Northern Spain – Getaria in Basque Country

 

This morning I woke early.  I generally wake early.  I really wanted a cup pf tea but it was only a small room and I feared that firing up the electric kettle would disturb Kim so I dressed as quietly as I possibly could, negotiated the creaky floorboards and left the room.  I thought that I might take a walk down to the harbour to see if there was any fishing boat activity.

The sun was shining, the sky was blue, the sea was blue and fishing boat crews were completing early morning activities.  A team of men carefully landed and folded an empty net and then went off somewhere, I suspect for breakfast or a sleep or maybe breakfast and then a sleep.

Around the port are old fish market warehouses which are no longer required and are undergoing restoration or maybe conversion into tourist attractions and harbour side restaurants because they are are no longer required for their original purpose because on the far side of the harbour is a modern fish processing factory of industrial proportions where all of the catch is delivered and processed and then efficiently dispatched all across Spain in a fleet of refrigerated HGVs.

No chance of going inside to take a look like this.

Fishing here is big business.  Very big business. After Galacia further west along the coast, the Basque fishing fleet is the second largest in Spain. Although it only represents 2 % of the number of vessels, it has 19 % of the tonnage and 14 % of the power. In the harbour this morning the huge steel clad trawlers were laid up, their job done for now, ready to sail again later no doubt.

In Spain they eat a lot of fish but not as much as people in Portugal who eat more fish than any other in mainland Europe, fifty-seven  kilograms per head per year which is like eating your way through an average sized cod or tuna,  Norway is second, Spain third and then France and Finland.

In the UK we like to think of ourselves as fish eaters and we voted to leave Europe on the basis of getting our fishing fleets back but we only eat cod or haddock or anything else from the same genus ( hake, colin, pollack etc.)  and on average we eat a miserly fifteen kilograms per person per year.

In mainland Europe, those who eat least fish are Albanians at only five kilograms followed by people from Serbia and North Macedonia and what is surprising is that none of these are really that far from the sea.

The most popular fish in the UK is cod and in the USA it is prawns (shrimp), Canada and in Australia it is salmon; in France it is sea bass and in Spain hake.  The most popular Christmas Day meal in Australia is prawns (shrimp).

After an hour or so I returned to the room, Kim was awake so I could safely boil the kettle.  She had improved and I told her where I had been and she said she wanted to do that so after a croissant for breakfast we went out and I did it all over again.

Mid morning and the port was getting busy, day trippers of course but also workers.  Sitting under umbrellas to shield from the sum local women were busy mending nets.  The nets were huge so how they knew which bit to mend I have no idea but they seemed to know what they were doing.

I used my Google translator to tell them that I lived in a fishing port town called Grimsby in the east of England, they smiled very politely and carried on working.  They had no idea what or where I was talking about.

This is Grimsby…

This is Getaria…

Rising above the port was a headland walk.  It looked tough but Kim declared herself fit enough to tackle it so off we went.

It was just a gentle climb and every twist and turn along the path provided a view or photo opportunity.

A rock carving…

And an eagle…

So, we walked to the top to an abandoned lighthouse and what was once a cafeteria, admired the views and walked back down again.

At the bottom of the path there was a seafood restaurant, not one of the posh ones in the town centre with tablecloths and high prices but rustic and reasonable and full of local people so we took that as a good sign and ordered plates of  squid and shellfish. It was so good that we agreed we should return later for evening meal.

 

 

Northern Spain – Fishing Port of Getaria and an Around the World Sailor

“…lively commentaries on village happenings relieved the monotony of net-mending to which many women were obliged to devote the major part of the daylight hours.  Net-mending left the brain free to create its own fancies and to work on the raw material of speculation and known fact from which the tissue of gossip was woven.” – Norman Lewis – “Voices of the Old Sea”

After three days in Labastida it was time to move on.  I had liked it,  it was the sort of place that could go on a ‘must go back to one day’ list but I won’t go back because I fear that if I did it will have changed dramatically from how I remember it.  I’ll just keep it locked away in my memory.  I had even walked in the footsteps of Napoleon Bonaparte.

Kim’s back had made some small improvement, it is amazing what a bag of frozen peas can do to provide relief so we cleared the apartment, I put more air in the tyres, probably now dangerously over-inflated and we set off north towards the coast.  We had done the turf and now it was time for the surf.

