial container throughput of 1.5 million TEU, the eight large gantry cranes being assisted by 32 automatic stackers and 32 straddle carriers.

A new Vopak oil terminal was opened in the Isla Verde Exterior area in 2009. The Isla Verde Exterior area comprises 121 hectares, 2,754 metres of quay flanked by 2,060 metres of concrete caisson breakwater with an alongside depth of 16.5 to 18.5 metres. There is rail access from Algeciras station to the Isla Verde terminal, as well as another branch line to the La Gomera Basin, Fish Dock, and Juan Carlos 1 Terminal of APM Terminals.

Algeciras Port Berths

Port Traffic Figures 

Total cargo moved through the port amounted to 91.1 million tonnes (up 2.5% over the previous year), of which general cargo amounted to 60.1 million tonnes (up 2.6%) and liquid bulks amounted to 25.0 million tonnes (up 5.7%). ro-ro cargo traffic was up 9% to 252,358 vehicles and trailers. The importance of rail traffic in and out of the Isla Verde Exterior rail terminal deserves to be underlined, because it more than tripled its traffic during the year to 18,228 TEU (up 192.1%). The whole of the port is served by rail access to the national RENFE rail network.

Passengers were up 7.9% during 2013 over the previous year to 5.17 million, and passenger vehicles were up 3.9% to 1.19 million vehicles. These figures include those passengers moving through the Port of Tarifa, which is administered by the Port of Algeciras. The Port of Tarifa had its best ever year with 1.42 million passengers and 270,124 vehicles carried on fast craft to the port of Tangier.

The CEPSA oil refinery at Puente Mayorga in San Roque had a throughput of 25.0 million tonnes of oil. Large fully loaded Aframax and Suezmax tankers move up the centre of the Bay of Gibraltar in deep water with crude oil for the refinery, and berth at a ‘T’ jetty. Smaller product tankers move the different grades of refined oil to coastal storage tanks at many Spanish ports. Bunkers from the refinery supplied to ships in the Bay of Gibraltar amount to around 2.65 million tonnes of fuel per annum.

The ENDESA power generation company has a quay to the north of the container port for the discharge of coal and biomass in bulk carriers up to Capesize. The quay is over 700 metres in length with the power station situated close to the discharge quay. There are also two quays for the loading of Handysize bulk carriers up to 25,000 dwt with dedicated cranes. There is also a quay for the import of raw materials for the ACERINOX steel company, used in the manufacture of stainless steel.

Containers handled by the Port of Algeciras during 2013 amounted to 4.35 million TEU, much of this being transhipment. The largest container ship to arrive in the port was the ‘Triple E’ Maersk Line container ship Maersk McKinney Moller of 18,800 TEU capacity in November 2013. She arrived fully laden from the Far East under the command of Capt. Niels v. Pedersen and was guided by pilot Julian Garofano and four powerful Boluda tugs to her berth at the most northerly stretch of quay of the Juan Carlos Terminal dedicated to Maersk Line. Maersk Espana S.A. had invested over 47 million Euros on a project to prepare the quay for such mega container ships as the ‘Triple E’, and to which the Port of Algeciras added another 33 million Euros on quay reinforcement and dredging work. Towing operations in the port of Algeciras were also handled by tugs owned by Compania Iberica de Remolcadores del Estrecho S.A., with tug Algeciras of 339 grt built by the Union Naval de Levante yard at Valencia as a typical example. She was of 2,200 bhp and powered by a 12-cylinder Sulzer diesel manufactured at Bilbao by Astilleros Espanoles S.A.

Container lines using the port during the year also included CMA-CGM, Hanjin, COSCO, UASC, China Shipping, Hapag- Lloyd, Hamburg-Sud, Evergreen, MOL of Japan, Delmas of France, DAL of Germany, ‘K’ Line, Safmarine, Yang Ming, Seago, Arkas, X-Press, BG Freight Line, Zim Line, I.M.T.C. of Casablanca, Boluda Lines of Spain and OPDR of Germany, both serving the Canary islands, and many others.

The water depth of all cargo berths in the port is between 36 and 40 feet (11 to 12.2 metres), the main channel into the berths has 46 to 50 feet of water (14 to 15.2 metres), the anchorage has 76 feet of water (23.2 metres), and the CEPSA oil Terminal berths at San Roque have alongside water depths of 46 to 50 feet (14 to 15.2 metres). There are large numbers of gantry cranes in use at the container berths for vessels up to the ‘Triple E’ size of 18,800 TEU capacity, plus a good number of mobile cranes up to 100 tonnes capacity. Large supplies of water, diesel oil, fuel oil, and provisions were supplied to ships in the port and the anchorage during the year, and the large dry dock in the north part of the port was kept busy with ship repairs.

