San Sebastian, Spain

Dean’s folks and one of his sisters paid us a visit in May/June, so we joined them for a week in San Sebastian, in Spain’s Basque country. It’s a foodie paradise, with more Michelin star restaurants than anywhere in the world. So yes, we ate!

We stayed in a fabulous big apartment right on Zurriola beach and I think one of Mini-Yazza’s highlights was running around in that, he’s not used to so much space, sadly.

Other highlights included days on the beach (the nude beach is perfect for swimming with little ones, and it’s fine to get them nude too!), eating icecreams, wandering the old town with its gorgeous churches, enjoying the aquarium on a rainy day, exploring the famous La Concha beach and walking up to the top of Urgull hill to take in the views from the 12m tall statue of Jesus. For mini, the highlight was going on a tourist train (‘Car! Car!’), stuffing a whole plate of fresh tuna in his gob, stealing my entire icecream when I offered him a lick, and having so much quality time with family.

Spot the stowaway

Bliss.

 

Fly: Easyjet to Biarritz in France, then it’s a 30-40 minute car trip. We arranged a van for the 5 of us, including a car seat for mini at £120 each way which was a bargain.

 

Stay: Hollywood Zurriola – can’t recommend this place enough, 4 huge double bedrooms, a well-equipped kitchen and loads of space. The bakery/café downstairs has the most friendly staff (Mini got loads of kisses) and just a block to the beach. Also plenty of outdoor playgrounds in the neighbourhood and a supermarket a couple of blocks away.

 

Eat: The in-laws became regulars at Bodega Donostiarra around the corner from our apartment which was busy every evening with locals. We also ate plenty of churros and plates of pinxtos as we wandered the old town, including a highlight of beef cheeks at Atari Gastroteka in the Old Town.

The view from our apartment

Alicante: Late summer sun

Our holiday years are out of sync with each other, so with Lou having a few days to take, and her sister Ange having a week’s holiday as a teacher, they decided on a cheap and cheerful girls’ holiday to Alicante in the south of Spain, where they were guaranteed sunshine even in late October.

We stayed at Playa San Juan, outside of Alicante itself, but an easy 20 minute bus ride to the city. Our hotel was a Holiday Inn, purchased as a 'Top Secret Hotel' through lastminute.com in a super cheap flight and hotel deal. 

It didn’t look like the city had all that much to offer in the off-season, so we were happy with our little hotel at Playa San Juan, complete with swimming pool and 5 minute stroll to the beach cafes and bars. We made good use of them, becoming a regular at GAME bar, which offered live music on Sunday evening, and cheap mojitos everyday. Acqua bar was pretty good for food and cofe, as was Lys de France - all with beach front locations.. 

We spent a happy few days chilling out, reading, walking, and one day exploring the castle overlooking Alicante (which they clearly want visitors to get the elevator to - we walked up and with no signs, spent 2 hours circling the mountain until finally stumbling over the entrance. We got the lift back down!).

Highly recommend Alicante - or Playa San Juan - for a sunny, relaxing time.

Barcelona!

We just spent another weekend away, this time exploring Barcelona and getting the final bit of sunshine out of the year.

What a fantastic city. From the moment we arrived we wanted to live there - the weather, the food, the Spanishness - but I guess being on holiday always puts a place in the best light and real life's a bit different.

Barcelona's a really small city, so very easy to get around and see plenty, but even so we will have to go back to fit in everything we want to do there.

We stayed at a really cheap hostel, Hostal Neutral, right in the centre of town. The place was really basic, but perfect for two nights, and cheap to boot. We arrived late on Friday night and took a midnight wander down Las Ramblas, stopping for a beer en route. We enjoyed this introduction to the city, one of all night partying and entertainment. As it was October there weren't too many tourists which made wandering along much easier.

Saturday was meant to start with a bike tour of the city, but as we'd both been really busy the week before the trip we'd forgotten to note down details of where the tour began. So instead we explored Mercat de la Boqueria, enjoying some delicious fresh juice (mmm strawberry and coconut), some seafood treats and some pastries and fruit. From there we took the metro (very simple and cheap) to Sagrada Familia, stood in the queue and paid 12 euros to get in (boy inflation goes up quickly in Spain, our guide book from 2007 had the price at 8 euros so that's a 50% increase in just three years). Gaudi's masterpiece has been in construction mode for more than 100 years and still has a long way to go. The exterior's amazing, and we both enjoyed most the more modern side of the building, designed by Josep Maria Subirachs. There's an excellent museum under the church itself and it was well worth a visit.

We finally figured out the starting point for our cycling tour and joined it at 4pm. What a brilliant way to see a city! Our tour was with Fat Tyre Bike Tours. In about 4 hours we saw various Piaza, Arc de Triomf, Palau de la Musica Catalana, Parc de la Ciutadella, Barcelona Cathedral, the outside of Sagrada Familia, and finally a drink on the beach. We will definitely look for bike tours in future, and highly recommend Fat Tyre Tours.

The following day we kicked off with an excellent breakfast sitting at the bar of Ciudad Condal and wished we'd found it for dinner the night before. After that we visited the Cathedral, took in some Catalan dancing outside, and braved the crowds to queue for Museu Picasso (the first Sunday of each month is free so it was a bigger queue than normal we expect). Well worth waiting as the museum has hundreds of pieces from Picasso's early life.

Our weekend ended with a reminder of why we'd love to live in Spain, the most fantastic tapas meal at Lonja de Tapas, just down from the museum.

Sunshine in Spain

We just got back from a totally rejuvenating mini-break in Tenerife in the Canary Islands (best known for loutish English people who want to party and eat English food and avoid anything Spanish) and it was brilliant. We stayed in an area away from the louts, the Golf Del Sur. Our hotel, the Vincci, was a 4 star place right on the waterfront, with everything we wanted for a lazy long weekend (a comfy bed, sunloungers, and great breakfasts). During our two, 38 degree days on the island, we explored the really touristy areas of Los Americas and Los Christianos, drove north to Puerto de la Cruz to check out the other side of the island, and had plenty of time lounging pool side. We ate at Tapas and Opera in Golf Del Sur, and found a fantastic fish place called Tambo’s right on the rocks at Puerto Santa Cruz, and fell in love with Canarian style potatoes. We even enjoyed the touristy cocktails with sparklers, and the karaoke-style entertainment all the restaurants have (Lou had flashbacks to the dance floor of the Happy Tav in Havelock North when one singer pulled out Kenny Rogers great “Coward of the County”). All in all a brilliant weekend and we returned sunned and relaxed – and we highly recommend Tenerife for a long weekend.

Weekend in Madrid

We spent a lovely weekend in Madrid with Lou's brother and his fiance Hannah at the end of November. With snow falling in London it was great to be in a warmer city. We had a great time, didn't overdo it (tired wee kids as we are) but the Spanish weekend has certainly made us decide to move Barcelona towards the top of our "must visit" list next year.



We saw plenty of the sights by jumping on a bus tour, went to a Flamenco dinner/show which was amazing, and visted the Museo del Prado. With only a couple of hours there we focused on Spanish artists including plenty of Goya and really enjoyed some of Flemish artist Bosch's weird and wonderful creations.


Oh and we LOVED the churros and chocolate, just the ticket for afternoon tea.