Northern Spain is a wonderful place to drive a car, the scenery is immense, Alpine villages, lakes and mountains and an ever changing sky, sometimes clear, sometimes cloudy and sometimes bleak but always interesting.  The lace bonnets on the mountain tops often replaced by unwelcome black skull caps. 

Sometimes challenging, especially bouncing about on over inflated tyres the drive north is fascinating along roller coaster roads sometimes flying like eagles, sometimes burrowing like moles, the road twisted and swooped, turned and soared into the sky and then disappeared into sinuous tunnels and always with more curves than Marilyn Monroe.

We had considered driving to San Sebastián but we had been there before and we didn’t have a wonderful experience so instead choose a seaside town further west and closer to our return airport of Bilbao.

After an hour or so we arrived at the coast,  The sun was shining, the beaches looked biscuit caramel immaculate and the sea was the sort of soft gentle blue of dreams.  It looked wonderful, good weather at last as we made our way into the fishing port of Getaria, parked in the harbour  where Kim dispensed with the soggy bag of once frozen peas and we made our way to the village centre.

Getaria is an up-market sort of place which is popular with day-trippers out of  San Sebastián and Bilbao.

And by our lunchtime arrival the place was already buzzing with visitors competing for tables at the seafood restaurants.  Along the narrow streets grills were sizzling with fresh fish and the harbour side restaurants were rapidly filling up as visitors bagged the best tables.  We planned to eat later so this lunchtime found a bar with a table in the sunshine, sat and simply enjoyed the view over the harbour.

It struck me as the equivalent of somewhere like Padstow in Cornwall but without the riff-raff, the sort of place that if he were Basque that Rick Stein would have opened a seafood restaurant and various other shops and establishments.  Luckily Rick Stein isn’t Basque so it is spared his sort of commercial expansion and exploitation.

Close to our lunchtime bar of choice was an impressive statue, a statue of a sailor called Juan Sebastián Elcano (Elkano in Basque) who I had obviously never heard of before but everywhere I visit has a surprising story to tell.

Elcano sailed with Ferdinand Magellan on his voyage of circumnavigation in 1519-22, the first ever to achieve the feat as the captain of one of the five ships of the expedition.  Magellan gets the headlines for organising it all but he himself never actually completed the voyage because like most other sailors accompanying him he died on route, he himself meeting a bloody and rather grisly end somewhere in the Philippine  Islands and it was Elcano who actually completed the famous voyage of discovery.  Who knew that I wonder?

Here he is…

As the sun began to sink and the shadows lengthened eventually subsuming our table we thought it time to locate our accommodation.  It was close to the harbour and although tiny was perfectly adequate and acceptable for just a couple of nights.  Kim settled in and rested her back and I tested mine by making three return trips up and down several steps to the car park in the harbour to transport our luggage from the car to the room.

Later we returned to the streets and there was quite a transformation, the day visitors had left, the fish grills were closing with only dying embers as a reminder of a frantic lunchtime and the once vibrant bars were practically empty.  We needed somewhere to eat but the reasonably priced lunchtime menus had gone and  it was all more expensive.  We read and rejected and eventually ended up in a sort of  popular Mexican fast food sort of place where to be fair we had a very good meal.

It had been a good day and we had enjoyed it and looked forward to a second day in Getaria tomorrow.

Thursday Doors – Through the Keyhole in Labastida

Labastida turned out to be a treasure trove for a lover of doors and sometimes I like to concentrate on the detail.

Northern Spain – Abandoned Plans and Confinement

We had plans today to drive to nearby Navarre, the last of the Spain Autonomous Communities on my ‘to visit list’ but shortly after getting up Kim reported that whilst making the bed she had felt a spasm in her back and she was in pain.  Within half an hour or so she was unable to walk any distance, sit comfortably or even lie down without extreme discomfort.  This was bad.

I walked to the pharmacy down the road and purchased some deep heat ointment but it had no immediate effect and it soon became clear that we might be marooned for the day in a village that was much like a cemetery for those left living.

After an hour or so I walked to the pharmacy down the road again (they were surprised to see me so soon) and asked if they had anything stronger and purchased more ointment which also failed to work.

