Bilbao/ Bilbo / Bizkaia

We’re in Basque country now, where everything is written in a font that looks remarkably like Asterix and Obelix and the letters X and Q appear way more often than our English-speaking tongues can fathom.

After a wonderful few days, it was time to wave goodbye to La Rioja and ‘head to the beach’, aka Bilbao and the Atlantic Coast. As we drove over the coastal mountains, the landscape suddenly changed from rocky, Mediterranean warmth to a lush green scene that looked more like northern European alpine scenery. Houses with rooves designed for serious snowfall, steep green fields, sheep and cows clinging to the hillsides. And the reason for all this greenery was immediately clear. Apparently the Aussies had only been able to pack 10 days of sunshine for their two week trip.

We arrived in our beachside town of Plentzia with its large crescent beach, inlet to a marina and river scattered with restaurants and bars. What we hadn’t factored in was that this was Atlantic beachside – waves crashing in, rain and wind lashing the coast, grey skies. It reminded Dene and Michelle of summer holidays in Albany on the south coast of Western Australia (ie: wet and cold, freezing swimming lessons). This is no longer Mediterranean Europe!

I guess we didn’t take any photos on the wet windy days. And there were a few nice days sprinkled in.

The landscape wasn’t the only thing to change. We’re in Basque country now, where everything is written in a font that looks remarkably like Asterix and Obelix and the letters X and Q appear way more often than our English-speaking tongues can fathom. While in most of Spain a simple ‘Hola!’ works as a greeting, here its Kaixo (Kai-sho).

Guggenheim Museum

The big draw for Bilbao – really, what transformed the city from a rather dreary industrial town to a world-class tourist destination – is of course the Guggenheim Museum. The building is designed by Frank Lloyd Wright and is a wonder of stainless steel and anthropomorphic curves. We peeked up at it from under our umbrella – Dene and Kerry’s magical charms seem to have worn off weather-wise. Inside, the permanent collections don’t really compare to some of the other museums we’ve seen… but… that building!

Luckily, there was a super cool temporary exhibition on the role of art and design in the history and development of the automobile. They had some pretty amazing cars on show including many one-of-a or just-a-few-of-a-kinds. We spent a couple of hours wandering and ogling the machines on display.

One of only four made, this Bugatti Type 57SC Atlantic is… pricey.

Behind Brian’s older brother is the actual Aston Martin from the James Bond movies. They even had a loop from one of the movies playing in the background, to make sure you knew! 😀

Bilbao is so much more than just the museum, too!

Padel-mania

Along with our golf clubs we’ve also brought tennis and pickleball rackets to Spain. Pickleball doesn’t seem that popular but another tennis-related sport is everywhere – Padel. Kerry is an avid tennis player and tells us that Padel is taking off in Perth so she was keen to give it a go. And give it a go we did, a couple of times. Padel is somewhere in between tennis and squash (and maybe cage fighting?). You’re surrounded by fences and glass walls, which are all ‘in play’ – though the subtleties of how that rule works in practice escaped us the first time we played. We had a great time though, no doubt to the consternation of the courts around us. When we got home that night and actually read the rules, we realized we’d missed a couple of pretty key concepts which, the second time we played, pretty much fundamentally changed the game. Never mind, still really fun. We resisted buying rackets here because… we already have sooo much sporting equipment with us it’s getting a little ridiculous.

The other game that we’ve been dying to see in action but have yet to find is Jai Alai. The way that Al remembers Jai Alai is from the opening credits of Miami Vice – apparently the game was born in Basque, but its second home is in Florida. Unfortunately it doesn’t seem that popular anymore, as we saw plenty of Jai Alai courts but no one actually playing.

Getafix

Since this part of the world has a bit of a reputation for great food, we knew we needed to be on the constant lookout. Luckily we had the inside track from a local (a friend of Al’s uncle Roy); they are part-time residents of Bilbao and gave us a comprehensive list of places we should try. And the list did not disappoint! We had the best meal we’ve had so far in Spain at a gem of a restaurant in Bilbao called ‘Ad Hoc Cascanueces’ (Nutcracker). Another recommendation for pintxos (you can’t visit Basque Country without having pintxos) in the central square of Bilbao was magnifico. And a day trip out to the nearby fishing village of Getaria provided a spectacular mountain drive followed by a great seafood meal.

Getaria – like Icebergs in Sydney!

Speaking of food, somewhat randomly we discovered that there was an award-winning restaurant in our own backyard in Plentzia. We managed to snag a reservation for Saturday lunch – sadly Dene and Kerry were already on their way home by then – we’d dropped them at Bilbao station for a train to Madrid, followed by a 200-hour flight back to Oz.

Octopus lollipops in a ceramic octopus arm – LOL!

‘A fake strawberry’, both the menu and the server were insistent on pointing out. Have others before us thought that was a real strawberry??

Bilbao Basket

You had to persevere all the way to the end to find out more about Bilbao Basket. Well done! The Basket is, of course, Bilbao’s basketball team in the Spanish Basketball League. Spaniards are pretty passionate about their sport, and basketball ranks reasonably high in their list of faves. I mean, it’s no football, but still – pretty popular. We’d seen that the Basket had managed to knock off Réal Madrid (yes, that Réal Madrid) a couple of weeks back, so when we saw that they had a home game against…somebody… we thought, why not? As an added bonus, tickets to the Basket are a little cheaper than a Toronto Raptors game… like, 10-15 times cheaper. Another reminder of how much cheaper things tend to be here. As luck would have it, the game went down to the wire, with our beloved Basket coming through in the dying seconds to hold on to a thrilling one point victory. Vamos!!

Down In Front

And with that, our time in Bilbao drew to a close. Next stop the Pyrenees, in an even smaller town, for some (more) hiking, tennis, golf and more.