Bombed by Basques

Let's see, what else happened in May besides Steph's parents' visit, a weekend in Strasbourg and my parents' visit...hmm, what was it now again..? Oh, yeah, nearly a week in northern Spain with my younger brother (three years younger, not eleven minutes) Guillermo and wife Amada (their Spanish names). Just another slow month for us in Europe. No wonder I wasn't blogging.

Guillermo and Amada toured Spain for three weeks in May, a longer version of their 2003 two-week tour of Spain. What can you say, these kids love Spain. You want something crazy, here's their travel map:
They initially traveled with both sets of their parents (big group!), then my parents continued through Provence to Switzerland. After Amada's parents split, Steph and I met Guillermo and Amada in Bilbao (below map, 'A'), the Basque country's largest city. From there we planned to canvas northern Spain via rental car, from Bilbao to San Sebastián to the Rioja wine region to Pamplona.

The Basque region is an historically- and again today mostly-autonomous territory in northern Spain dating back to ancient Roman times. Possessing its own particular culture & second language (Basque) within greater Spain's patronage, it's unfortunately infamously recognized for civil bombings by its still active "disenfranchised" separatist extremists (everybody's got 'em, huh?). How did that knowledge affect us as obvious tourists? Well, as smart tourists know, preparation and awareness are the keys to prevention, so we prevented potentially slow bar service by learning the Basque word for tapas, which is pintxos, (pronounced PEENCH-ohss) and using it exclusively. Indeed, we miraculously avoided problems!

Guillermo's, Amada's and my fairly intensive Spanish distance-tutoring program taken 2006-2007 coupled with their two-week immersion in Guatemala last summer (and Steph's general ear for language) served us well throughout the trip. Although still not fluent due to comprehension remaining frustratingly difficult due to velocity and accent (the Spanish lisp!), our communication abilities proved sufficient to garner significant acceptance by the locals.

In both our first days and night in Bilbao and subsequent two nights in San Sebastián, eating and drinking consumed us. Many people are familiar with tapas style dining, i.e., appetizer-sized portions of various traditional Spanish dishes. If you've visited Spain, as Steph and I had briefly hit Madrid (central) and lovely Sevilla (southern) in 2005, you know that like the world's every great gastronomical style, tapas as experienced locally are irreproducible; anywhere else--no matter how authentic--provides only an interpretation. Primarily because of the preponderance of tapas bars in Spain, only there can you wander from bar to bar sampling the specialty from each. As a bonus, conventional wisdom regards San Sebastián's offerings including its pintxos as Spain's gastronmic frontrunner. You'll see in the attached pictures.

Perhaps overly anxious to reunite with family (again) and sample the local fare--and probably astounded by the sheer volume of bars and food--we were served early and often and then overserved late and often in downtown Bilbao our first Wednesday afternoon and evening together. We probably haven't consumed like that since our early 20's at the U of Madison, but this time add a rich food element. Sardines, anchovies, green olives, black olives, peppers, oil, ham, sausage, eggs, octopus, foie gras, shrimp, mayonnaise, lamb, goat cheese, blue cheese, on and on. Washed down over and over with cerveza and vino tinto and the local specialty sidra (hard, dry, slightly sparkling cider). Amazingly delicious food and drinks alike so inexpensive, especially by Swiss standards! I'm not sure how to say it delicately, but before 2pm our first full day together, 3/4 of the group had unfortunately already experienced an abrupt visceral reversal (and not me, amazingly, ha! How's that for giving up the secret??).

Despite Bilbao's industrial reputation, we found it quite charming although not so much as smaller seaside San Sebastián (B). They say smart people learn from their mistakes and wise people learn from other people's mistakes; we were neither as, fooled partially by a false second-wind but mostly by the world-class, five-star cuisine (Chicago-ites, think 'Charlie Trotter's' or 'Tru' on a small(er) plate), the town's Friday evening pintxos scene swept us up and we repeated an almost-as-extravagant performance as in Bilbao. One narrow, shoulder-to-shoulder bar in particular serves as training ground for young up-and-coming international chefs (I forget the name); they feature only about eight dishes but every one is spectacular. I controversially proclaimed our 45-minute stint there as Comida del Año (MOY) worthy, although admittedly the first MOY without a restaurant bathroom and, for that matter, barely any oxygen.

Needless to say, by Saturday our roiled stomachs (too much dried cod and sardines?) and weary livers were ready for a more low-key endeavor, specifically Spanish Rioja wine country. So who needs militant separatists to critically damage our beloved bodies? We'll allow the Basque restauranteurs that honor, muchísimas gracias.

Travel map below and lots of food pics: http://www.kodakgallery.com/I.jsp?c=2hd8fyj.91mwyhdf&x=0&y=-yfwd4x&localeid=en_US


View Larger Map