I checked the car tyre pressures and phoned the car hire company to get approval to go to a tyre place somewhere.  They said no because they only use approved suppliers and if I went somewhere else then I would have to pay for it myself.  I asked what would happen if the tyre completely deflated and they said that they would send a breakdown truck and if it couldn’t be repaired (no spare in the boot of course) that they would tow it away and I would have to get back to Bilbao by train or bus and they would reimburse me the costs.  What great customer service.  I explained that I was in a small town in Basque Country and how was I supposed to get a train but they had no advice on this matter and it didn’t seem to bother them unduly.

I put some more air in the tyres.  All of them and then went for a slow stroll into the village.

I formed the impression that Labastida was a town on the precipice, about to tip over in an avalanche of change that will achieve an instant transformation and erase a hundred years or so of history in the blink of an eye.  It is rather like one of those penny drop machines in a games arcade, one shove and it will all tip over.  One day it will all be gone.  It is a shame but it will be ultimately it will be impossible to cling on to the crumbling rotting wreckage of an old town like this and everyone despite their objections will eventually be obliged to move to the nearby featureless modern new town instead.

Old people will weep, young folk will smile.  Old people will lament, young folk will rejoice.  Property developers will move in behind them and there will soon be a new old town of modern swanky apartments and boutique hotels.

To my surprise the church was open but only because some local men appeared to be making some preparations for a festival.  It wasn’t an especially interesting church I have to say but it passed twenty minutes or so.

It is one of those Spanish villages where I suspect nothing much happens for fifty-one weeks of the year and then has a festival (for a Saint most likely) and everyone goes bat-shit crazy, jumping over babies, throwing goats from bell towers and bull running through the streets.

The village shop was closed again so I went to a bar and had a beer and a disappointing pintxo which had probably been there since yesterday and watched as some men came and went in a daily ritual of wandering around, stopping off for a chat and a glass of wine and then wandering around a bit more, stopping off for more chat and another glass of wine.  Rinse and repeat.

Back at the apartment there was no improvement and Kim was still struggling with pain so I made a third visit to the pharmacy and persuaded the chemist to sell me some prescription pain killers.  I think he took pity on me or maybe it was because I was his best customer of the day, maybe the week.   Who knows.

So, it was a long afternoon, I drove to Lidl in Haro and purchased supplies for evening meal and when I got back checked the tyre pressures again just for something to do and then went for another village walk just in case I might have missed something earlier.  As it turned out I hadn’t but with weather improving all the time there were some good views over the adjacent countryside.

And then on the way back I chanced upon a second village shop that I had previously missed, it was one of those old fashioned places that hasn’t yet been replaced by a modern convenience store.  It had gaily coloured plastic strips across the doorway to stop the flies getting in and inside the tiny one room was an eclectic jumble of random grocery items that you would really need to be a local to have any idea what you were looking for.

After evening meal we went to bed early and hoped for improvement the following day.

The next day Kim declared herself fit for a short drive so we took the journey to nearby San Vicente de la Sonsierra through acres of vine groves as far as the eye could see and all twisting away into the distance like Chubby Checker.  The small town with the grand name was no more lively than Labastida but it had an abandoned fortress and church high above the town and we took the trek passing abandoned cave houses on the way so that we could see the expansive views and dramatic leaden skies.

It also had a bar and a terrace in the sun so we selected a table and had a light lunch.  It was a pleasant little town and we enjoyed it.  The sun was finally shining and the sky was blue (ish).

Nearby was a bodega and wine museum but it was very expensive so we declined to pay the entrance fee or purchase the wine on offer and chose instead to stop off at Lidl on the way back.  Lidl is my bodega of choice and in Lidl or elsewhere I generally like to choose bottles with black labels because I think they look more classy and are likely to taste better.  That is the best way to select wine purchases in my opinion.

Later on account of anywhere being open for food we dined in the apartment again.

