Eight Years, and Counting

Today, July 25, marks 8 years since we arrived in San Sebastian. And counting, because in two more years we can seek Spanish citizenship. Doing so is not something we planned to do when we arrived, but now that it’s not that long to go, we would say that it is fairly certain that we will do it. We have never regretted our decision to move here, not even for a minute. So, why wouldn’t we seek the advantages of being dual nationals?

We continue to be enthralled by the Basque region, culture and people. Just last weekend I went to see a mini concert of the city’s Txistulari band, made up primarily of txistu players.  The txistu is a vertical recorder, typical of the Basque Country, with three holes that are played with the left hand. This band plays every Sunday morning on the street below where we live and also at various city events. We think it sounds a bit like a fife and drum band from the American revolution.

Note that some of the musicians play two instruments at a time – the txistu with the left hand, and a drum or tambourine with the right. While the crowd was small, the enthusiasm was genuine. It was delightful to watch young children dancing with their parents and grandparents.

Living in such a small city with most everything within walking distance makes it easy to take advantage of everything on offer, if we choose to do so. On Tuesday, the last day of good weather we had – yes, it’s been raining a lot this week, which we don’t mind – I decided to inflate my inner tube and head to the beach for a float. It was a great decision. One I hope to repeat often during August. This afternoon, we’ll catch one of the free jazz concerts that are part of Jazzaldia. Tomorrow, we head to Bilbao for the Blues Festival there – an annual favorite.

More on the musical summer we’re enjoying soon.

Hasta pronto,

Shana & Jeff

More Satisfied Visitors

After bidding farewell to Bruce Springstein and our Springstein-loving friends, our next visitors arrived just a few days later. Andrew and Karen, with whom we stayed on our trip to Washington, D.C. last year, came for a few days before heading to see the Rioja region and other parts of the Basque country on their own. Then, Andrew returned alone to further explore with us. Note that all of the photos except one are Andrew's, as he is an excellent photographer, and this gave Shana a welcome break from having to play that role.

As always, we were happy to show off San Sebastian, and especially its amazing food options. A pintxos crawl gave us a chance to not only show off the food, but also our ability to correctly pour Basque cider and Txaikoli, the local white wine.

Given how much we love hiking from Zarautz to Getaria for lunch, we repeated that day, which worked out great because we got to try a fish that we had never even heard of before. Although it was very hot, the hike over, part of which runs along the Camino de Santiago, was still beautiful.

Our table had a great view of the beach, which was very crowded given that we were there on a Sunday. In fact, we had never seen Getaria so busy.

Andrew's return allowed us to show off some of the "secondary" sights that we don't get to show to people who come for a shorter visit. First, we went to San Jean de Luz in France for a bit of French culture, history, and food. It was a beautiful day, and we sipped wine while we watched an orchestra perform on the main square (ironically performing two songs by Frankie Goes to Hollywood, a classic US 80's band) before walking around the city and having lunch overlooking the beach in the neighboring town of Ciboure.

Of course, given the extra time, we had to take Andrew to our favorite place in San Sebastian, the Chilida sculpture El Peine del Viento (The Comb of the Wind). The day we visited was a bit overcast and stormy, but in some ways that improves the spot because it is fun to watch the waves crashing among the rocks and the sculpture.

On Andrew's last day, we did another of our favorite things, a boat tour from Zumaia to see/learn about Flysch. It was a beautiful day although the sea was pretty rough making for a fun ride along the cliffs.

After the boat, we had time before lunch to walk down to the main beach, and through a bit of the Geopark to get a closer view of the flysch.

Finally, we almost never see the sunset in San Sebastian during the summer because it does not occur until almost 10:00 pm (thanks Franco!) and we are rarely out that late. But we did see one or two while Andrew and Karen were here, and Andrew went out alone to get photos of others. Here are just two of the best.

Note the difference in the number of people on the beach. On a clear, weekend night, the beach is still crowded at 10 pm, while on a more blustery, weeknight it is virtually empty.

More to come from summer in San Sebastian soon.

Jeff and Shana

Springsteen in the House!

