Europe Blog #3

San Sebastian:

We boarded our train and 5 or 6 hours later, we found ourselves on the outskirts of San Sebastian which is the north western boarder of Spain next to France. It is where the Basque people are from.

Unfortunately the rental car I had booked was not at the airport as I thought it would be. It was in the center of the city. When I called to sort their location, I found out that they had closed for the day (at 8pm), so we took a cab to our hotel and decided to deal with the car in the morning. The following day we wandered into the city, only to find out it was practically an international holiday for boat races. There were thousands upon thousands of people filling the streets. We met with another photographer friend of mine so that he could introduce us to Spanish tortillas (which is essentially an egg and potato omelette) and then off to the rental car company we went. This is a good time to mention I regularly rent cars in the US (probably once a month when traveling), however I've never rented one in Europe before. Unfortunately, it was a big shock when we found out that they don't have automatic cars, and neither my boy or I ever learned to drive stick shift. This was an expensive lesson, because they had one car that was not stick, it was the biggest upgrade one could get-a 2016 Mercedes, and it cost $300 more to have it for less than 48 hours. Oops. We sucked it up, because what else can you do really (except go home and learn how to drive stick so this doesn't happen next time you go to Europe), and then we went off to the San Sebastian history museum.

At the museum I got to see the history of the people-like most things, some good, some bad. This culture is very competitive and very into sports. There were old bowling tournements and so many interesting religious pieces. The Basque people hunted whales, and wore unsual fashions. Unfortunately, I can't help but frown over the bull fighting. I hate the idea of torturing or hurting animals for sport, and really hope that this tradition will get squashed in the near future.

Following the museum we visited an old castle called Hondarribia, and the town was adorable. We ate lunch here, shopped, got to experience some of what the locals experience. There were groups of people singing (I had a few snapchats that showed this), and there was a kids show that drew huge crowds to see clowns performing. There was also a carnival and from across the water, you could see France.

The whole experience was wonderfully romantic. We held hands and just took it all in. The people, the animals, the environment. The air is so clean, the ocean breeze smelled different than every other beach I had been to. I wish we could have stay longer.

The following day we were off to Barcelona-but not before stopping in a town called Maya. 

(to be continued!)