My next adventure took place as a result of a suggestion from a guy in Barcelona about a small beach town on the west coast of Spain called San Sebastian. After 5 hours of quiant little towns, castles, fields of wildflowers and rolling hills of farmland, my train had arrived. Before this, scenery such as this only existed in my mind as a mere fantasy.
Unbenownst to me, I was pleasantly suprised to find that San Sebastian is a gastronomic paradise. The bars serve tapas called pinxos, which are a true art form. They are displayed on the bar and ready to eat along with sidra (cider), which is poured from a great height so it can aerate. You are given a plate and you take what you want and after you eat, using the honor system, you tell them how many you had. Brilliant. San Sebastian has more Michelin stars that Paris.
The hostel, also a suggestion is called Urban House. I was a little apprehensive at first, when I walked in the door the place was packed with everyone ready to go out for a pub crawl. I was escorted to the room where the girl showed me the bed I was to sleep in while simutaneously taking a pile of dirty sheets off it. It turns out that the place is so amazing that believe it or not it's very easy to overlook all the madness. There were a few quotes on the wall that I think are worth mentioning:
"and this is the corner where the bums and Italians piss" and "what's the word in English for when you touch something with the tip of your penis" Elin from Sweden and "she is my favorite girl because she has the biggest nuts"(reffering to her boobs) Christopher from Denmark
Those were my favorites. It's an anything goes type of joint so you have to take the good with the bad and in this case the good happened to be very good. The place is steps from the ocean and I step out to the balcony in the morning with my tea to the sound of a man playing accordian down below. The gregarious guy who runs the place, Rudy, encourages comradery between all the guests. Everyone in the hostel goes out together at night and we all connected so much and ended up being facebook friends. The guy puts sriracha in his coffee in the morning and cleans singing Celine Dion ballads. He knows all the hot spots for food and drinks in the neighborhood. One of his favorites is called Nestors. They only have a few things they serve, which are: a huge piece of rare steak that is split between 4-5 people, a large plate of heirloom tomatoes with olive oil and balsamic vinegar both seasoned with maldon salt.http://www.maldonsalt.co.uk/ You must try this stuff. It is un-fucking-real. They make ONLY two tortilla espanas at lunch if you are lucky enough to get a piece and also an expresso drink that is made with condensed milk, cinnamon and a secret liquor that no one know about except for Nestor himself. It is in his will though, so the secret will not die with him. It was fabulous but had me up all night. We also went to an anchovy bar that serves anchovy pinxos in any way you could imagine. My favorite was by far the coconut. Some of the best pinxos in my opinion were: roasted red pepper stuffed with crabmeat on a crostini, a battered and fried tomato slice topped with a sardine and I have to mention I had the best ice cream I think I ever had in my life. Rudy also took us to a bar that served cow cheek cooked for 12 hours, so tender it falls apart with a fork, crispy pig ear, and duck in prune sauce. I was in my glory. At the end of a meal, you take a sweet/licoricy liquor shot called pacharon to help digest your meal.
Besides eating, San Sabastian has so many things to do. I went on a few hikes, long walks on the beach, beautiful cathedrals, shopping and I also went kayaking to Isla de Santa Clara with a native named Gabriel. He is a teacher but takes people kayaking for a side job. He loves American music and asked a lot of questions about New York. Here is how a conversation went for example:
"Do you have beaches in Nueva York?"
"Yeah, New Jersey too."
"New Jersey? Bruce Springsteen is from there, do you know of him?"
"Of course." I said
"I love the music of Bruce...." as he's paddling and looking off the horizon.
He took the money I paid him and we went to get drinks with it, not a bad deal at all.
Although I am living my fairy tale, it is not all rainbows and unicorns all the time. I've had my fare share of obstacles. It's been a bit of a culture shock, not too bad but I don't speak fluent spanish and I can ony imagine what lies ahead for me in France as far as that goes. It is very expensive to wash your clothes so I learned that most travelers handwash their clothes and hang them on the balcony to dry. I'm used to the idea now. I was supposed to work on an organic vineyard in the south of France outside of Bordeaux. We exchanged a number of emails but days before I was to arrive, they said they were on vacation. OoOokaaaay. Throw a wrench into my life why don't you? So I freaked out for about a day and a half until I realized that being stuck here is really quite amazing and I need to just enjoy it, there are plenty of farms out there that would be happy to have me. I forget sometimes that the universe always wins.
I did some more haircuts here, which helped me tremendously with cash money records taking over for the 9-9 and 2000.
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