another excursion and Barry's return

Finally I've made it back to the blog, I was away longer than I meant to be.

Going back in time to Friday 14th March and another Friday excursion. 

This time we went to the Balcon de Pilatos in the Urbasa Natural Park which is in Navarre, a region adjoining The Basque Country. I can't say exactly how far it is from Azpeitia, nor how long it took us to get there, because we had a few stops and starts and missed turn-offs and such like along the way.

The country side that we drove through is quite different than The Basque Country and Zaragoza. It is a landscape  of huge rocky outcrops, mountains in the background, wide green valleys with villages dotted throughout like mushrooms. Here's some photos which will be better than my descriptions.

  It was another fabulous warm, blue sky and sunshine day

   The Pyrenees in the background 

  

Looking down from the village where we parked the car and then walked through the park to the waterfall

We walked for 21/2 - 3 hours wandering along beside a stream, or maybe it's actually a small river. At times it was small and other times it was quite a bit bigger, it's not important in the long run. Suffice to say that it was pretty damn wonderful wandering along with the ever present sound of the river tumbling down (we were always walking uphill which was, fortunately, a gentle slope) with the warm sun shining through the leafless trees. It was really great stress-free exercise for my body and the mixture of Basque, Spanish and English languages provided exercise for my brain. 

  Most of the time the track was easy going, certainly different than the NZ bush

In some places it was quite wet and boggy which provided us with a bit of fun as we negotiated ways around the bog.

sometimes the track wasn't quite so easy

 This is the best I could get of the big waterfall because there wasn't a clear view of it, always there were enormous rocks or trees in the way and the water didn't just fall a long way. Instead there was a series of drops and twists for quite a long way. We couldn't get to the top of it because the track was closed.

 

the top of the cliffs is the Balcon de Pilates 

  the park boundary on our way back to the car

   

same place looking down the valley 

After we got back to the car we went back to where we'd had lunch for a beer feeling happy with our day so far, mostly because we thought we'd had a good lot of exercise. Miren is a regular 'walker', I had done a few decent walks but Nerea  is not an 'exercise' person.

We still,hadn't been to 'The Balcon' and Miren was determined that we'd find it so off we went on a search. We drove up to the top of the cliffs and then stopped to read every sign post we came to, with no luck.  Turns out to be the least sign posted spot ANYWHERE - there wasn't one! Finally Miren had a guess and parked the car and off we went on foot. We spied a farmer walking along in a distant paddock so off went Miren to ask for directions and hopefully we weren't far from the spot. Yes! we were in luck - just a little further and we were on the edge looking down at where we'd been walking. Well, that's not quite right - Miren was on the edger while Nerea implored her to come back and I held my breath hoping she'd get back from the edge - 900 meters down is too far to bounce back from.

She did and we finally set off on  our way back to Azpeitia. By the time we got out of the car and walked it was dusk and the setting sun was the brightest red sunsetI have ever seen. Unfortunately, the photo doesn't quite do it justice.

 

 looking at us as we walked to the edge of the cliff

  from as close as I got to the edge of  The Balcon de Pilatos

   The landscape at the top. A few weeks before this was covered in snow

  The moon in the clear, clear sunset sky

  It's a shame that it was dusk and therefore rather murky because the view from here shows villages along the valley just like mushrooms dating back to times when people walked.

And another day done, by the time we got back to the car it was truly dark, and we set off to Azpeitia feeling very happy with it.

On the Sunday following this Friday I had a day with Mirari, one of the teachers who I work with. She lives in the  nearby village of Zestoa, 10 minutes drive from Azpeitia on the way to San Sebastian. She picked me up  and after coffee in Azpeitia we went to her place and then to the tiny coastal village of Getaria, which I've talked about before. It was another fabulous blue sky, warm sunshine day  and we walked along the coastal walkway for a bit and then walked back to Getaria and wandered about for a bit. A lot of the railing and paving is missing - taken by the huge seas  during recent storms nd extraordinary high tides which caused quote a lot of destruction all along the coast.

   

  

 this pathway is from the main street to the port and has been here since the 2nd century BC, well, at first it wasn't paved.

