San Sebastian: A Day In Spain In The Rain

We're definitely in Spain!

We didn't think we'd get the chance to visit Spain on our yearlong trip.  But while we were staying in the French Basque Country we spontaneously decided to take a day-trip to San Sebastian.  We took the Euskotren, a small commuter railway that traverses the French-Spanish border.

San Sebastian is a beautiful city on the sea, and after looking at pictures on the internet the night before our visit, I was thinking we'd need to bring our bathing suits and allot some quality time for the beach.  But then we looked at the weather report and lamented that we'd have to bring our rain jackets instead.

We made the best of it and we all enjoyed our brief, wet foray into Spain.  We did some shopping for kids' clothes (it was cheaper than in France).  We pretended we were hip and fashionable among all the trendy stores and cafes dotting the elegant city center. We strolled through the old part of the city (the "Parte Vieja") and enjoyed a tasty, leisurely lunch of tapas, wine and apple juice. The visual feast of the neatly ordered plates of colorful tapas lining the long, polished bar was an enticing prelude to the actual meal itself.  We also strolled alongside the seaside in our rain gear, trying to imagine what it would be like on a hot, sunny day.

We wished we could have spent more time in Spain, but it was a great visit and it definitely made an impression on all of us.  Two things struck me from our day in San Sebastian.  First, while it's so close to France, and while both sides of the border share a common Basque heritage, the look and feel of San Sebastian are totally different from those of its French neighbors like Bayonne and Saint Jean-de-Luz.  The French cities exude a kind of old-fashioned, small-town charm with narrow lanes lined with colorful half-timbered houses.  San Sebastian, on the other hand, is a city of grand boulevards lined with stately Belle Epoque buildings.  Even the old part of town - which according to Lonely Planet has a higher concentration of bars than any other neighborhood in the world - feels more chic and worldly than historic.  It's not just that San Sebastian is larger and more cosmopolitan - the city is noticeably distinct from its French cousins in its personality, demeanor and urban design.

Second, on both sides of the border, many signs are bilingual.  But in the French Basque Country, signs are labelled in French on top with the Basque translation below.  In San Sebastian, Basque is on top with the Spanish translation below.  And in a number of places, the Spanish was scratched or crossed out.  I don't want to read too much into this observation, but I certainly got the sense that the feeling of Basque independence and resistance is stronger in San Sebastian than it is on the other side of the border.

Well, that does it for our brief Spanish interlude.  In our next post, we'll be back in France, making our way to the heart of Provence.