I will just preface this post with saying that I know that I’m way overdue. Especially being that it covers our summer holiday in September and we just finished Christmas. Life has been busy!
The time had finally come for part 1 of our summer holiday! We have always enjoyed taking vacation in September when the crowds are smaller and it’s cheaper but the weather is still good. And since this is the last year we can do this before Josephine starts school, we figured we’d take advantage one last time. The first week of September we were off to San Sebastian in the Basque region of Spain. It’s a place that we’ve talked about going ever since we moved to Europe plus it has been quite a while since we’ve been to Spain. So the perfect spot!
We flew into Bilbao and an hour drive later we were in San Sebastian. We kicked off our trip with a pinxtos tour (it’s the Basque region’s version of tapas). It had been recommended and was so worth it as we tried many different pinxtos including ones I know I wouldn’t have tried on my own. There was an amazing gambas one and even a few good ones with anchovies and we enjoyed them all with the typical wine, txakoli. We learned quite a bit and had amazing pinxtos from a variety of pinxto bars. A great way to start our week.
San Sebastian is ideal as it’s on the water with a big sandy beach but also has a cute little town with of course amazing food. The weather was better than expected so we spent a couple of days just down at the beach. It was Elaine’s first time putting her toes in the water and she loved the little waves! Josephine had a blast as well playing in the sand and chasing the waves.
We took a day to go explore Mount Igueldo. You take a funicular up the mountain and at the top you get amazing views of San Sebastian. There’s also a cute and old little amusement park at the top. We took a small boat ride that took you around the very edge of the mountain….amazing views indeed.
And on our other days we took time to just explore the city, and of course eat lots of pinxtos. It’s a great set up for those with kids because you essentially walk into a place (they are everywhere), pick out what you want at the bar, enjoy your selection with perhaps a beer or glass of wine and then you could be off to the next spot. We found it to really work well when you have kids that have only so much “sitting” time in them.
And that’s our trip in a nutshell. It was exactly what we were looking for...relaxing, beach, sun, food, wine, old town. We would absolutely go back!
