Friday 27/9 - our 1st day in our new home town. The hotel's rather nice, at least we have a decent sized room but alas, no tea & coffee making facilities so we decided that we'd buy a kettle when we got the chance. The head of the school languages department met us at the hotel and took us to school where we met the English teachers who I'll be working with and, like the teachers in Zaragoza, their english is really good. Everyone seemed really nice and friendly and one of them, who lives in San Sebastian, offered to come with us to take the car to the drop-off place at the San Sebastian railway station. We were very happy for him to come with us although we thought it was a bit strange that he insisted on sitting in the backseat. It was really funny, in hindsight anyway because it turned out that he doesn't drive so from time to time he forgot that he was supposed to be giving Barry directions. I should mention that Barry had decided to drive the coast road which wasn't as straight forward as the motor way, of course. Not only did Barry have to deal with the demands of the 'other side of the road' driving, he had to keep asking "which way now!". When we got into the city and to the railway station we went around the block twice before seeing the entrance to the rental car company's car park. It was another stressful trip and we were both happy to say goodbye to the car and walk. Both of us were more focussed on the driving aspect of the trip to San Sebastian than taking in the view, unfortunately, so no photos either. I remember that the road was narrow and winding through towns and villages which sit along the coast, hills on one side and the sea on the other and I can't say more than that except that we will take a bus trip along the same road one day so we can take it all in.
We'll be back in San Sebastian for a much longer visit as well. Didn't take much in this time although we did seem to walk for miles. I think the driving took all our energy. Finding the bus station and then finding the right bus to get us back to Azpeitia was a bit of a walk, too. We did it and zoomed off along the motorway after crawling through the city around police putting up barricades to divert traffic because of some famous actors being there for a film festival. It was really nice to relax and let someone else drive, namely the bus driver who knew exactly what do and where to go.
Back in Azpeitia, back to the hotel, Oh yes, almost forgot - no kettle! Apparently the people here don't use electric kettles. Now we're on a quest to find one - somewhere there has to be a kettle! The receptionist has put a coffee-making machine and the necessary requirements into our room, which was fairly decent of her but I have no idea if there's a charge for it.
This hotel staff never change, the same people work in the dining room morning and night and the same people work at reception all day and evening. Just an interesting observation.
The weather has been very hot and sometimes very humid, much like Auckland weather but so far there's been no rain. We have to leave the doors onto the little balcony open all night to try and get some cool air in, that's right - no air conditioning.
Our first weekend here was really nice, uneventful, just mostly walked about getting our bearings which Barry got much quicker than me. Next time I'll tell you about the town but for now here's some photos
No comments:
Post a Comment