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Santander to San Sebastian (4,137 kms)

Sep 27, 2011

The day has become hot and humid but the riding through great sweeping curves and hills on the motorways has been enjoyable. We also learnt why it has been so smoky the last few days. We had wondered if there were fires in the area but it is very green and that seemed unlikely but on the way out of Santander this morning we discovered some forested areas which had been logged in the process of burning off the refuse on the forest floor, so there you go. We wound our way back through alpine regions which looked for all the world like the Swiss Alps complete with the mountain chalets. Very quirky. We have also travelled through some terrific tunnels today and we are so impressed with the engineering of theses European Motorways tunnels and bridges,

We stopped off in Bilbao to visit the Guggenheim Museum. The town itself had some very nice buildings and public spaces but felt cramped and grubby in a lot of areas. The Museum on the other hand was a spectacular building to say the least. There are twenty separate galleries and it confirmed for me that I am not into Abstract or Modernistic art on the whole. There were a couple of pieces that I liked and would have liked to see the water garden with fire fountains active but it was undergoing some work. The reflections of the fire on the water and against the shining titanium exterior walls of the museum would have looked spectacular.



The Museum entry complete with an interesting piece of artwork – A Floral dog

We were gobsmacked at the end of our tour when we wanted to purchase a calendar to find they have postcards and calendars of their art but none of the building! Clearly they want people to buy one of their obscenely expensive books which I was too mean to do. Ah well, you get that! The building itself was exquisite. It had beautiful soaring spaces and changing shapes of marble, glass and steel on the inside and glass marble and titanium sheeting on the outside. It was apparently built to look like a ship in full sail on the river which on some angles probably does. My practical self-wonders about the cost and overall purpose, but I loved the space and feel of it.



Another piece of external Artwork and so able to be photographed guaranteed to freak out my girls....but having said that I wouldn’t like to walk past it closely myself!

From Bilbao we headed to St Sebastian and it was largely a hot though spectacular ride with momentary relief from the temperature on the shady sides of some of the mountainsides and we were glad to get into the hotel and have a welcome shower and just chill in the bar. The temperature is 27 degrees and the same is expected for tomorrow and then 28 the next day.

Bits and Bobs:

An observation of the universality of human kind. Traffic on motorways / large arterial roads close to and winding through cities / large towns definitely have more aggressive / impatient daily commuters than out on the motorways on the weekends. Found some really aggressive pushy sods today with flashing lights and the works to get us back into the lane after passing ….even though the speed limit had changed and at that stage we were 13kmh over the limit! Needless to say he disappeared from view like a rocket with my best compliments behind him…..well okay that was a bit of a stretch but I refrained from giving him the finger or throwing my hand in the air in a ‘what the’ manner so I did well.

Last nights’ accommodation:

Gran Hotel Victoria
Calle de Maria Luisa Pelayo 38
39005 Santander Spain

A lovely hotel just a building or two back from the beach but with a lovely view of the beach. Rooms’ nice, bike parking, staff helpful but not much English which is fair enough because we don’t have much Spanish but we all muddled our way through. A lovely relaxed atmosphere with big veranda and grassy areas outside with room to relax. Lots of hydrangeas and other ‘simple’ flowers in the gardens here as well as the public areas (canna lilies and begonias and the like). I’m particularly grateful to the young man who spoke better English than most there as he has arranged to send my riding glasses to the hotel we are currently at as I left them in the room. DUH! Finally figured out how come the sun was so glary this morning when we were really too far to go back and get them.



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