 Restaurant  cooking on the side of the street. This was at the port, there were quite a few, on a smaller scale, along the main street, for cooking both meat and fish of all sorts.

  

Sunday market at the port

and then we had a glass of wine overlooking the port while we soaked up the sun and chatted.

After our glass of wine we went back to Mirari's home in Zestoa for lunch. Yes, the usual 3 course meal accompanied with some lovely chardonnay and chatted away the afternoon until almost 6pm by which time it was time to call it a day and so I was delivered back to Azpeitia.

And that was the end of another great weekend.

And now Barry has returned - he arrived on Saturday, late afternoon. It is lovely to have him back.

We now have to get cracking on sorting out our travel plans for the Easter holidays which begin on Friday week for me and I have 3 weeks and 2 days so we have a bit of planning and organising to do.

The dilemma is - where we will go and where to leave out. So much to see and do all fairly much on my doorstep.  Never did I think I'd have such a dilemma!  The one certain thing is that we are meeting Emma and Sam in Amsterdam the weekend after Easter and we'll have such fun exploring and enjoying each other's company for 5 nights and 4 days. Wo hoooooo 

back up from underground

On the Friday after I got back from London I went into San Sebastian to get my NIE from the police  station, more than 40 days had gone by so it would surely be there, you'd think, eh!! Oh no no no no not there. It was almost enough to put me underground again.  On Monday Maitere telephoned the appropriate department and was told that it would definitely be there that coming Wednesday. Apparently, a whole batch of cards, mine included, were sent to some other place by mistake, the MOON perhaps. So, on Wednesday off I went to San Sebastian once more and this time ... YES It was there! Oh boy, the relief  - now I have my NIE and can show anyone who's interested,- the police, border control, national security - that I am allowed to be here, I can go out and come back into the   country as many times as I want to. Well, within the next  2months that is, because after the end of May I have no job so no pay so that will be that.

On Sunday after yet another fruitless trip to San Sebastian I took myself off to the beach. It was a beautiful day, cool and sunny and this time I went to Zumaia. The beach was ok and it was certainly damned wonderful to beside the sea again however the really interesting thing there, for me, is the rock formations. I know nothing of geology except that these area is noted for the 'flysch - info from wiki - "The town has two beaches (Itzurun and Santiago), which are of interest to geologists because they are situated among the longest set of continuous rock strata in the world. Known as the "flysch" they date from the mid-cretaceous period to the present, a time period of over 100 million years. The K-T boundary is present at the Itzurun beach, and fossils can be found, notably of ammonites. The strata stretches along a distance of about 8 km, between the towns/beaches of Deba and Getaria, with Zumaia lying in the middle". So, there you have it.

There are walkways along the top of the cliffs and along the seaside between the towns which I hope that Barry and I will wander along before we have to head on out of here. Anyone who wants to come along with us  is most welcome.  Come on, come on - you know you want to!

I wandered along the beach for a fair chunk of the day and then got the bus back to Azpeitia refreshed and rejuvenated, thankfully.

Here are some photos - 

  In Zumaia just bedore the bus stop over the bridge. look at the sky - beautiful

  

   

can't resist 'a little house that sits'

looking down from the walkway

The next Friday I was off on another excursion with Miren and Nerea to Urbasa  in Navarre and to find a waterfall and to see something called the Balcon de Pilotas.  Urbasa is a mountain range and is in a national park We wander through part of the park at the bottom of magnificent cliffs and then went and had a look down at the park from the Balcon de Pilotas at the top, 900 meters down.

But just now I have to go to school, I will be back soon. 

the last couple of days in London

following on from where I left off - 2 days left in London. Emma had these 2 days off and it was great hanging out with her. We visited the Jeffrye Museum,  which is dedicated to the ' history of the home' and shows how homes and gardens reflect changes in society, behaviour, style and taste over the past 400 years. As it turned out this means middle-class homes! The museum is in Shoreditch, East London, and is set in 18th century almshouses. It was interesting to see how the styles and furnishings of rooms changed over time from being rather plain and sparsely furnished to begin with and becoming more fancy and cluttered as time went on. We thought it was rather interesting even though the gardens weren't up to much,  being winter.  I think that Emma got more out of it than me because I felt a kind of a lack of energy, possibly due to a lack of sleep the night before. She charged around looking at everything that was there to be seen.