 

Thursday Doors – Labastida in Basque Country (2)

What a grand place for doors Labastida turned out to be. This was our apartment at 40 Calle Mayor in the heart of the old village…

And these are some fine examples from the same street, what stories they could surely tell.  A street of fine buildings and palaces that ooze history from every stone and timber…

In 1808 Napoleon Bonaparte invaded Spain and marched on Madrid.  The French army of 20.000 men marched along the course of the River Ebro and it is reported that on the way he stopped overnight in Labastida.  He was due to stay in Haro but could find nothing suitable so chose nearby Labastida instead.  He stayed at the Paternina Palace just about one hundred yards from our accommodation close to the Larrazuría entrance arch to the old town.  This is it…

Sitting in a bar with a glass of Rioja I got to thinking, maybe if Napoleon was staying overnight at no. 9 Calle Mayor, then just maybe someone important stayed at no. 40?  It is entirely possible, maybe one of his Marshalls, Michel Ney or Jean-de-Dieu Soult?  Who knows?

“The Emperor’s visit to this noble town is nothing more than a reflection of the magnificence of Labastida in the past.  Palaces and ancestral homes remain everywhere, still proud, reflecting the splendid and noble past of this town” – Official guide.

Northern Spain – Haro and Labastida

I told you previously about the quest to visit all seventeen of the Autonomous Communities of Spain and today we were finally in La Rioja in the north of the country.  Sixteen down, only one to go.

Thankfully as we had driven south from the city of Bilbao the weather had continued to  improve, the rain had cleared away and although it remained overcast and cool at least we could manage now without raincoats and umbrellas.

As it turned out, Hora was closed and I mean closed.  Very closed.  Completely closed.  Nothing was open, not even the church and generally speaking the church is always open and you can spend twenty minutes or so inside.  But not in Hora.

Hora is a nice town but it is one of those places that need sunshine because without sunshine it is the sort of place that seems stark and bleak, tables in the Plaza Mayor are unoccupied and the zesty nature of Spain is completely missing.

So we spent some time looking for signs of life and then gave up and went inside a bar where local men in ludicrously thick jackets, scarfs and gloves were drinking white wine and eating raw onion and we stayed for a short while and then left.

Rather disappointing as it turned out, I imagined a lunch time glass of beer and tapas but all the bars deemed it too cold to offer out door service so we were obliged to find an indoor bar with only a small offering of pintxos/tapas.  The men at the bar looked suspiciously upon two people from the north in shirt sleeves as though we had escaped from an asylum.

I had a Madeleine moment and remembered that several years ago I was in Florida, USA and it was really rather cool.  I was in shirt sleeves and shorts and a local man looked me up and down and said “Jeez, where are you from?  Alaska?”

We were not disappointed to leave Haro I have to say. but it did have a Lidl supermarket so after we gad stocked up on what we thought we might need for three nights in nearby Labastida we moved on.

I like Lidl, I always look for a Lidl when I am away, they have both familiar and unfamiliar on offer.  Fresh fish, a different cheese selection and sometimes a local speciality.  I came across this one in Sicily just last year…

It got me thinking, wondering if a Spaniard or an Italian would shop in a Lidl in United Kingdom and get excited about Lincolnshire Sausage or Cornish Pasty or maybe Yorkshire Pudding.  Probably not.

We found the accommodation and it was fabulous.  An old palace apparently with rooms spread over two floors.  We liked it and approved it immediately, settled in, had a cup of tea and then thoughts turned to evening meal,

The door to the apartment from the interior…

So we went for a stroll and it quickly became obvious that evening meal might be a problem because just like Haro, Labastida was also closed.  The shutters were down on the village shop with a promise to open later but it didn’t look especially thrilling anyway, a couple of bars were open with a limited selection of Pintxos that looked like they may have been there since yesterday but there was no restaurant activity at all.  We made some enquiries but blank faces told the tale.  We wouldn’t be eating out tonight and most likely not at all during our three night stay in Labastida.

This is a problem with visiting remote villages in Spain in early April and we have come across it before so should have been better prepared.

So now I had to go back to Lidl in Hora to buy something for evening meal that we would have to prepare for ourselves.

On the way I stopped off to take pictures of the naked lady statue eating a bunch of grapes.  I think I took more pictures than I really should have done.

So we had an evening in, Kim cooked some steak (excellent by the way) we drank some wine, played cards and then went for a final walk through the village but abandoned that promptly on account of the chill.  We returned to our excellent apartment, had some more wine and played some more cards.

It had been a good day (except for the troublesome tyre issue).