When I learned last October that Bruce Springsteen would be performing in San Sebastian on my birthday, it felt like a sign. We had never seen him perform, had heard for decades how amazing he is, and since he is 75 years old, we knew that if we wanted to see him, 2025 would be the time. I immediately messaged my dear friend Debbie – a true Springsteen fanatic since age 16 – to invite her to come from CA, and she didn’t hesitate in responding, “YES!”

Buying tickets was a stressful process. We managed to secure two tickets on the floor for Debbie and Rebekah, her law school buddy/fellow Springsteen fanatic, and two seats for Jeff and me. Rebekah also secured two seats for the second show that was added as tickets for the first were selling out. The excitement in San Sebastian was palpable. These wouldn’t be the Boss’s first shows here, but they would be the only shows in Spain during this tour.

Debbie & Rebekah arrived on Wednesday evening (June 18) and immediately went to the “roll call” location where they were assigned numbers 163 and 164, which gave them the opportunity to be “on the rail,” or as close to it as possible. The process required them to check in three times per day (10 am/3 pm/7 pm) until the day of the show, when they would have to arrive at 3 pm for the 9 pm concert. Failure to appear meant you lost your place.

Learning this, we were beyond thrilled to have seats and no obligation to do anything but show up. The idea of spending so much time and effort was unimaginable to us. Ultimately there were more than 600 fans with numbers who queued for the opportunity to get in before anyone else. Bruce fans form a serious  community, and Debbie and Rebekah made many new friends and saw others they had met in Cork, Ireland last year.

Fans took over the city; you couldn’t miss seeing them in their concert T-shirts and other regalia. Many of them stalked Bruce and the members of the E Street Band, inside and outside the Hotel Maria Christina – Debbie and Rebekah included. Here they are with Charlie Giordano and Curtis King:

Each day the local paper reported on the Bruce sightings. Overall, he kept a low profile because of the response when he appeared, always with a bodyguard:

In between their checking in, we enjoyed everything San Sebastian has to offer, especially the food:

On the night of the concert, we sent Debbie & Rebekah with a picnic to the stadium, where they spent 3 hours waiting outside with their new besties, then another 3 hours inside in front of the stage. We waltzed in about 20 minutes before showtime. Based on their views of Bruce as he visited “the pit,” one might argue it was worth it:

In contrast, here was our view from the last row of the stadium:

We were perfectly happy where we were, with seats, unobstructed sight lines, a view of how the entire crowd was reacting, and our own space. The show was impressive; they played for just under 3 hours. We would not consider ourselves converts to Team Bruce, but we are pleased that we had the experience, especially since it is possible this could be the last European tour.

The second concert was 3 days later (June 24) – Bruce is smart to rest up between shows. This time Debbie & Rebekah had seats and therefore no further “roll call” obligations. This allowed us to enjoy more outings, including a hike, and more restaurants and shopping.

We went to see the Noche de San Juan celebrations on the 23rd, which marks the beginning of the summer with bonfires. We saw the main celebration in Constitution Plaza, where there was traditional Basque dance around a tree that was later lit on fire, which was then extinguished, and then pieces of the bark were cut and distributed to the crowd. The pieces of wood are considered good luck for the year if you hold on to it.

I had never witnessed this ceremony before, which included the mayor among the dancers. I was happy Debbie and Rebekah got to see it – and get some wood (a unique souvenir).

The second concert was momentous. First, (Little) Stevie Van Zandt did not perform as he was in the hospital recovering from having his appendix removed not long after the first show. Second, they stopped the show, in the middle of a song, due to a thunderstorm. After a 30-minute break, Bruce and the band returned and played the longest set to date. They were more spontaneous and performed several songs that were not previously heard during the tour. Debbie and Rebekah were relieved to have seats, where they were protected from the heat and rain, and could rest their very tired legs and feet during the break.

The energy the Bruce fans brought to the city was eclectic and exciting. Still, I think everyone who lives here was glad to have the city back to “normal” once the Bruce circus moved on.

It was a fabulous visit and a memorable way to celebrate my birthday, shared with old and new friends.

Hasta pronto,

Shana & Jeff 

Galician Wine Tour

In early June, we joined a small wine tour (12 people plus the couple that ran the tour) in Galicia, a place that I had never visited, and Shana just visited for the first time during her art and architecture tour in April. We began in Santiago de Compostela where the Camino de Santiago ends at the city's Cathedral. Since we arrived early on the day the tour started, we had time to visit the Cathedral and have lunch. 

