San Sebastián - Donostia and Orio

Odometer reading: 159943

Today was our wedding anniversary, the thirteenth.

We had discussed wanting to look at the sea in the morning, see the waves, and then decide whether to stay and surf or to leave. The decision was made quickly, as the wind had picked up, but there were hardly any waves to be seen.

So we concluded that it was time to leave France behind and continue on to Spain.

It took us about 2.5 hours to reach San Sebastián - Donostia. This place was chosen by Sebb as our destination, especially because of its name. We drove through winding country roads, green forests, and it was surprisingly mountainous, which Gary managed without complaints, often only in third gear. Thus, we passed through the French Basque Country, where one town followed another, and the exit sign of one was often directly next to the entrance sign of the next little town.

As we drove over a bridge in Hendaye, crossing the La Bidassoa River, we didn't really notice the police car of the French Gendarmerie parked there. It was more the road signs on this side of the river that were slightly different, which made us wonder. Had we just crossed the border completely carefree? The advertisements were in Spanish, the shops too, and so we were now presumably in the Spanish town of Irun.

After a few kilometers, the typical sign with the national speed limits appeared. 50 in urban areas, 80 outside of town, expressway, highway.

Our chosen parking spot in San Sebastián was unfortunately fully occupied, so we simply went two corners down and - after a thorough review of the parking rules in Spain - parked our Gary by the roadside.

As we looked around, we realized that we had landed in the university district of the city, and we felt quite at home. Anthropology Institute, Faculty of Law, as we peeked through an open window into a chemistry laboratory and could see a tablet press in the next room, pharmacy and chemistry couldn't be far behind. We walked around the area but found even the cafeteria closed; it was evidently semester break.

We began our city tour on foot at the beach, which curved around the entire Concha Bay. The former imperial spa had a wide waterfront promenade and an impressive city hall. Then we went into the old town with its many tapas bars.

The city had long had two names since it was located in the autonomous community of the Basque Country. Basque Donostia, Spanish San Sebastián was a more or less literal translation. In fact, everything in this region was multilingual, first Basque and then Spanish. One must not forget that the armed independence struggle of the ETA was only declared officially over in 2011.

The bus brought us back to Gary around 5:30 PM. We tried our luck again at the parking spot, which now had a line waiting at the entrance.

So we simply drove on, out of the big city. After about half an hour, we reached the small village of Orio by the Oria River. The city officials had set up the motorhome parking area at the yacht harbor under the highway bridge, which was quite noisy, but the parking fees were very reasonable.

In the evening, we treated ourselves to a wedding anniversary dinner in the town center. The tabernas were spread around the market square and offered good food at reasonable prices. When we ordered tortilla with cod for an appetizer, we were a bit surprised when we were served an omelet. It was delicious, but not what we expected. Thus, we learned that tortillas in Spain have nothing in common with Mexican corn or wheat tortillas.

On our way back to Gary, we took a little time to stroll through the beautiful, steep streets and stairways of the now dark, old town.