The 2014 traffic figures for the port were higher than for 2013 as four large container cranes of height 100 metres arrived in the port in June 2014 on the Chinese heavy lift vessel Zhen Hua 25 for the Juan Carlos 1 Terminal of APM Terminals. These have a much higher container work rate per hour than the previous cranes, and were part of a $80 million modernisation project by APM Terminals and the Port of Algeciras.

During 2014 the port handled 4.6 million TEU, an increase of 4.7%, and the total cargo handled reached 95 million tonnes. Liquid Bulks returned 25 million tonnes (+4 ́1%), Solid Bulks returned 1.6 million tonnes (+0.4%) and general Cargo came to 61.2 million tonnes (+1.8%). HGV (ro-ro) traffic has broken through the 276,000 unit barrier for the first time (+9.6%), transporting cargoes from one shore to the other on the Strait of Gibraltar. Finally, bunker operators at the Port of Algeciras Bay supplied 3.5 million tonnes of fuel to ships in 2014 (+33.5%). There were 26,748 ship calls during 2014, a record for the port.

Passenger Ferries

 The main passengers using the port are Moroccan migrant workers who head home during their summer holidays and during major Islamic festivals. The passenger ferries struggle to cope with this volume of foot passengers as well as cars and lorries during these times. The bankruptcy of Comarit Ferries and its subsidiary of Comanav Ferries in 2012 has not helped this situation during peak times. The Passenger Terminal (Terminal de Pasajeros) is very spacious and has digital display screens of departure and arrival ferry times.

Acciona Trasmediterranea 

Trasmediterranea of Spain were using two Gaviota class ferries, Ciudad de Ceuta and Ciudad de Zaragoza, as recently as 1999 on the route from Algeciras to Ceuta. They were built in 1975 at Gijon as Monte Contes and Monte Corona for Naviera Aznar, and were purchased three years later and renamed. They were twin funnelled passenger ro-ros of 2,752 grt of length 101.7 metres with accommodation for 859 deck passengers, bow and stern doors and ramps and a lane length of 1,185 metres with space for 348 cars. Ciudad de Zaragoza was sold in 1999, but Ciudad de Ceuta suffered huge damage in a collision with fleet mate Ciudad de Tanger in July 2000 in the Strait of Gibraltar with six passengers killed. The damage was so great that she was laid up and never sailed again for Trasmediterranea. She was later sold as a constructive total loss in 2001 and was eventually repaired.

Euroferrys operated for ten years from 1998 to 2008 between Algeciras and Ceuta and Tangier with two fast ferries, Euroferrys Patricia and Euroferrys Primero, and five conventional ferries including Euroferrys Atlantica. The company was acquired by Acciona Trasmediterranea in 2006 and it was merged into its parent company two years later. Euroferrys Pacifica is my favourite fast ferry on the Strait of Gibraltar with her twin red funnels and yellow and red flash hull markings aft. She is the only one of this now defunct ferry company to have kept her ‘Euroferrys’ name in the Acciona Trasmediterranea fleet. She has a service speed of 39 knots from quadruple 18- cylinder Caterpillar diesels developing 39,156 bhp, and can carry 950 seated passengers and 96 cars and fifteen trailers. She was completed at Fremantle in 2001 by one of the two Australian builders of aluminium alloy fast craft, Austal Ships (Pty) Ltd.

Acciona Trasmediterranea currently have the fast ferry Millennium Dos sailing from Algeciras four times daily to Tangier, and the conventional ferry Vronskiy, the former Duc de Normandie built in 1978 for Brittany Ferries, three times daily to Tanger Med, the big new container port to the east of Tangier. Tanger Med will soon be one of the largest container ports in the Mediterranean since coming into operation in July 2007 with an initial container capacity of 3.5 million TEU.

Balearia/Buquebus 

The newcomer fast ferry companies of Balearia of Spain and Buquebus of Uruguay also operate on the routes from Algeciras to Ceuta and Tanger Med. Eurolines Maritimes started operations under the Balearia brand in July 1998 with a group of former executives, captains and officers of the ferry company Flebasa. Balearia, as their name suggests, have their main routes to the Balearic Islands from mainland Spain, with their first fast ferry being Patricia Olivia with seats for 600 passengers and room on the vehicle deck for ninety cars and five lorries. Patricia Olivia was transferred in 2011 to Balearia Caribbean Ltd. and renamed Pinar del Rio for the ‘Bahamas Express’ service between Fort Lauderdale and Freeport (Bahamas).

