We woke up early to do yoga on the beach, but the weather disagreed with our plans. Together, we searched for a pastry shop for breakfast. We found a cute little colonnaded square and claimed a table. Here, nothing has a set price because everything was weighed and charged by the pound. We ate our goodies and sipped our tiny cappuccinos. We made friends with a baby boy that had been carrying a breadstick around. He greeted Aria with a wave and decided he wanted to share his breadstick with her as he spit it out on her lap.
We discovered a Basque history museum with free admission that day. The building that held the exhibit was a unique blend of a historic building and a modern metal green-wall building. The museum was very interesting, especially the religious section. The Basques didn’t really seem to worship a higher power. Rather than depicting a deity, their church was clad in paintings of themselves doing important every day activities. They seemed to worship the ability in everyone and elements in nature that allowed their settlement of the Basque Country to be successful.
We met Hannah at McDonald’s for a second time. It was too cold to lay out on the beach, but we needed to catch up on everything we’d both been doing the last eight months. We bought chocolate, sidra (a type of Spanish cider), funny-looking round crackers and some cheeses. We sat underneath the boardwalk above and hung our feet over the side of the ledge.
Some boys walked by and started saying creepy things to us. We paid them no mind until they started coming back toward us. They were kinda scary and wouldn’t leave us alone. Hannah was about to tell them to “fuck off,” but I think they got the idea before she needed to say something. I’ve never met American boys that are so persistent. Men here make a really strange noise when you walk by. They start clicking their tongue and teeth together to make a noise that sounds relatively like a squirrel. It’s quite gross, and definitely scary.
Hannah and her friends wanted to take us for Indian food on the main strip. Before we even ordered, we were wreaking havoc on the restaurant. We had smuggled two bottles of Sidra (cider) into the restaurant. Someone at the table accidentally kicked one bottle over and it exploded all over the floor. The man was not happy as he mopped the floor and muttered to himself.
A couple joined us in the restaurant. The two tried to speak in Spanish, but no one could hear past their southern twang. Locals have been making fun of us and saying that there is a distinct American accent every time Americans try to speak Spanish. Until hearing this couple, I never really noticed this issue before. “Unos maysa paara dose poor-favore, grassy ass,” made us feel quite embarrassed.
We decided to stay the night in San Sebastian again in order to have another beach day the next day. The locals of San Sebastián boasted about how San Sebastián was far superior to Bilbao–the next stop on our agenda. We were kicked out of our AirBnB because Ricky had other guests coming. Thankfully, Hannah’s friend Moo graciously offered us the floor of her apartment. It was so nice to be welcomed by someone who had just met us. The night was very hot and thus we discovered that our lightweight vinyl sleeping bags are not awesome. We woke up simultaneously, several times during the night, gasping for air and clinging to our mummy-bags.
