In Memorium

So our last day in San Sebastian, I had been scouting around trying to figure out the most efficient way to get to Hendaye, just on the other side of the Spain/France border. That would get us hooked into the French train system and on to Bordeaux. You can go with the national rail and take a few hours, or take the completely confusing Basque train, the Eusko-tren, for 1.45 euros and it only takes 30 minutes. We took the Basque train. Unfortunately HoneyCrisp was eavesdropping on my plans. She had fallen in love with Spain and did not want to go to France. She was also suffering severe depressions, vapors, water on the brain, a distinct lack of firmness and was terribly worried about her wrinkled skin. Not to shock everyone, but bottom line is, she jumped. Right down on to the train tracks and try as we might we could not coax her to safety. Well, the train was on a schedule, and pulled out.

As you can see there were many many signs for and about safety and what not to do posted about, which she ignored. I think she just decided it was time for a brave stand to finish her day(s) in Spain. Nora was inconsolable. I did not push her.

The Grocery Store in Spain

While walking around the streets of San Sebastian, we saw a big glass roof covering an escalator and decided to see where it went. We found the best grocery store. Everything you could possibly want, except maybe gummi bears.

Ok, so these are not Alaska spot prawns but at least they don't come from Thailand's depleted mangroves. Plenty of Iberico pork to go around too!

I don't know what these sort of foot/snailsnout looking things are, but they are really fresh.

Bread and Pastry anyone??


Nora is mentally calculating how much this Spanish beef costs in US dollars. You know that great "entrecote" cut can set you back a euro or two.

San Sebastian

San Sebastian is the western world capital of cuisine. It has more top rated restaurants per capita than any other place. Of course we get here in November when everyone takes a vacation and the world famous chefs are in Seattle for a food conference. I still had the best meal ever. The language and signs are unrecognizable in Basque, so we had to just stumble on things and did a very good job of it. There are the obligatory churches under repair and the scenic alleys and streets. But the added bonus is the beach plus a river that runs through the middle of the city. Here is a shot of the city hall and the surrounding tamarind trees. Since San Sebastian is in the Pyrenees mountains, it has been a hot bed of terrorist activities by a group called the ETA. While we were here the French and Spanish government had a combined group activity which resulted in the arrest of the head of the group. We also have been lucky in that there was a transportation strike last Friday and Air France, our ride home, is on strike.

There are lots of surfers even though the water has to be 5 Celsius. The only rain we have seen has been here, and it is only a cheepy-cheepy drizzle.

HoneyCrisp went out to make new friends and found a playful cupid that seemed friendly enough initially. Little did HC know, but the cupid already had a friend and tried to push HC into the river. Nora saved her, even though she is going through that phase of life with depression, wrinkling, bad smells and skin discoloration (HC, not Nora).

Nora and HC decided to go to the beach. HC demanded an umbrella so her skin didn't burn and then headed out to catch a wave. Unfortunately she washed back up.

I, in the mean time, wanted to follow Dad's admonition that you can always survive anything if you have clean dry socks. We have been traveling for almost three weeks and the strange thing about Spain is there are no laundromats. Everyone just looks at me with a blank stare when I ask, and try and send me to the tintoria (dry cleaners). The hotels all offer to send laundry out but it is 5-10 euros for a pair of socks. I finally got desperate and sent out 3 pair of socks, 3 undies, one shirt and two pair of pants. They did a lovely job and delivered it back to the room, tissue wrapped and in a basket. All for a mere $97.75. I am buying new stuff next time.

More Bilbao Art

So hanging out all over Spain, we noticed that the dogs are off leash and go everywhere with their owners, and here in Bilbao, even imitating the hands behind the back stroll. I can't figure out how they don't get hit by cars in all the heavy traffic. When we were in Seville, and a car would come up the tiny roads, we would have to slam our backs to the wall and hold our breath in order not to get sideswiped and the little dogs just sort of scooted to the side and managed not to get smooshed, but of course all dogs do seem to have the marking instinct world wide.