The Cathedral was filled with pilgrims, and we passed on visiting the tomb of Saint James since the line was insane. Lunch was at a place that Shana had previously visited, which is focused on sustainability, even to the point of working with wineries to buy wine in boxes (and not your normal boxed wine). We very much enjoyed our meal, and I got my first taste of mariscos (shellfish) for which the Galicia region is rightfully famous.

Our tour started that evening with welcome drinks and a wonderful dinner, including wine (of course) and more shellfish (in this case amazing scallops). The people were a mix (from Norway, Sweden, the UK  and the US), but everyone except us had some connection to Mallorca, where the operators own a wine business. We are not sure how Shana ended up on their mailing list, but we are glad she did.

The next day, we set out for three wine tastings. First, we stopped at Eladio Pineiro Rural Wines, where the very interesting winemaker told us the story of his winery. The coolest part of this visit was trying wines directly out of the stainless steel vats where the wine is aged. Although wine made from albarino (the primary grape in this region) is usually bottled shortly after it is made, Eladio ages his albarino for several years before bottling, so we got to do a verticle tasting of the same wine for 2023, 2022, 2021 and 2020. It was very interesting to see the differences in the wines from the different years.

After a long visit with Eladio, that included tasting two additional wines from bottles, we headed to Granbazan winery where we had both a tasting and lunch planned. Because we were running behind (a commom theme of the trip), we started with lunch, which of course included wine. Lunch was very good, and then we took a brief tour of the vineyards where we started to learn about how albarino grapes are grown. Because Galicia is very wet, albarino vines grown normally closer to the ground risk being destroyed by mildew. Therefore they are grown away on a sort of trellis known as a pergola, which allows for more air and sun exposure.

The tasting was also very good, and was well paired with food (not that any of us was hungry, but the pairings they offered did a very good job of showcasing their wines, so we had to find a way to try some). 

Our third tasting of the day at Attis Bodegas and Vinedos was probably our least favorite of the trip. It seemed more commercial, and while the wines were fine, they weren't anything special. It was also at the end of a very long day, making it harder to focus.

That night, we checked into a Parador in the city of Cambados, which is right on the coast. This was our first stay at a Parador, which are hotels in old and historic buildings throughout Spain. The Paradors, which began in 1928, were greatly expanded during the Franco dictatorship in places that he liked to vacation. We were impressed with our accomodations, and would definitely like to visit some of the other Paradors.

The next day, we only had one wine tasting and lunch, but somehow we still found a way to overindulge. The winery, Bodegas Albamar, picked us up at our hotel and the first stop was a shellfish distributor where we learned a bit about the process of growing some of the types of shellfish we ate, as well as seeing examples of many types of shellfish (they had something like 15 different types in their tanks that day).

Next we drove around a bit and saw some of Albamar's vineyards and learned about the various things they are trying in terms of grape growing. It was a beautiful day, and the scenery was amazing.

In the bottom picture above, you can see a number of small vineyards. In the subregion of Galicia that we were in, Rias Baixes, the vineyards are generally very small, and many people who live there have their own vineyard connected to their home. In this past, these grapes were often used to produce wine for personal consumption. Now, with the increased value of the grapes, most are sold to wineries to make wine commercially.

The wine tasting at Albamar was fantastic, as we tried 10 (!) different wines, including one from the winemaker's private cellar: a 10-year-old albarino that was amazing. We were, of course disappointed that we could not buy this wine, but at least we got to try it. In addition, there was more shellfish, in this case delicious mussels.

After leaving Bodegas Aldamar, we returned to Cambados for another fantastic lunch and yet more wine.

After lunch, and a bit of rest, Shana and I managed to rally ourselves and went for a walk around Cambados to see the two primary sites in the city: the ruined Church of Santa Marina, and the ruined Torre San Sadurnino, a defensive tower that dates from the 8th-9th century.

The next day, there were no wine tastings (although cava was available at breakfast), just a bus back to the Santiago airport and a flight back to Bilbao. We very much enjoyed this tour and had a lot of fun with the people we met. We are already looking forward to their next tour, possibly to the Rioja region, and maybe a trip to Mallorca to visit our new friends.

Hasta pronto.

Jeff and Shana