 

Northern Spain – Bilbao and Basque Country in The Rain

Whilst visiting the Cathedral the weather took a turn for the worst and once outside the doors and onto the street there was a steady drizzle that had forced all of the street traders to retreat inside and there was a grey steely feel to the streets, rather like half day closing day in Galashiels in the Scottish Borders.

Read my Galashiels story here…

Rain can be a real spoiler but we walked the streets of the Old Town and emerged from the labyrinth of twisting medieval streets close to the river and decided to walk inland a little way towards the Guggenheim Art Gallery, about half a mile or so away.

The rain was steady but not too inconvenient but as we advanced into the river valley ahead the innocuous grey clouds turned to steely grey and then threatening black and then the steady rain turned nasty and heavy.  We reached the Guggenheim and thought that would do for the afternoon, at least it would be dry inside but this was Monday and although I know European museums and galleries are often closed on a Monday I had forgotten and it was indeed closed.  Bugger!

I wasn’t especially disappointed I have to say, I am not a big fan of modern art and on the positive side we had saved €40 admission fees.  Every dark cloud has a silver lining of course.

So we took some pictures and I bought an umbrella ( €5) and talk the walk back the way that we had come along the river.  It is a very fine building but it most likely looks a whole lot better in dazzling sunlight.

As we walked away from the funnel of rain in the river valley it eased slightly, Only slightly.  I dispensed with the umbrella (what a waste of money that was) and we made our way back to the market hall for shelter and lunch.

More Pinxtos and a glass of wine.

Outside we had to concede that the weather was unlikely to improve today so we walked the Old Town again looking for restaurants for later and then wet and miserable returned to the hotel room with the magnificent view over the extractor fans and drank some wine.  Later we went for evening meal, Kim chose well, I chose badly, I am so unlucky like that, I think in future I will wait for Kim to order first and then just have the same.

If yesterday morning had been bad today was even worse as we watched the rain lashing down, bouncing like bullets on the pavements from the breakfast room window.  Today we were moving on but had planned to spend the morning in the city and then take the reasonably priced bus to the airport but the rain was so hard that we abandoned the entire morning plan and instead of the reasonably priced bus took an expensive taxi ride instead back to the airport to collect a hire car.

I had enjoyed Bilbao but I don’t think that I had seen it it at its best.

The car hire was with a company called Gold Car and customer reviews are often rather unfavourable so mindful of that I paid the rip-off full insurance option so that I wouldn’t be caught out for additional charges upon return.  The car allocated had had its best motoring years firmly behind it but we accepted it anyway and drove off.  Sadly, we were glad to be leaving Bilbao.

The route took us around the suburbs of the city and through large matchstick like high rise housing estates.  The road dipped and weaved between the buildings and their individual accommodations each with a tiny balcony, some with flower pots, some without, some dripping with colourful washing and some with empty washing lines but all with satellite dishes and television aerials.  It really wasn’t very attractive at all and we were pleased when the motorway split in two and we started to head south and away from the city and to where the weather forecast promised better weather.

As we drove south the weather did begin to improve.  It remained overcast but there was no rain and there was a moody ethereal mist over the emerald green pastures and fields which added to the rural ambience.  Once off the main road the driving experience required complete and undivided attention as we drove along twisting narrow roads, under mountains and into deep gorges, through forests of fresh broad leaved trees as we alternately dropped and then climbed along a twisting river valley.

The tall mountains all wore lace bonnets made of swirling clouds as we followed the small roads through a succession of rustic villages where local people were working hard on the farms and weren’t expecting tourists.  Twice we had to stop for cattle being driven along the roads as they took priority over cars on their way to and from the milking sheds and everywhere dairy cows with bulging udders were grazing on lush grass on the precarious slopes of the hills and mountains.

And then it happened.  Just about thirty miles out of Bilbao a ping and a dashboard warning light.  Low tyre pressure!  I found my notebook put it over the warning so that I couldn’t see it and carried on.  Like a racehorse wearing blinkers.  I always find that this works a treat.  Out of sight, out of mind.  We were heading for the town of Haro, the centre of the Rioja wine industry.

 

 

Northern Spain – The City of Bilbao

The weather forecast was depressingly correct.  It was raining when we woke and this shouldn’t really have surprised us because this part of Northern Spain is one of the wettest places in Europe with an average of  one hundred and eighty-one days of rainfall in a year.  This compares with one hundred and fifty-two days in London and only sixty days in Seville in the south of the peninsula.

