There's much to love about Gibraltar,

Samantha Mallac learns

- Samantha Mallac

Stepping on to the baking airport tarmac, I glance over my shoulder to get my first look at the Rock of Gibraltar.

Dramatic and dominating, the great monolith of limestone and shale looms 1,400ft above us, dwarfing even my accommodation here - a 465ft long, 189-room five-star superyacht hotel.

Lovingly called Gib by the locals, the peninsula is located at the entrance to the Mediterranean, on the southern tip of Spain. Its strategic position has shaped its complex and fascinating history, through the changing hands of multiple nations - it was ceded to Britain in 1713 - and as a vital Second World War Allied stronghold.

Today, Moorish, British, Spanish and Jewish influences come together to create a unique aesthetic, while almost 40,000 locals, many of whom speak a Spanish-English hybrid language called Llanito, live alongside Barbary macaques, Europe's only wild monkeys.

We are lucky enough to be staying at the Sunborn Yacht Hotel in the lively Ocean Village Marina, a stone's throw from the busy town centre.

Azure waters teeming with little fish lap at the moored boats, while holidaymakers chill outside pubs showing the football highlights.

Across the water, almost close enough to touch, and with the airport runway between us, is Spain.

A backdrop of cranes and building sites are evidence of the forward charge of development, with land reclamation around the harbours a huge part of the progress.

No time to stop for too long, though, as there's so much to do on the peninsula that within a couple of hours of landing we're on a yellow boat in the nine-mile-wide Strait, between the Rock and the Rif Mountains, watching a friendly pod of dolphins play and leap around us while our tour guide points out the calves.