an experiment in spain - day 7: very hot day in san sebastián
I had a lazy morning today. I did not set an alarm, and allowed myself to just lounge. Eventually I got up and found a place I wanted to eat breakfast, which was about a 25 minute walk away. Walking to breakfast, I snapped some pics on San Sebastian to share.
Looking out to the Atlantic along the Urumea River:
A really cool tree/shrub called a Tamarisk with its leaves turning this lavender/pinkish color in the summer:
Neat buildings
breakfast
I finally arrived at Delices Maiatza for breakfast. It was delicious, I had toast with tomato, avocodo and 2 eggs, as well as a smoothie, a mocha, and a freshly-squeezed orange juice. I forgot to take photos of the food as I dug right in.
Bay of La Concha
On my way back from breakfast, I walked by La Concha Beach in the Bay of La Concha. I had been contemplating going for a swim, but upon seeing these crowds, and that the swimming area appeared to be a relatively small roped-off area, and the heat, I decided against it.
More wandering around
I happened upon this building with a wire sculpture, titled "Grandfather and Grandson Fishing" (or El aitona y el nieto pescando). It was created by artist Iñigo Aristegi. It is a life-sized iron work depicting two seated figures: a grandfather and his grandson. Kind of neat. Not sure what the red splashes of paint are though.
Konstituzio Plaza
Bullfighting used to happen in this square, as seems to be common in many of the squares. The rooms around the plaza are numbered as the elites used to rent the rooms like private boxes at arenas today to watch the bullfighting.
cold has a taste
It was so very hot today. It was dinner time, but I did not have much of an appetite, least of all for anything that wasn't cold. Then I happened upon a popsicle shop. And I got a raspberry popsicle dipped in chocolate and rolled in waffle cone crumbs. It was perfect.
I went strolling with my cold popsicle and happened upon a jazz concert in a public square
Once my popsicle was done, I still had no desire for a proper dinner and everyone was eating ice cream. So I thought that was quite a good idea. I found a gelato shop and got a scoop of hazelnut and stracciatella (vanilla gelato with chocolate drizzled through). It was delicious and so rich. This is not the most elegant photo, but as I said, it was very hot and I wasn’t taking any chances of this falling on the ground.
chocolate flower cart
I kept wondering around and saw this neat display in the window of chocolate shop -- a flower cart, with all flowers made of chocolate!
pinxtos and txakoli
Pronounced "pinch-oes" and "cha-ko-lee", these are distinct to the Basque region of Spain. Pinxtos are little stacks of food on a toothipick, similar to the idea of tapas. The traditional way to eat them is to eat a few in a number of different places, essentially a pinxtos-crawl, and traditionally you eat them standing up. And Txakoli is a Basque wine -- it is white and has some light fizziness, and must be poured from a height (part of "waking up" the wine).
I went to one place before my popsicle and had a goat cheese, tomato and pistachios pinxtos:
Then I went into another shop, I did not get anything (as I said, I was craving cold), but did get a picture of how they display them in these pinxtos bars.
After the gelato, I felt a bit sugar-ed out and felt like I needed something that at least resembled dinner before calling it a night. So I found a neat spot I could sit down and ordered one pinxtos (ham, egg, some sort of mayonnaise, and more ham), a bocadillo (spanish sandwich, this one just had ham in it) and a glass of txakoli. All was tasty, and the txakoli was very light and cold.
And that was the day! Tomorrow I head back to Madrid on a morning train.