Strait of Gibraltar blocked

[Liberator]

It's the second campaign that I have to face this problem.
Morocco, now Portugal, blocks the Strait of Gibraltar by raiding the trade routes of Russia.
So the only way for all ships from the Mediterranean to the Atlantic is blocked.

In my first campaign in which this happend I was playing as the Ottomans; I just killed off Morocco (what I would have done anyway), so this bottleneck was clear again.

Now in my Campaign with Genoa, I did so again, but shortly after that Portugal stepped in and locked the Strait again.
Well, I could just kill them off, too, but I almost expect someone else to block the Strait again.
I thought I just block it myself all the time and just open it up for my own ships (and close it immediately again)
Has anyone another idea?!

[anweRU]

That's the way to go. Unless you capture France or Spain, which have ports in both the Atlantic and the Med. Then you can build a Med fleet and a separate Atlantic fleet. That's been my solution so far.

[Marquis of Roland]

I killed Morocco and bought Gibraltar from Spanish, blocked it off with my own ships, problem solved.

[Darth Venom]

I killed Morocco and bought Gibraltar from Spanish, blocked it off with my own ships, problem solved.

That seems to be the easiest strategy/workaround. If it's only the Morrocans who are blockading the strait, taking them out will suffice. Which is dead easy btw.

[Servius]

Same. As Britain, I don't care too much about the med, but when I have tried to kill of Spain completely, access to the Med is helpful. I too usually just kill off Morocco who is usually the first one to block the straight, and then I put 2 ships in the adjacent slots that do not have any adjacent slots north or south of them. In that way, I make a 2-door gateway. First, my fleet merges with the first gatekeeping ship, then it moves to the second, and finally out into the Med.

The reason to have 2 ships perform this role is due to the fact that there are 2 ship spots where there are no adjacent spots to the north or south. If you only held one of them, another nation could hold the other, and in that event you couldn't move through the straight. You must hold both of these spots in order to ensure you can get through without being blocked in yourself. Let me try to show what it looks like with some letters (ignore the dots, needed for formatting).

....SPAIN

X............X
X.A.......B.X
X.A.C.D.B.X
X.A.......B.X
X............X

..MOROCCO

In order to get from A to B, you must hold both C and D.