Through the window of the breakfast room we watched raindrops race each other down the glass and outside a plethora of umbrellas, raincoats and puddles.

Basque Region is part of Green Spain, the name given to the strip of land between the Bay of Biscay and the Mountains and it is so called because it has particularly lush vegetation, due to a wet and moderate oceanic climate that is strongly influenced by Atlantic weather systems.  It is a place of complete contrast to the dustiest and driest parts of Spain in the arid South-East where most Northern European visitors head for the beaches and the sun-loungers of the concrete and tarmac strip.

While Northern Europe goes to the South, Northern Spain by contrast is a popular holiday choice with Spanish people living in the south and the central cities of the country because they like to holiday in the north to escape the oppressive heat and enjoy the famous seafood.  In August alone, eight million Spaniards travel north from cities like Madrid and Seville to the more temperate climate of Galicia, Asturias and Cantabria with its green scenery and spectacular beaches.  

After breakfast the weather improved a little so we left the hotel and took to the streets and walked through the old town and to the banks of the river Nervión flanked by swanky apartment blocks with balconies overlooking the water and decorated with flags of the city football team, Athletic Club who had played an important match against Villareal the previous day.

Some interesting facts about the club;  It has the English spelling Athletic rather than Athletico because the club was formed in the late nineteenth century by expat English workers who had migrated to the industrial town of Bilbao seeking employment and Basque students who had studied at English universities.  It is the fourth most successful club ever in Spain and has never been relegated from the top division of the Spanish League.  It only allows players with Basque heritage to play for the team which perhaps means that you don’t need to pack a team with international superstars to be successful.

Beyond Madrid the Basque Country is the most prosperous and  wealthiest region in Spain, with gross domestic product being 40% higher than that of the European Union and 33.8% higher than the average for regions in Spain and it shows, Bilbao oozes wealth with elegant buildings, smart shops and wide boulevards and immaculately clean streets with sweeping crews working constantly.  It also ranks second in regions of Spain after Madrid in the Human Development Index.

We were making our way to The La Ribera Market which according to Wiki “ was recognized in 1990 as the most complete municipal food market by the Guinness Book of Records. It is the largest in terms of traders and stalls and the biggest covered market as regards space in the whole of Europe, with a surface area of 10,000 square metres”

Always need to beware of boasts about size however because both Riga in Latvia and Leeds in UK make the same claim.  Size matters but it depends what you are measuring, floor space, height, number of stalls.  Does it really matter?

I have been to Riga market but never to Leeds.

It is always a treat to visit a European covered market with immaculate rows of stalls all carefully laid out and arranged in tempting style and we lingered for a while admiring the produce and watching the buying and selling activity before we moved on to the food hall which was very tempting but it was too soon after breakfast so we thought that we might return later about lunch time.

Moving away now from the river and into the narrow streets of the old town which continue to retain a medieval ambience we quickly found our way to the city Cathedral which is not especially grand and could quite easily be missed.  The Cathedral Basilica of Saint James is dedicated to the apostle James the Great, by virtue of being a point of transit for the pilgrims that followed the Northern Way of the Camino de Santiago. In 2015, it was declared a UNESCO World Heritage Site together several other sites along the route.

There was an admission fee and I usually decline to visit a cathedral when there is an admission fee but it was raining again so we paid up and went inside.  There was no reduced rate for seniors but by way  of compensation admission did include an audio guide.

Kim thinks that all Cathedrals are pretty much the same and I suppose (grudgingly) she is correct, I couldn’t from memory separate any of them but there were a couple of memory nudges inside this one.  Firstly Saint Anthony who is one of my favourites and who I have come across before in Padua and Lisbon…

… and a chapel dedicated to the Black Madonna which we almost saw in Montserrat in Catalonia. This is the Black Madonna, considered to be one of the most celebrated images in Spain, which is believed to perform numerous miracles and attracts millions of visitors every year from all over the world.

People queue a long time to visit the Black Madonna at Montserrat, about three hours on the day that we were there, and when they get to the front of the line they get just about five seconds to make a wish before it is all over.  No such problems in Bilbao I can report.

Visit over we went back outside where it was raining heavily now and we had to accept that it didn’t look likely to improve.

