Sunday, October 14: Bid Bilbao Adios

My apologies to the lovely people of Bilbao, but I couldn't resist. The idea of a hot shower with seemingly no end was too much to resist. I think my shower exceeded ten minutes this morning. And it was glorious! We set the alarm for 7:45 (oops, that would be London time. My husband pointed out it was actually 8:45 local time) because we were meeting Fernando and Alejandra at 10:30 so we needed time to not only get ready but also have breakfast. Good thing we started early because we did not take into account the half hour of banging on the door, pounding on the wall and ringing the boys' room non-stop in order to get them to wake up. Thankfully Colin groggily answered the phone shortly after Jamie gave up and stalked off to hunt down some rolls at a local bakery.


We had a few minutes to allow the boys to run in the beautiful park within the roundabout before our hosts arrived right on time. They drove us to Las Arenas to show us where Fernando and his friends sometimes go to a local beach. The area is lovely and the boys certainly enjoyed playing in the sand after having their tea and a snack. I was a little amused to see the boys cheerfully building a sand castle oblivious to the fact that they were on a topless beach. Jamie, ever the pig, had to point out that the only women topless were those you wouldn't want to see anyway and the ones that made you a bit curious kept everything covered. I think that made it through translation and Fernando agreed.

After walking the length of the half-circle beach over to the houses previous generations of fishermen inhabited, we made our way back to where we left the car and stopped into a food court type place for lunch. Sandwiches and tapas of course. Jamie and I continue to be amazed by how many people stop to greet Fernando or Alejandra on the streets of a big city. Small town as a big city. I love it! We drove by some beautiful one-family homes on the way back out of town. Alejandra wanted to take us to a footbridge that has a lift to take you way up high to cross the river, but we really didn't have time. Especially after some idiots blocked a small street resulting in a bit of a delay and eventually driving up on the sidewalk to get around it.

Jamie, Fernando and I fell asleep on the car ride out to Vitoria airport. Did I mention there is nothing there? We were out of Euros so we couldn't even buy a bottle of water from a vending machine. Way to plan! I slept most of the flight back so it felt like all of fifteen minutes to me. Just the way I like it. The boys got add a new country to their passport stamps, experience another culture, immerse in another language and have the distinct honor of being welcomed into a Spanish home. I'd say the weekend was well worth it.