Euskadi 2018 - Part 1

July 2-10, 2018.

It's that time again!

Time for me to post about a recent trip, even if it's one I make every year now.  It's always a long time coming, but it's so much better for me to make it at least once a year instead of once every who-knows-how-long.  I promised my best friend, and myself, two years ago that I'd make this a regular thing, and I will keep that promise.

I booked the tickets in March or April, about the same time I booked the tickets to the Philippines, after talking to my best friend about the dates, and when she confirmed they'd work for her, I booked them, and when the time came, off I went.

My flight left at 10 PM out of JFK, so I'm not really counting that day as a travel day, since only about 2 hours were actually covered, fewer if you count in the time difference that inevitably occurred within two hours of flying east.

Bilbao 2016, Part 2

Bilbao 2016, Part 2.

June 6.

I didn't realize how long this would be when I started writing this, but I'm going to keep going and using the same header image, because I can.

Anyway.

June 6th started with a partly cloudy day threatening rain, but it cleared up quite nicely, which worked out great because I'd told my best friend that I really wanted to go to San Juan de Gaztelugatxe, because I hadn't been there in 16 years.  And it's absolutely stunning, completely unmissable.

That morning we walked along the cliffs that lead out over the Bay of Biscay, and it's a nice walk from my best friend's house.  It has beautiful views of the sea and the cliffs, as well as the main port.

Year in Review, 2016

Here's my 2016 in review, with pictures. I know I didn't do much blogging this year, and it's been a while since any decent updates. I'm not necessarily trying to make up for it with this post, but it is going to feature she of the pictures from my long-awaited trip to Spain, which ended up changing my life in ways I never even thought were possible. I'm also sharing what was to me the one song that *was* 2016 for me: "Faded" by Alan Walker, at the top of the post.

Guggenheim Bilbao. June 4, 2010.

Bilbao

Photo © Aitor Agirregabiria

It feels so weird after the fact, knowing that I spend 2 1/2 years living a 40-minute subway ride from this area (plus a 20-minute walk if I'm going to the Guggenheim), the Guggenheim being such a mecca for modern art and even just an architectural icon in and of itself.

It feels so weird to me.  To me, it was always just "home", it was where I lived, where I'd occasionally go on weekends, occasionally going a couple months without ever going into Bilbao and spending all of our time in the suburbs.  It was a special occasion when we had to run some errands in Bilbao and made the 30-minute drive in.  But not because it was Bilbao, but because it was the city.

And now, with how big it's gotten, how modernized it's become (it didn't lookhalf as nice when we were living there 11 years ago; all that was notable was the Guggenheim and Calatrava's Zubi Zuri, and maybe the Teatro Arriaga), and the amount of languages other than Spanish that can now be heard, including Basque, it's weird.  I almost felt like a foreigner going back last summer.

It is funny though, I saw my first Andy Warhol (the Marilyn Monroe piece, as well as some of the Campbell's Soup ones) pieces when we visited in November 1997, a month after the museum opened and probably a few weeks after we moved in.  I think that was my first taste of "real" art.