Travels with V
Basque, Spain
The circumnavigator's town
Basque part 5, San Sebastian 2
One day we’re curious to see San Sebastian’s surroundings, and we take a bus to Getaria, a small seaside town west of San Sebastian. Fishing and winemaking has traditionally brought riches to the town, but fishing is now of less importance, here as everywhere else. Instead tourism has become more intense, resulting in the opening of many new restaurants and pintxos taverns. According to the Lonely Planet guide the best grilled fish restaurant in the Basque area is right here. Getaria also has a beach that is wide and popular.
Something we’ve never seen before is inside the San Salvador church, to the left in the harbour picture above. Since it is built on a slope, the floor is not horizontal, but slopes backward under the pews.
The city’s most famous son stands as statue on a small square beside the pelota court. Juan Sebastián Elkano was born here and he was the first ship captain to sail around the world. His ship ”Nao Victoria” was the only one in Magellan’s circumnavigation fleet that made it back home.
Today another fine old sailing ship is moored in the harbour. We walk closer and are surprised to see that the crew is loading a pile of wine bottles in boxes. We never find out why. But the winemakers around Getaria produce the typical Basque txakoli white wine.
Back in San Sebastian we check out the popular aquarium in the old town harbour. It’s in an obviously new or renovated building with big tanks for the fish to swim in. They also have a tunnel so you can walk through the largest tank with sharks swimming by overhead. It’s perfect for an afternoon visit. And what do you know, here we see an axolotl, the little salamander that lived in the lake that once surrounded Mexico City, but now is more or less extinct in the wild.
On our last day in San Sebastian we visit the San Telmo art museum by Plaza Zuloaga, at the foot of Mount Urgull. It so happens that it’s free entry this day, so we examine modern Basque art, mostly by Eduardo Chillida. But even Picasso is represented. The modern art section isn’t very big, but they also have older works on display, for instance an interesting collection of portraits and religious art.
We mentioned earlier that the growing focus on gastronomy has spread from the Basque countries to all of Spain. But the epicenter is here in San Sebastian where a “Culinary Center” started in 2011, and at university level it now promotes research and innovation around high quality cooking. At the same time it’s obvious that the pintxos/tapas tradition is incredibly strong, to order you have to queue for a long time. And when you finally get them you mosty often need to eat standing upright.
Another aspect of the Basque kitchen is perhaps so obvious that you tend to overlook it. The nearness of the Atlantic ocean means a steady supply of fresh fish. And few dishes can beat grilled fresh fish in our opinion. This is how happy I was when I had grilled monkfish in the old town harbour in San Sebastian. Served with just some potatoes and fried garlic…