In April 2003, Balearia began operating services on the Strait of Gibraltar from Algeciras. Current fast craft on the route include the near sisters Jaume I and Jaume II, built at Hobart by Incat Tasmania (Pty) Ltd. and purchased between 2005 and 2007. They have seats for 600 to 700 passengers and space for around 150 cars, with maximum service speeds of 43 knots from four powerful Ruston Paxman or Caterpillar diesels driving four water jets. The fast craft Avemar Dos also operates from Algeciras, as well as three conventional ferries to Ceuta and Tanger Med from Algeciras in Poeta Lopez Anglada built in 1984 as Champs Elysees for SNCF, Passio per Formentera built in 2009 for the Balearics routes and powered by Rolls Royce Marine diesels, and Nissos Chios on charter from Hellenic Seaways of Greece.

The two fast ferry companies, Balearia and Buquebus, operated in partnership, until in September 2007 Buquebus was taken over by Balearia and became a subsidiary. Ceuta is reached in under half an hour on ten daily sailings, and Tanger Med in under one hour from Algeciras on four daily sailings. I have travelled on these fast craft on both routes, as well as on the red and white hulled fast craft Tarifa Jet of FRS Iberia SL from Tarifa to Tangier, and can vouch for their very fast passages with long wakes creaming out across the Strait of Gibraltar. They have a small open air vantage point high up on their aft decks, which is very good for ship photography, as well as giving a better impression of their very fast forty knot speeds.

My day trips out to Tangier or Tanger Med by fast craft from Algeciras was always accompanied by an overland coach trip to the walled city of Tetuan with its very narrow streets and Arab souk. I enjoyed excellent long leisurely lunches of couscous followed by Arab sweet delicacies in medieval buildings there, and then returned by fast craft from Ceuta to Algeciras in the evening. if travelling in July at the end of the Muslim month of Ramadan, one will see the local men dressed in ‘jellabahs’ or long flowing robes to celebrate the end of their fast. Buquebus have a fleet of nine fast craft including Juan Patricio, built in 1995 by Incat Tasmania (Pty) Ltd. at Hobart, and the new larger Francisco, named after Pope Francis, completed in 2013 by Incat with a service speed of 58 knots and seats for 1,024 passengers and space for 150 cars on the Buenos Aires to Montevideo route.

Limadet Ferries 

Limadet Ferries was a Moroccan ferry company established in 1956 after the liberation of Morocco from French colonial rule. It began a passenger and car ferry service between Algeciras and Tangier in the early 1960s. A controlling interest in the company was obtained by Comanav in October 2003 but their ferries continued with their markings until 2008. The ferry IBN Batouta of Limadet Ferries was the former twin funnelled St. Christopher built in 1981 by Harland & Wolff Ltd. at Belfast for Northern Ireland services from Scotland. She was later sold to Stena Line and renamed Stena Antrim, and came out to Algeciras in 1998 for Limadet Ferries and was renamed IBN Batouta. She passed to Comanav in 2008 without change of name and is currently laid up at Algeciras. The ferry IBN Batouta 2 was built for Limadet Ferries in 1993 by the Vigo yard of Hijos de J. Barreras. She was sold to Trasmediterranea in 1998 and renamed Ciudad de Tanger and was the assailant of her fleetmate Ciudad de Ceuta in a collision in the Strait of Gibraltar. She suffered less damage and was repaired, and was sold in 2003 for Canary Islands service to become Isla de la Gomera, and currently sails as Zadar for Jadrolinija.

Comarit Ferries 

Comarit was a Moroccan ferry company with a passenger and freight ferry service between Morocco and Spain, France and Italy from 1984 to 2012. It is now defunct after bankruptcy in 2012. Two Fred. Olsen ferries figured prominently in its services for many years, Boughaz and Bismillah. Boughaz had a long history since completion by Jos. L. Meyer at Papenburg in 1974 as Viking 5 for Viking Line. She became The Viking in 1981 for Sally Line, Sally Express in 1983 for Vasabatarna, Bolette in 1984 for Fred. Olsen, Boughaz for Comarit in 1988 with Fred. Olsen as manager of their own Olsen subsidiary company, and is currently laid up at Algeciras. Bismillah was completed by the Ulstein yard in 1971 as Buenavista for Fred. Olsen, and served in the Comarit fleet between 1984 and 2006 when it was sold off. Comarit had expanded its ferry business after becoming an independent company in 2008, and purchased the former Moroccan national ferry carrier Comanav in 2009. The entire Comarit fleet of two fast ferries operating from Algeciras to Tangier in Bissat ex High Speed 2 and Boraq ex High Speed 3, and six conventional ferries was laid up in 2012/13 at Tangier, Algeciras and Almeria, with the larger ferry Biladi ex Liberte built at Nantes in 1980 sold for breaking up in 2013.