Some of the art INSIDE the Guggenheim is of the "what the *^*%$#@? is that supposed to be?" variety. But there was a very cool exhibit by Richard Serra, an American minimalist sculptor. It had 8 parts that were from 12' - 14' high and each weighed between 44 and 276 tons. They were huge shaped sheets of steel that reminded me of the canyons in
Southern Utah. You can walk around in these and get very disoriented. One is like a Nautilus shell, another like varying canyon walls. The steel is variegated and streaky which makes it look like windswept sandstone. They took years to shape and were made in a shipyard in Baltimore then shipped and installed in Bilbao. They are free standing, though I would not want to be wandering inside them during an earthquake.

I really wish Nora would learn to take pictures with my cell phone in under 6 minutes. She probably couldn't think straight because she had been traumatized by Momma minutes earlier. Momma even has a very realistic looking an egg sack ready to drop, but Nora would not even get underneath for the thousand euros I offered.
The workers that are all hanging around arranging things at the museum, even have to use plastic bags and duct tape to wrap their wheels so they don't mar the travertine sidewalks.

We had to go across the river to get far enough away from the main building to take pictures. The smoke puff on the left side by the water is a "fog sculpture that shoots off every hour and then floats away in an 'artistic manner' reflecting the natural environment and wind" (looked like a puff of smoke to me) There are all sorts of little surprises about, including some shooting fire that we did not get to see because we had to go home at dark to check on HoneyCrisp. She was fine, but had pushed Heimi into the profundo desfiladero between the beds and it took me 30 minutes to find and rescue him.

The Guggenheim serves as not only a museum with art exhibits, but a city icon with itself being a huge installation of art and makes for an impressive experience.

Espana Xtra - Bilbao

More Bilbao...HoneyCrisp pretty much stayed in the 5 star hotel room with her friends Sombra and Heimi, and looked out the window at Puppy in front of the Guggenheim, taking baths and ordering room service. (the little white-ish figure by Puppy's foot is the groomer)

The city is on a great river and has a "new city" and an old quarter with small winding streets and not too many churches. There are lots of arts and theatre and if Nora and I get stuck in Europe, we are going to live in Bilbao.

We had the hotel make reservations for us at the fabulous restaurant in the museum. The world famous chef Martin Berasategui really hooked us up with Cream of Cara Negra cheese and sauteed Ballobar capers, roast Aubergine with olive oil made from 1000 year old olive trees, pasta in Joselito ham stock with parmigiano reggiano foam, and roasted leg of suckling veal, lamb with lemon jalapeno broth, creamy chocolate with coffee ice cream on hot marzipan sand, and to finish, a coffee-salty yogurt drink (Sylvia, you would have loved this one!!) Dad modified his saying "eat right and get a little exercise" to keep up with the French. It is now "eat less, move more", so here are some of my portions, with my fingers included for scale.

This last photo is my finger bowl that the waiter poured hot lemon water over and it turned into a bath towel. (don't forget to bring a towel!!) ...jah

Fried or Scrambled?

My 120/220v converter melted Nora´s curling iron in about 10 seconds a week ago. I chalked it up to her iron being 15 years old. Yesterday it seems to have fried my laptop, so we will have fewer photos coming up in the blogs.

HoneyCrisp is out of control

HoneyCrisp got all petulant when she found out we went to Grazalema without her. She is getting hard to handle. Trying to find ways to punish us like stinking up the room while we are gone.
Nora gave in and got HoneyCrisp her own seat on the plane. HC pitched a fit at the isle seat and made me change so she could have the window. Then She makes a scene at the check in desk at the Bilbao hotel, Gran Domine, so everyone knows She is there, the staff bring her two cuddlies for her sleep as well as a special pillow. She likes the cat, which she names Sombra. Nora thinks that she will settle down if she gives her a bath.

Nora called me an abuser when HC jumped off the statue and rolled down the street, she called me a kidnapper when I was trying to lighten the weight in Nora’s purse and took HC out prior to going to Grazalema. So: What do I get to call Nora when she POACHED HoneyCrisp, I ask you????

Espana 8-Grazalema

This post happened before we went to Bilbao, but I was disorented and posted out of order...

