San Sebastián esta muy bien!
Author: Brandon (Dad)
It's official. Our family is in love with San Sebastián.
You know it's a good spot when you spend time studying the advertisements at the real estate offices, figuring out if you could swing a house here.
This city in Basque country has a bit of everything: amazing beaches, spectacular architecture, history, tremendous food.... we're kicking ourselves for staying just four days here.
Here's a quick recap of the past two days:
Sunday
San Sebastián, known as Donostia in the Basque language, is home to three beaches, so we wandered by all three of them on Sunday, before settling in at Ondaretta (known as the "family" beach). We rented an umbrella and spend pretty much the entire afternoon soaking in the sun and playing in the water. The Bay of Biscay is very inviting, but pretty cold.
After the beach, we wandered around in the district we are staying in, Gros, experiencing the area's famous "pinchos". If you don't know what pinchos are, here's Wikipedia to fill you in.
We hit up a half dozen or so places, trying to select ones that had the futbol on. We don't like to stray too far from a TV showing the World Cup action!
Around 9:30 or so, we went to an Italian place and shared a pizza. The waiter was very impressed with Livi's Spanish language skills. Following dinner, we came back to our place, tucked the kids in, and Tiffany and I popped down to the street for one more glass of wine. The street we are staying on (Peña y Goñi) is filled with little cafes and pincho bars.
Monday
We started off Monday by taking a bus up to Estadio Anoeta, home to Real Sociedad, the local football team. They play in La Liga with giants such as Barcelona and Real Madrid. Unfortunately, we were not able to take a tour as the stadium was undergoing major renovations, but we did pop in to the store and peek around a bit.
We then walked back through the city, past a University (La Universidad de Deusto) and through a very nice park that featured many walkers and runners.
We popped in for an afternoon pincho, then had an American style lunch of hamburgers, before exploring Monte Urgull, a forested area that sits atop a hill overlooking the beaches and city. Home to an old fort, cemetery, castle, and more photo opportunities than you can imagine, we spent a good hour or two walking along the old pathways. This place was unbelievably gorgeous... the photos don't do it justice.
The day concluded with us wandering through the Old Town, stopping at pincho bars, watching the World Cup games, and drinking wine.
We ended up eating dinner at the same place as the night before. I knew they had a great big TV and I wanted to watch the end of the England/Tunisia game. Turns out, the waiter we had the same one as the night before. He remembered us and said we couldn't use English... he wanted to hear Livi's Spanish again.
Wow, that's a long blog post. I tried to leave some stuff out, but all of these experiences were important to us and a big part of our experience in this beautiful city. We are writing this blog for two reason, really....
1. To make our friends and family jealous.
2. To document our experiences so that we will have them in the future.
It's about 8:30 in the morning on Tuesday and the kids are still sleeping. I've been enjoying my mornings on the tiny little balcony attached to our fourth floor flat. Think I might pop down to street level for some coffees and pastries.
Until next time, keep on traveling! (That's what my hero Rick Steves says...)
It's official. Our family is in love with San Sebastián.
You know it's a good spot when you spend time studying the advertisements at the real estate offices, figuring out if you could swing a house here.
This city in Basque country has a bit of everything: amazing beaches, spectacular architecture, history, tremendous food.... we're kicking ourselves for staying just four days here.
Here's a quick recap of the past two days:
Sunday
San Sebastián, known as Donostia in the Basque language, is home to three beaches, so we wandered by all three of them on Sunday, before settling in at Ondaretta (known as the "family" beach). We rented an umbrella and spend pretty much the entire afternoon soaking in the sun and playing in the water. The Bay of Biscay is very inviting, but pretty cold.
After the beach, we wandered around in the district we are staying in, Gros, experiencing the area's famous "pinchos". If you don't know what pinchos are, here's Wikipedia to fill you in.
We hit up a half dozen or so places, trying to select ones that had the futbol on. We don't like to stray too far from a TV showing the World Cup action!
Around 9:30 or so, we went to an Italian place and shared a pizza. The waiter was very impressed with Livi's Spanish language skills. Following dinner, we came back to our place, tucked the kids in, and Tiffany and I popped down to the street for one more glass of wine. The street we are staying on (Peña y Goñi) is filled with little cafes and pincho bars.
Monday
We started off Monday by taking a bus up to Estadio Anoeta, home to Real Sociedad, the local football team. They play in La Liga with giants such as Barcelona and Real Madrid. Unfortunately, we were not able to take a tour as the stadium was undergoing major renovations, but we did pop in to the store and peek around a bit.
We then walked back through the city, past a University (La Universidad de Deusto) and through a very nice park that featured many walkers and runners.
We popped in for an afternoon pincho, then had an American style lunch of hamburgers, before exploring Monte Urgull, a forested area that sits atop a hill overlooking the beaches and city. Home to an old fort, cemetery, castle, and more photo opportunities than you can imagine, we spent a good hour or two walking along the old pathways. This place was unbelievably gorgeous... the photos don't do it justice.
The day concluded with us wandering through the Old Town, stopping at pincho bars, watching the World Cup games, and drinking wine.
We ended up eating dinner at the same place as the night before. I knew they had a great big TV and I wanted to watch the end of the England/Tunisia game. Turns out, the waiter we had the same one as the night before. He remembered us and said we couldn't use English... he wanted to hear Livi's Spanish again.
Wow, that's a long blog post. I tried to leave some stuff out, but all of these experiences were important to us and a big part of our experience in this beautiful city. We are writing this blog for two reason, really....
1. To make our friends and family jealous.
2. To document our experiences so that we will have them in the future.
It's about 8:30 in the morning on Tuesday and the kids are still sleeping. I've been enjoying my mornings on the tiny little balcony attached to our fourth floor flat. Think I might pop down to street level for some coffees and pastries.
Until next time, keep on traveling! (That's what my hero Rick Steves says...)
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