Comanav Ferries 

Comanav also traced its origins to the liberation of Morocco from French colonial rule in 1956. It was 80% owned by the Moroccan State when it began its first ferry service in 1975 between Sete in Southern France and Tangier. The ferry Agadir of 3,777 grt built in 1969 on dimensions of length 348 feet by beam of 57 feet began the service with accommodation for 350 cabin class passengers and 111 deck passengers on reclining seats. Services were begun between Algeciras and Tangier in 1998, with the Moroccan State privatising the company in 2007. The company was sold to Comarit in February 2009 for 80 million Euros, but is now also defunct after the bankruptcy of Comarit in 2012. The Comanav fleet included BNI Nasr, the former Japanese Ferry Akashi built at Kure in 1972 and which came to Algeciras in 2005 as Marrakech Express and took her present name in 2010. The other big Comanav ferry, Mistral Express, was a favourite of mine, having seen her many times in Tangier, and she was built as Esterel at Nantes in 1981 with accommodation for 1,726 unberthed and 556 berthed passengers. Comanav funnel colours were red with a central yellow and white floral logo, while Comarit funnel colours were yellow with a central Fred. Olsen ‘bone and biscuit’ logo.

Tanger Med Container Port 

This new container, ferry and oil products port lies forty kilometres east of Tangier and twenty kilometres south of Algeciras. The port began with an initial capacity of 3.5 million TEU in July 2007, but has now reached a capacity of eight million TEU of containers, seven million passengers, 700,000 trucks, two million cars, and ten million tonnes of oil products per annum. The port consists of a very large rectangular cargo dock with six berths and sixteen large container ship gantry cranes along one side, and another dock to the west with ferries accommodated at four piers with passengers arriving and departing from the Gare Maritime. The ferry companies of Acciona Trasmediterranea, Balearia, inter Shipping, and FRS Express offer regular daily fast craft and conventional ferry links to Algeciras. FRS Express has the fast craft Dolphin Express on this route to complement their fast craft Tarifa Jet on the Tarifa to Tangier route.

There are four container terminals, Terminal 1 for APM Terminals, Terminal 2 for the Eurogate Consortium (CMA CGM, MSC), Terminal 3 for APM and the Akwa group, and Terminal 4 for Marsa Maroc. Container lines using the port include Maersk Line, CMA CGM, Delmas, Hapag Lloyd, APL, Hamburg Sud, MSC, UASC, MOL, Hyundai, Safmarine, IMTC, X-Press Feeders, Marfret, Seago Line, Feeder associate Systems and Arkas Line. The port is not far from the coastal mountain of Gibel Musa of 2,790 feet in height, one of the two fabled ‘Pillars of Hercules’, Gibraltar being the other, that were once connected across the fourteen miles of the Strait of Gibraltar, making the Mediterranean an inland sea.

Postscript 

Over one hundred thousand vessels per year transit the Strait of Gibraltar, with almost one third of these calling in at Algeciras and Gibraltar. The Port of Gibraltar lies just over four miles east of the Port of Algeciras, with fixed lines of jurisdiction drawn for both ports into the Bay of Gibraltar. However, incursions by Spanish helicopters and fishermen into British air and sea space occur frequently, and can (and do) lead to diplomatic incidents between Spain and Britain. Collisions occur in the Bay of Gibraltar, particularly at the entrance with big bulkers such as New Flame sinking just off Europa Point, the southerly extremity of ‘The rock’.

Co-operation talks between the two ports and three nations on navigation issues within the Bay of Gibraltar have always come to nothing because of the Spanish insistence over its sovereignty rights to Gibraltar. Referenda of the 30,000 inhabitants of Gibraltar have always come out at 99.8% of the population wishing to stay with British nationality, so it is very difficult to see how a solution to these important navigation issues will ever be solved.

The traveller today, viewing the huge industrial port and its associated industrial base, will struggle to realise that Algeciras was once an elegant resort in Edwardian times. One hundred years later, Algeciras is not only the fastest growing container port of all the top thirty container ports in the world, but massive investment continues to be made. APM Terminals has ordered sixteen more large rubber tired gantry cranes for its Juan Carlos Quay berths of Maersk Line container ships. Hanjin Shipping through its TTI Algeciras subsidiary continues to invest heavily in the Isla Verde container terminal to increase its trade to West Africa and South America and thus challenge the dominant container lines in these trades.