Anyway. Spring break happened in mid March and my Parents came over to Spain for three weeks. We spent the first week and a bit travelling around the northern part of Spain.
We rented a car and drove up from Madrid to Santiago de Compostela which is in the Autonomous Community of Galicia. On the way we stopped by a roadside restaurant with a great Menu del Dia which had good meat. we we finally got to Santiago, we had to navigate the old city streets which were windy and confusing, but we found the apartment without too much fuss. We even got to find a good parking spot right next door and didn´t have to pay for the parking spot. The apartment was super cute, almost like it came out of Ikea. The woman who owns it lives upstairs with her family. After we settled we went exploring, and I realized that I should have brought my winter jacket instead of my spring one. I ended up wearing two sweaters almost the entire trip. True to good Hatayama Fashion, we bought food for dinner that night and ate in.
Thats us eating our first meal in. My mothers favorite treat from Santiago that we found was the Tarta de Santiago. It´s basically an almond cake,that is round and comes in different sizes and the really cool ones have the Cross of Santiago in powdered sugar on the top. Here is the one that we thought was the best (yes, we tried various ones...)
Very untrue to Hatayama Fashion, we continually got up late and didn´t make it out of whatever lodging we had until around noon. We went to see the cathedral and we walked around the newer part of the city. I really like Santiago de Compostela. Its a nice city to walk around in with some nice parks and the skys were pretty clear and the people are friendly. I don´t know if I could live there for a long time,but it is a nice place to get away from the rush of Madrid. I think that the main highlight of that day was eating some really good seafood. We found a restaurant that had the best deal (the winner by a few euros), on a huge seafood plate. The restaurant was definitely family owned and run and the family lived in the upstairs part. The owner´s little boy went hammering and banging his way around the dinning room before being taking up for his nap. It had both cold and warm seafood, but my favorite one was the Bogavante, which is like Lobster, but so much better. This is also one time where I didn´t mind the simple seasonings of Spanish food. Fresh seafood that has been put on the grill with olive oil and salt is amazing. It has multiple types of clams and crabs and it had two scallops drenched in a type of tomato sauce. I think my mom was in heaven. She had her favorite white Spanish wine, amazing seafood, and her favorite Spanish sauce, and crusty bread. oh, and of course, I was there...
After Santiago de Compostela we drove east towards Austurias and Cangas de Onis where we would be staying one night in the Parador there. It was a nice little Parador with a good breakfast and nice grounds. In Cangas de Onis there are a lot of wilderness adventure programs. When we were driving out the next day we stopped in the town next door and saw an old Roman Bridge and had our taste of Austurian cider. It tastes a lot more like beer than the stuff I've had from the large fabricated bottles. And it it sour. It is poured form high up at an angle so that the liquid hits the glass. Only an inch or so of cider is poured and you are supposed to drink it all in one swig. Kinda like a shot. After obtaining our cider drinking experience we continued on and got sidetracked into visiting the Basilica Covadonga which is up an insanely steep narrow road that is packed by tour buses. It is set into a mountain and is very majestic at the top.
We then continued our journey onto Basque country, but once again got sidetracked into stopping in Santander for a bathroom/leg stretch break. Santander is right on the ocean and has a beautiful wide walkway right along to water. We figured we should try and get some food because by the time we would get to Basque country, all of the stores would be closed. While we wandered and passed many closed supermarkets we ran into the procession path of the brotherhoods (it still being holy week). We saw an adult one and we saw a child one. We got out of Santander just before the procession hit the main streets we needed to get out and continued on to our final destination.
We arrived in Zarautz, which is a small beach town, and I do believe it was raining. The apartment we stayed in was really nice and was like living in someone's home instead of living in a vacation apartment. Our first day there we went to Bilbao to see the Guggenheim Museum. It was raining again, but we had a good time at the museum. We saw a very interesting exhibit by a Japanese artist who focuses on using anime characters and flat paintings, and bright bold colors. Getting out of Bilbao for us was a huge guessing game. We had a map from the house and a freeway map, but the two didn't quite match up. We spent about an hour trying to get out and one time getting out, but not really getting out and then finally going back into the city and through to the other side where we saw more of the industrial parts of the city and we finally made it onto a main recognizable highway.
The following day we went to San Sebastian to try our hand at tapas. Once again it was raining, but we drove to the top of one side of the bay and found this campy little amusement park that was amazing. To get in you have to pay the toll at the gate which is monitored by a real live person who physically pulls the gate up and then lowers it again using a sting.lever system. All quite high technology. It had pony rides and bouncy things, and a water ride, and a roller coaster and water bumper cars, all made for little kids, but fun for big kids too. You also got some of the best view of the bay from the top where it was. After we rode the roller coaster, we went back into the city part and walked around a bit and then went for some tapas in the old neighborhood. We walked down the streets and everything was just lit up with a sign for tapas or a bar or a restaurant. My parents concluded that the best tapas we got were from the modern place. They were the most creative and had the most flavor. However, my mother decided that the Tapas life is not for her because she doesn't like standing that much.
On our last day in Zarautz, the sun finally came out and we decided to take the owners of the apartment up on their suggestion to go to this cider restaurant that was up the hill from the city. When they said, up the hill, they meant up the hill. The last little climb was a one way dirt road. The building a very plain, but modern and you get to pour your own cider, as much as you want from the little spickets on the wall. There were 4 options to choose from ranging from sweet to less sweet (but I couldn't tell the difference...). It was a good birthday lunch for my father. If we had more time we would have been able to get a tour of the cider making facilities from the owner himself, but we were rushed for time because I had to get a train back to Madrid from a city that was around 3 hours away.
We had a beautiful if rushed drive to Vittoria where I was to catch my train. By accident we stayed on the old windy highway instead of taking the new shiny one which slowed us down and then we had the difficult task of finding the train station with no directions. My friend had told me the name of the street it was on, but my Dad's IPhone wasn't being very helpful so we drove around and ran into the sign that pointed to the train station. It did not help that the streets are not straight and the arrows on signs vaguely point in a direct direction...we did eventually make it, on time to the station and I boarded the train, only to wait about an hour for it to leave. Later in the ride, people were coming on the bus only to find that because it was missing some cars, they didn't have any seats. Luckily I had gotten on at the start point, so I got to keep my seat the whole way.
My Parents were a week or so toodling around northern Spain where they drank wine and met up with our friends on Barcelona before they came back to Madrid. I took them to see my school in Moralzarzal, and we got the best churros with chocolate and we ate the the world's oldest restaurant. The Restaurant Primo de Botin has a certificate from the Guiness Book of world records that proves that it is the oldest. We also ate some Senagalese food, because I was in a Spanish food rut and needed so variation. My friend had studied in Senegal and so she took us to a restaurant in the Lavapies neighborhood. The neighborhood is a little rougher than other parts of Spain, but it is also more ethnic. There are a ton of Indian Restaurants and a couple Senegalese places and some Thai places.
It was really nice to have my parents around town for a while and to car travel with them. It was really fun to drive and to show them where I live and where I work.
