Vacaciones...de puta madre

With a few days before I return to the US, and classes finished this week, a couple classmates and I took a short trip north to the País Vasco (Basque Country). Two days enjoying the beach and the cool weather of the northern part of Spain. I had never been to the northern coast, and I absolutely loved it. How could you not, with views like this:

The city rests around this bay--Bahía de la Concha and the beach of the same name. Concha, because the shape is just like a seashell, or concha. Our hostal was right underneath the big statue of Jesus on the mountain in the picture.

The trip was fantastic, relaxing on the beach, taking a boat ride out into the ocean and around the bay, enjoying the view from the top of the mountain, and taking in the spectacularly cool night air. The most interesting part was the signs posted around the city that read (in English):
"Welcome tourist. Remember: You are not in Spain nor France. You are in the Basque Country." Well, if that didn't put those thoughts in the back of my head about ETA to rest, I guess nothing will :)

Despite the scary separatist propaganda, it was cool to see the Basque language on all the signs and everything. We thought about counting all the appearances of the letters t, x, and k, but decided to stop after the count hit 100--on the first sign :)

Got back to Madrid around 7:30am this morning and it was pouring rain, with a little thinder and lightning. I am not sure I have ever seen a thunderstorm in Madrid. Granted, it has nothing on the storms you see in Iowa during the summer, but it is rare to even see rain during the summer here, so the thunderstorm is a bit of a conversation piece here. I took advantage of the free day at the museum on Sundays to head to the Sorolla Museum and to make a visit to the Prado. Sorolla was Spain's best impressionist painter, and the museum is in his old residence here in Madrid. Nice, but I was disappointed there was no store to buy a print or two. The Prado store also disappointed, since I really wanted a couple Goya prints for the house. I took a stroll through the Goya wing and visited my favorite Velazquez works, the got the hell out of there, because the Prado on free Sundays is a tourist haven and the crowd was driving me nuts.

Tomorrow is my last day in Spain :(

I am having lunch with MadridMan (see sidebar link), and then the traditional dinner with Marcos and Sandra on the night before I leave. We have gotten together for dinner in Madrid on my last night in Spain every summer for the past few years, and I am looking forward to doing it one last time.