  

 Jeffrye Museum

We also saw 'The Dallas Buyers Club' which, I have to say, I knew nothing about it, not even the subject of it, before I saw it and I have since learned quite a lot. I'd never heard of 'buyers clubs' for starters although I remember some of the aids related news items from the late '80s.  Neither Emma or myself thought much of the film and I wasn't convinced that the 2 main actors were worthy of awards but Emma thought they were. Neither the film  nor the performances pulled me in, I never felt involved with it, or the characters, and we both thought that it didn't convey anything really about the wider context of what was going on at that time re Aids and the stuff that was being put out regarding at 'risk people', where it came from, the religious crap etc etc, and  buyers clubs generally within the whole scheme of things at the time. For example, when his office/distribution center was being shut down would all of those people in the queue waiting for their life -saving drugs just have quietly melted away? What did they do??????

Thinking about it now, my general feeling is that it was a ho-hum film that didn't do it's subject justice,  and that it was just as well that I was ignorant about it before I saw it because I certainly would have been expecting a much bigger film and would have been sorely disappointed. And, it's the first film I've seen in almost 2 years!!!!

Holly and Brit met us for dinner and Brit said that she'd no wish to see it and Holly thought much the same as Emma and I.

Anyway, we had a really good pub dinner at the Market House in Brixton along with a beer or two. What a busy place it is, this was a Monday night and it was packed. Fortunately, we'd arrived in time to procure a table  and it wasn't long before Holly and then Brit arrived. 

We had  thought that we'd eat there on Thursday night when I first arrived but while Emma and I were quietly supping away and catching up the place filled up and was jam packed,  Brit had come in and couldn't see us, no tables were free and didn't look like we'd get one before it got late so we met Brit outside and mooched off to Lounge where the waitress  remembered me from being there either when we stopped off in London en route to Azpeitia or before I went back to NZ in June last year. I don't know what I'd done to be remembered and she wasn't telling me!

So that was on Monday and we went to the Jeffrye Museum on Tuesday, getting back to Brixton in time for me to finish packing and be on my way to Heathrow - Bilbao - Azpeitia. Fortunately, there wasn't any problem with the taxi not coming - it came early!

Another damn good holiday - I missed Sam though, and a few times I almost said something to Emma about calling him or meeting up with him and then remembered that HE WAS IN NEW ZEALAND ... humph. I did have a great time with Emma,  and spending time with her and Sam, the other times I've been in London, have been everything I had in mind, when I first hatched my plan to live and work in this part of the world, and so much better than that. 

So, it was back to Azpeitia. I was very lucky to be met at the airport by Jaione, the teacher with whom I went to the cider house with, and driven back to Azpeitia. It was extremely kind and generous of her because she doesn't actually live in Azpeitia but is a further 45 minutes down the road, in Beasain.

The next day it was up and off to school. February had turned out to be an interesting month - visitors, excursions and travel. March wasn't looking to have so much going on but it's been pretty good so far. The weather was pretty good in London -  chilly with lots of sunshine and just a little rain and since I've been back the weather here has been fabulous - Zaragoza sunshine every day - so so lovely. However, today it's back to drizzly cold which means that I can't pack my big coat away just yet.

I did my usual 'going to ground' after being in London and then got on with enjoying all that Azpeitia has to offer. 

11 days until Barry is back - just saying in case anyone is wondering.

Now it's time to finish this up and post it. I've been doing this in Etxe Zuri while Davia, the cook, cooked my dinner, got shouted a beer by a guy because, as Miren told him,  I come from NZ! I've drunk the beer and eaten my dinner and had a chat to Miren - It's time to go home.

Some random photos - 

  some shoes in Camden

    some more shoes in Camden - amazing eh! Couldn't see a price.

