After San Fermín and Pamplona you need to relax. So Rune and I decided to go a little bit up north to San Sebastián, then Bilbao and Santander. San Sebastián you can call the "Cannes" of Spain. It got a famous film festival and a lot of "posh-ish" tourist go there. When we were there, you couldn't hear no word in Spanish, but only in American-English. San Sebastián was populated by North-Americans. Once we were sitting on a terrace with about another 40 people, all from the States. We wanted to have breakfast. I asked the waiter: "Nos traes una carta, por favor!" ("Please bring us the menu!") He looked at us akwardly and asked "En inglés?!" ("In English?") We said kind of insulted: "Por qué? Que nos digas? No, no, en castellano por supuesto!" ("Why? What are you saying to us? No, no, in Spanish of course!") So the surprised waiter brought us the menus in Spanish. Apparently he was just used to serve American tourists. And the other thing is: I was surprised they had the menu in Spanish...!

When we arrived, we first had some "Pintxos" or "Pinchos", little canapées so-to-say. Delicious, but a bit pricey.

Then we needed to relax from San Fermines and went to the lonely beach.
Instead of having a bath in the sea we had a bath in the crowd.

But we found 2 square meters and could bake in the sun.
We even went into the water to swim, but the water was so cold that our wet trip lasted only three minutes (but twice!).

After our sunbath we explored the little hill behind the old town.
In the back you see the beach we've been before. The bay is called the "Concha", the "Shell".

Rune in front of a little island in the bay.

The shore.

The Cathedral of San Sebastián - or shall I call it the Cathedral of Cologne less one tower.

A church at the hill behind the old town. And Rune.

Tomasito and nice houses in nice colours with nice balconies .

We are having a break at a fountain.

The pavilon at the promenade. Tomasito is singing Spanish operas.

Some nice little park.

The railway station. And the one who can spot Rune on the photo gets a free train reservation from Bilbao to Roma.

Rune refreshing himself.

The next day, the weather gets rainy and foggy. Now a view from the other side of the bay.

The weather gets even worse. It's drizzling and raining.

And it's even cold. Probably now the sea water would feel warmer.

But the weather doesn't matter to Rune.
Here he speaking with his girlfriend on his phone.

Tomasito sitting like one of these sea birds on a pillar.

We try to dry the ends of the legs of our trousers.

As we are at the sea, we have dinner in a fish restaurant at the port.

My mother gave me ten euros to eat some grilled sardines.
So here is the proof that indeed I had them.

Image of the hill behind the old town at night.
What you can't see on the photo is a Jesus Christ statue on the top of the hill.

Drive with us - the trip continues to Bilbao