The Road to Huesca

So last weekend, my french partner in crime (FPIC) and I, decided that we had slept too many nights in a row in the same place. We scanned the areas around us for an exciting, beautiful, and within driving distance, place to go to. In northern Spain there is not a shortage of exciting and beautiful places so in the end we decided to point our car east and drive to Huesca.

Driving east from where we live in Pais Vasco into Navarra is funny. Pais Vasco is mountainous, very rainy,and very very green but just drive an hour east and the landscape turns to desert. It's just as beautiful but like a whole different world.


After a couple hours of driving, we happened upon this landscape (foto below). It looked cool so we slowed down and checked out the area. There were a couple of business advertising rafting and mountain sports. There seemed to be no one around, but my FPIC called some of the phone numbers on the signs and for one there was an answer. A woman answered, she was in the office and told us to come right up.

She was an older woman with two eyebrow rings who was half French, half Spanish. She and my FPIC happily blabbed away in French and pretty soon she was giving us advice on what to do and visit in all the region. We decided to stay in the area for a bit before going on to Huesca and signed up to go kayaking and rock climbing.
When we told her we were looking for a place to camp she said, no no no, you will freeze. We assured her we would be fine but she insisted that we go stay in the hostel in town. When she told us it was 30euros a night a person, my FPIC and I shared a look that said, no way in hell are we paying that. She saw this look and said, "Ok, you will come stay at my house. I have a giant house and I live along and I am lonely, so come stay with me".

So we did. We went for it and it was amazing. She had a huge 4 story house (plus and attic, plus basement) in a little town called, Ayerbe. The house had about 10 bedrooms and one working bathroom. It has been in her family for generations where they lived and harveseted almonds and got them ready to sell in the attic. Attached to the house is an old empty general store that was run by her family as well. My FPIC and I made her pasta with homemade sauce and we ate it in the old dining room that has pictures painted on all the walls, and I got to brush up on my French.

The next day we visited a nearby old and beautiful castle and went river kayaking. (Only flipped it once...when I decided to be the one to steer). The second night we stayed with her again. She had picked up another vagabond girl our age along the way who was rafting and had planned to sleep in her van. She taught us how to make donuts out of pasta and made us pomegranate salad and gazpacho. Laughed our heads off about the kayak guide who had thought I was french and had spend the day speaking to me in a really fast spanish-french mix (much to my confusion) until the end of the day when he found out that in fact I am American. At about 1am when the three of us younger folk decided to go to bed, the women put on her high heels and went to the bars to dance and play foozeball.

We never got to Huesca, but it turned out to be a better weekend trip than we could have hoped for. :D

Breakfasting in front of Castillo Loarre

Rock climbing

Until next time, folks. :D

The Stairs of Eibar

My French Partner in Crime and I have relocated: this time to Pais Vasco!

We are living in the north of spain about a half an hour from the French border. At the end of Auguest, we packed up the little green car with everything we could fit, and headed south with not much planned. Thanks to our new handy GPS, we arrived in Spain and found a camp site near the beach called Saturaan where we lived while looking for an apartment.

Upon arriving in Spain, the most daunting and amusing thing we found was the language. We are living in the Basque Country (Pais Vasco, or Euskadi), where although there is Spanish, the more often found language is Euskara or Basque. We both speak Spanish so we can get by perfectly fine, but it does get a little ridiculous when you are driving down the highway and the sign says: Atsedenleku (rest area), irteera (exit) or Legebiltzarrerako hauteskundeak departamenuarekin (who knows what that means :P).

It is really beautiful here. We found an apartment in a little town called Eibar. It takes only about 3 minutes to get out of the town and to be completely surrounded by nothing but mountains.

With only a 3 minute drive to the mountains, a 20 minutes drive to the beach, a five minute walk to the grocery store, and a 30 second walk to the bar there is never a lack of things to do.

Being located in the middle of the mountains, our little town of Eibar is small but high. In order to get to the city center from our apartment, you go down the stairs. To get back you can take an escalator back up. They are everywhere. You can take an escalator or the stairs to basically any part of town that you want.

These are the stairs/escators closest to our apartment. :)

That is all for now, but there is sure to be more news soon from Pais Vasco.