Weather: Increasing cloud this afternoon, but still warm.
An early start was had this morning, mainly because the Aire at San Sebastián had been about full last night and we didn't want to find ourselves in a big queue for the service point before we left.
Our ploy worked, although it did land us in rush hour traffic instead. However, once out of town, all was plain sailing to Elorrio, which sits 80km away, and inland, from San Sebastián.
We had been lured here under semi false pretences, in that the tourist office advertises not just walking routes in the local hills, but also a 5km ex-railway line which is now a Via Verde, which we thought would be perfect for a running route. We failed to find it during our forays around town, and after some Googling, established that it actually starts from a town that's 3km from here.
All looking promising on the approach, with big lumps of rocky hills appearing before us.
Whilst we may have been partly lured by the promise of something that isn't here, we are still happy to have come, having had an excellent visit to the town this afternoon.
After an early lunch, we nipped out to the tourist office to pick up some information about walking routes in the area, intending to then return to Bertie to consider our options. Thinking we would be gone 20 minutes at most, we took neither water nor hats with us.
Two and a half hours later, we had:
- located (with some difficulty) the Tourist Office and established that, contrary to the hours stated on their website, it only opens at weekends at this time of year;
- during a detour to a public lavatory, stumbled across an information board that told us we could get an audioguide from the police station, located in the town hall;
- located (with some difficulty) the town hall, found an English speaker, obtained a map of the town, but discovered that the police station has moved;
- located (with no difficulty at all - the lady from the Town Hall escorted us) the police station and obtained the audiotour handsets plus a token for the motorhome service point; and
- completed the audiotour.
The town square. The Town Hall is the building with the arches.
Finding the start of the tour took us a few minutes of head-scratching, but once we had located it, it proved to be easy to follow.
Looking serious! Well, I was trying to listen attentively and take a photo at the same time.
One of the tiles inset into the pavement which imparted which number to press on the audio handset and also in which direction to go for the next point of interest
It may have been a touch too long, visiting a couple more palaces than necessary (this is a town stuffed full of historic palaces), but my opinion may have been swayed by how thirsty I was by the time we finished. Thirty one points of interest were visited in total, and the thing that made this tour so good (aside from being free) was that the English version of the narration had clearly been written by a fluent English speaker and was delivered by someone with an English accent*.
One of the streets in the town. Wouldn't want to try to take Bertie through there!
Without the tour, we would have wandered the town and found it to be pleasant and interesting; the tour took our visit to a whole different level.
Such was my thirst that as soon as we had visited the last point of interest, we hot-footed it back to the police station, handed over the handsets, and made our way back to Bertie for refreshment.
We popped into the basillica during our tour and found the biggest, and one of the most bling-y, altar pieces we have ever encountered (and we've been in a lot of churches and cathedrals). Look at the altar table for a sense of scale as to how vast this piece is.
We found the Aire as we had left it - with Bertie and two other vans who were already here when we arrived. There are 11 spaces on four tiers (two in the first tier, then two, five and two). We opted for a slot at one end of the bank of five, with the only other occupied slot in this tier being right at the other end. Perhaps predictably, the only two vans which have since arrived (British and French respectively) parked in between us, even though there are two completely empty tiers. Herding instinct? Or a subconscious belief that because vans were already parked in this bit, it must be the best spot?
(As an aside: this is attempt two at this post. I spent an age typing it then, in a moment of stupidity, accidentally deleted the whole thing. Doh!)
^^ (*I don't mean to sound ungrateful to those towns/tourist attractions who don't do their tours as spectacularly well as this town. I'm always grateful for any efforts to provide information in multiple languages, but it can be difficult to fathom what was meant when the translation has been done via Google Translate, and it can also be difficult to tune into the pronunciations of a person speaking English as their non-native language.)
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