14 September 2022 - Donostia-San Sebastian

Miles driven today = 24

Total Miles to date = 894

I have a confession.  I consider myself to be fairly well travelled, having almost clocked up one country visited for each of my 58 years.  As far as Spain is concerned, I have had family package holidays to 4 different Spanish islands.  I have flown into Perpignon and Faro airports, both of which are within spitting distance of the Spanish border at opposite ends of the country.  I've even been on a day trip to Andorra.  But apart from once transferring through Madrid Airport, I have never set foot on mainland Spain.  Until today, that is.

What with roadworks and the tail end of rush hour it took us a little while to free ourselves from the clutches of St Jean de Luz.  But from there it was pretty much plain sailing to the border town of Hendaye.  As we crossed the Bidasoa river, the only evidence that we were crossing an international border were a small customs hut and a handful of non-plussed looking policemen.  Lisa tried to get a photo of the sign proclaiming we were now in Espana but a car got in the way at the crucial moment.

The Gi 636 then whisked us along the 20km or so to San Sebastian.  We were heading for the motorhome aire to the west of the city and approached via a succession of short tunnels.  Everything was going swimmingly until about 3 junctions from our destination when my phone lost its data signal and Google Maps cut out visually.  Thankfully the audio kept going and we were therefore able to find our way here successfully on "Moaning Minny's" verbal instructions.

The full hyphenated name of this marvellous town is Donostia-San Sebastian, the Donostia bit being the Basque name much in the same way as we have Derry-Londonderry in Northern Ireland where different parts of the population can't agree on a name so we end up using both.

The aire is in an area of town surrounded predominantly by University buildings so, wiith the van successfully parked, we caught a bus downtown to the Casco Viejo old town area.  I was rather caught on the hop by the fact that mask wearing is still obligatory on public transport here but Lisa saved the day with a spare one dug from the depths of her bag.

Casco Viejo is built on a grid pattern of streets which is completely atypical of Spanish towns.  The reason for this is the British burnt the original old town to the ground in 1813 and almost everything we see now has been rebuilt since then.  Doesn't that make you feel proud?!

The City Hall was originally built in 1887 as a casino but was closed down in 1924 when gambling was criminalised. It was subsequently converted to be the town council's offices in the 1940s.

This is the Basilica de Santa Maria.  There is a more modern cathedral in the newer part of the town but this is reckoned to be infinitely more interesting.  We didn't go in.  They were charging a whopping €3 a head for the priviledge.  Us pensioners aren't made of money Senor!

We pretty much stumbled across the Plaza de la Constitucion.  They hold festivals here and it's also been an arena for bullfighting in the past.

We had our first taste of pintxos, which is the Basque equivalent of tapas.

The church of San Bizente.  We tried to listen in to what the tour guides were saying about the place but couldn't understand them so we pootled on.

We walked around the Monte Urgell headland.  This was the view back towards the Gros District.

This is Playa de Onderreta from Monte Urgell.

The historic harbour area is now mainly full of expensive yachts.

We decided to give the Aquarium a visit.  It's in 2 parts.  Before you get to the fish there is a museum of Basque maritime history.  There are some wonderfully intricate models of old boats.

A 1930s diorama of one of the wharfs at San Sebastian created by one of the people who worked there.

The Basque area also has a big whaling history.  This is the skeleton of a Northern Right Whale captured locally in 1878.

I loved this sculpture of a tuna, mainly created from discarded tuna cans washed up on the shores of Fuerteventura.

On to the aquariums.  These jellyfish were mesmerising.

Colourful urchins.

A coy seahorse.

The main oceanarium is 13x13.5 metres and holds 1.8 million litres of water.

All of the 30 species of fish are to be found locally in the Cantabrian Sea....

...With the exception of a couple of Tiger Sharks.

Shark eggs or "mermaids purses".  You could see the infant fish moving around inside them. 

The last section was dedicated to tropical fish.  Obviously they had to have these guys looking for their errant offspring.

I've never even heard of Pineapple fish before.

Scorpion Fish

OK enough of the fishy photos. This fella was just trying to blow us a goodbye kiss.

Heading back towards the van now we walked along a section of Playa de la Concha with some excellent sand art.

This was looking back at Monte Urgell and the old town.

Back at the aire and it's pretty much cheek by jowel so I'm glad we got here early in the day to bag our spot.  We've actually got British neighbours.  He's already stuck his head in the window and asked for 2 pints of lager and a packet of crisps!

15 September 2022 - The Costa Vasca