Northern Spain – Basque Country, La Rioja and Navarre

“The racial pride of this mysterious people has always revolved around the sacred oak of Guernica, beneath whose branches the laws of the Basques were promulgated and the Kings of Spain swore to respect their privileges” – Jan Morris

In March 2009 I visited Castilla-La Mancha and Castill y Leon and I came up with a plan to visit all seventeen of the Autonomous Communities in Spain.  After sixteen years only two remained to be chalked off, La Rioja and Navarre in the north of the country and some cheap flights to Bilbao in April 2024 provided the opportunity.

Soon after the Easyjet flights were booked I began to tell people that I would be travelling to Spain but by the time of the trip I had started to be more specific and was referring to it as Northern Spain and to be completely accurate the Basque Country.  This was because the more research that I carried out ahead of the trip it was clear that I would not be visiting Spain at all because the Basque Country, although part of the Kingdom of Spain is something altogether different.

The Basque Country, or Euskadi in the Basque language, is part of the larger Basque region that also includes Navarre and spills into northern France and is an Autonomous Community of northern Spain that was granted the status of historical region in the Spanish Constitution of 1978.  The capital is Vitoria-Gasteiz (Vitoria is the name in Spanish, Gasteiz in Basque) and Bilbao is its largest city.

It was a lunch time  flight and I slept for most of the journey but woke up as the plane began to descend shortly before crossing the coast of the Bay of Biscay just east of Bilbao so I was in time to see the ribbon of golden sand and behind that the glorious green of the forests and the alpine like mountains rising dramatically out of the sea and concealing lakes and rivers in the valleys and criss-cross gorges of the interior.

In contrast to the grand scenery of the natural environment Bilbao airport is a stark modern structure, a sprawling bleached concrete welcome mat that was austere and unattractive.  To be fair it was undergoing extensive refurbishment so perhaps we weren’t seeing it at its best but it was certainly somewhere to pass through quickly.  Unfortunately not to be because the long line of arrivals were processed at glacial speed through passport control by only two members of staff.

We were unable to use the e-gates because we are no longer part of the European Union so queuing at passport control is one of the consequences of the mad decision to leave.  We were promised hundreds, maybe thousands of Brexit benefits but they are proving hard to come by.  If you can think of one please let me know.

Our plan was to take the reasonably priced bus into the city but with time wasted inside the airport and the afternoon slipping away we opted for a taxi instead and within fifteen minutes and thirty euros lighter we were checking in to our hotel.  We gave it an eighty percent approval, clean and tidy but small and a window overlooking kitchen extractor fans and no tea making facilities.  I do like tea making facilities.  My own fault for not paying extra for a superior room.  Never mind, only two nights.

We had been up for a long time and it was definitely time for lunch so we roamed along the pavement trying to select a bar that was serving what we were looking for, and we were looking for pinchos, or pintxos in Basque. Pintxos are Northern Spain’s equivalent of the tapas, the main difference being that they are usually larger and always ordered and paid for independently from the drinks. They are called pintxos because this is the Basque word for spike and many of them are held together with a sharp wooden skewer.

In times past customers ordered pintxos and left the skewers on the plate when they had finished eating and the bartender counted up the spikes and made up the bill.  These days transactions go through an electronic till of course.

Another difference is that whilst tapas are served on a small dish, pintxos are generally arranged on bread slices and laid out on the bar was a mouth watering selection of tasty snacks and every one of them an attractive work of art. We made our selections and sat at a table on the pavement as the sun continued to strengthen its grip and the afternoon was getting progressively warmer.

Actually we overdid it a bit and went for a reasonably price platter of ten selections including a bottle of wine and as soon as we had finished we knew that we wouldn’t be eating again this evening.

The sun continued to shine but locals were looking concerned about clouds beginning to build and kept looking skyward.  We knew that the weather forecast was poor but the sun was still warm and we dismissed negative thoughts, found a mini-market, bought some wine and returned to the room.

it started to rain so we stayed in the room.

Thursday Doors – Labastida in Basque Country (1)

Labastida is a town and municipality of the Rioja Alavesa, in the province of Álava in the Basque Country, Northern Spain.  It is a charming town with some very fine doors.  I visited and stayed there just recently…