   

 Last but not least - a little house that sits .... between big ones that get bigger and bigger

 that's it for now

The White Cliffs of Dover with no blue birds over.

and so to Dover we went. Just over a one hour train ride from St Pancras Station and we were there. Unbelievably, there was no information or sign post to point us in the right direction to get from the station to the town center, the information center or even to the cliffs. After wandering about we finally found the information center - closed! Coffee time and while we were having our coffee we decided to get a cab to the white cliffs, we didn't know how else we'd find them or get to them. Happily for us there was a taxi just outside the cafe (coffee was crap!) and asking for a ride to the cliffs didn't sound as silly to the driver as it did to us. Turns out there is a visitors center, cafe and shop (of course) up there and the ride only cost a few pound. The cab driver gave us his card and told us to call him when we wanted a ride back, to which we replied thanks but probably we'll walk back. Turned out that this was rather an ambitious notion. 

After consulting the map and guide board re the walks along the cliffs we decided to do the shorter walk, not the 50 minute walk to the lighthouse mostly because there was a fairly fierce wind blowing and also the lighthouse was closed. Once we got to the end of the short walk and then went up onto a higher path and could see the lighthouse gleaming in the distance we changed our minds and trekked off to see it. We were pleasantly surprised to find, attached to the side of the lighthouse,  a really lovely cafe which was open and doing a roaring trade. What else could we do but go in and enjoy hot tea and scones. 

Actually the walk was really good fun because the wind was mostly on our backs, rather chilly though, and it was fantastic to be in such a wide open, green space with what looked like the edge of a village in the distance to the left, the sea on the other side of us (at the bottom of the cliffs) and France visible  in the distance. I actually received a message on my 'phone, in Spanish, welcoming me to France! We had a bit of a laugh at that one, I have yet to be welcomed back to the UK. 

The walk back was something else, that's for sure, because the wind was now howling into us with full force. At times I went backwards and certainly felt that I was going to be blown off my feet a few times. Fortunately this track wasn't right along the cliff edge so there wasn't any danger of being blown over the edge. Blew the cobwebs away, that's for sure. 

We didn't see a lot of the actual cliffs because we were on top of them but did see a fair bit and also the port which seemed to be very busy with big ships, possibly ferries, coming and going one after the other. There is a boat trip which takes  people out on the water to see the cliffs and I think that this is probably the best place to see them from.  I also expect that it probably only operates in the summer tourist months. None the less, we were quite happy with what we'd seen. No sign of any blue birds though. The cliffs weren't as white as I expected them to be but I guess that in stronger sunlight they'd look whiter and also possibly looking from from a distance from the sea perhaps.

Once we got back from the tracks along the cliffs we sat and looked down on the port below us and watched the coming and goings for a while. It was quite busy and fascinating and we spied a tiny little fishing boat ploughing up and down through waves, sometimes out of sight and seemingly swamped by the sea at times but would reappear again - up and down, up and down. A real sea sick  ride. The big ships just charged through the water so we didn't realise how rough the sea was until we spotted the little boat battling along. We gave it a cheer when it made it into the shelter of the port. And then we'd had enough of the chilly wind and the cafe and shop beckoned.

It was warm and calm inside and while we were inside we decided that we'd spent a fair amount of energy walking  about and battling with the wind so telephoned the cab driver who promptly came and delivered us to the station and the train was only a few minutes away so we didn't have wait at all until we were on our way back to London and on to Brixton for pizzas and crib. 

All in all we were happy with our day but thought that Dover could do a better job in terms of information and being visitor friendly. 

There's also the enormous castle sitting up there on the hill overlooking the town and which we had to go past on the way to and from the cliffs. We would have loved to have gone in but didn't have the time, We'd actually been walking for quite a while. It was on winter hours and closed at 4pm with last admissions at 3pm.  Apparently there are tunnels underneath it which date back to the time of Napoleon Bonaparte and can be explored. The castle certainly looks worth a visit and so maybe we'll get back there before heading back to NZ.

So much to do, so much to see, so little time. And now - here's some photos

  almost there

    

Dover's main street

    our first view of the castle

 wind sculpture at the star of our walk

    

Brit's hair at right angles to her head 

    our firs view of the cliffs 

  

    the green space also stretched across the land on the other side of the path, it was as flat as a pancake

 this house is perched on the cliff on the left hand side of the light house

   can you see France? It's over there

    coming and going