But on to another day’s adventures. We had originally planned on taking the train over to Granada for another day trip, but it turns out the trip was too long and would have required an overnight stay, so we found ourselves with an extra day on our hands. Once again Jennifer’s amazing research skills came to the rescue. She wanted to see an olive oil plant (you know how she is about factories), so she found someone who specializes in three kinds of guided tours: wine, olive oil and pigs! Roger picked us up and drove us 52 miles out of the city to a little mountain town called Zahara. Let me just say that the drive alone might have been worth it, it was so beautiful. In Zahara we visited two “molinas” that pressed the local olives into oil. I’ll let Jennifer give you the details, but we got to taste some of the oil that was being pressed at the moment and man! was it good! So fruity, so green, so grassy, so GOOD! Then we drove over the mountain to Grazalema for lunch.
This over-the-mountain road was a serious ascent, I’d give you the statistics, but my grasp of the metric system sucks. On the way we picked acorns off the Holm oak. These are the acorns that the Iberico pigs eat that give the meat its unique qualities. Until I put one of those acorns in my mouth and bit it in half, I was feeling sorry for those poor pigs, but these are not anything like the acorns I’m familiar with. They’re oily and nutty, a bit like an almond or maybe a chestnut. Apparently the contain a lot of good nutrients that pass into the flesh of the pig and make Iberian pork a healthier choice. I hope that’s true as I’ve eaten more than my share on this trip.
Anyway, lunch was good, the trip was beautiful and informative and I got two birds on my life list. It was a good day . . .nll

Today Nora had glasses of olive oil for breakfast instead of sherry or cafe irlandes.

Most of the times of year, to olive oil producers are just growing olives. We luckily ended up visiting just at harvest time and the mills were just starting up. We went to a small family owned molina that was very high tech, and very clean. They do only first press extra virgin and make oil from the mazanilla and the lechina olives. The oil is centrifuged not pressed, so there are never any old or moldy bits stuck in the press mats.
Most places blend the oil, but this molina makes the pure varieties, as well as some blend of both olives. One of the owners got us a cup of manzanilla oil coming out just as it was finished and we compared that to the lechina that had been made the day before. OMineGatto, as John would say. The other thing they do is store in stainless steel vats with a nitrogen blanket taking up any headroom until it is bottled so no oxidation. Aging is not olive oils friend.

The second place we visited was old school, with the water used in the initial mixing heated by the corner olive wood and olive pit burning stove, olives crushed in a really old mill, churned in a rusty looking vat, pumped up and layered by hand on mat after mat, stacked together like a really big layer cake then put in a big press that slowly screws itself shut for 4-6 hours, all the while dumping out oil into a trough on the floor that drains into barrels and then is bottled. It was very good also, but of course I liked the little high tech place.
The very scenic drive included white villages nestled in the rough hills, goats, cows, sheep (we had local made sheep and goat milk cheeses that were fantastico!!) and a griffin vulture standing in the middle of the road…jah

Civilization returns to air travel

We are headed to Bilbao, which is somewhere in the neighborhood of 1000 kilometers north of Sevilla. I decided sitting on a train for 9 hours with two changes of train was not matching my mood, so we are taking a 1hr 20 minute flight.

HOLY COW…you walk into the airport, check your overweight luggage, and no one yells at you, you walk up to security, take your computer out and jacket off and NOTHING ELSE!! I walked through security fully clothed and with my shoes on for the first time in years.
They even have a big space with tables so you can re-pack the computer and put your jacket on in comfort, no rushing or trying to lean on the wall to tie your shoes.

Once past security you can buy a haunch of Iberico pork to take on the plane with you. Or if you prefer, have a chef grill you a new york steak or a whole fish to eat while you wait (this counter is where you make your selections) You can purchase any beverage of choice and wander around. The seating by the gates consists of regular seats or café tables with service to order a café solo or tapas tipica.
It only took 20 minutes to board the jet. We took off 10 minutes early. They served fresh squeezed juices in real glasses. They give everyone a moist toweled. We landed 20 minutes early. My luggage came out of the baggage claim first...jah

I am so disoriented.