|
Beyond Bilbao,
there's a whole forgotten world in this corner of Spain, with a unique
language, cuisine and beauty. Jon Bryant explores.
Spain means "land of the rabbits". Pet shops usually have them running
around in pens: scurrying rabbits (presumably Catalonians), wet rabbits
(Galicians), sleeping rabbits (Andalucians), rabbits that enjoy a vigorous
night life (Madrileños). Then in a corner, for some inexplicable reason,
there will be a solitary guinea pig, all grumpy and plotting, desperate to
get out and thinking: "What am I doing in this land of rabbits?" He's the
Basque.
Throughout history, no one ever seemed to want to invade the
Basque Country, and the one time they did encounter aggression - from
Charlemagne at the end of the eighth century - the Basques annihilated a
hitherto undefeated army. Their land is very mountainous, the forests dense
and the soil poor. The coastline is rough and the sea ferocious. Basques
have wider faces, more sunken features and thicker fingers than other
Spaniards. They have competitions involving tree trunks and lifting boulders
above their heads. They have a different blood-group pattern and they speak
a language so complex and isolated that it has no relationship with any
other tongue.
Sitting in a Bilbao cafe, I studied the extravagant array of pintxos:
fried elvers, a quail's egg and tiger prawn on toast, a woodcock breast,
bramble jelly and white bean paste on wafer. Basque cuisine has a
-celebrated reputation but it made me yearn for a ham and cheese sandwich.
Unfortunately, in the Basque language, Euskara, this was not so
straightforward: "Urdaiazpiko eta gazta ogitarteko bat, mesedez."
|
|
 |
Occidental Carlton Hotel Bilbao *****
The Occidental Carlton is an elegant four star hotel located in the centre
of the financial and business area of Bilbao. Constructed in 1919 and
completely renovated in 1994, the building has recently been declared an
architecturally historical cultural monument. It is situated 9 km from
Bilbao airport and 12 km from Fuenterrabia Airport. |
Last Minute Hotels Bilbao  |
Words that should be short, such as "no" (ezezko) or "police"
(udaltzaingoa), are multisyllabic. Eta means "and" in Basque, so you may be
forgiven for thinking people are talking about a separatist movement when,
in fact, they are simply making a list.
The road signs all seem too long because words begin and then, just when
they should be coming to an end, are joined by more and more letters, all
jostling to be pronounced. The fishing towns along the coast are a mouthful,
and your jaw has to work hard to finish words such as Iruarriaundieta,
Ibarranguelua or Matxitxako.
British travellers have never been deterred by language barriers, so why
have they neglected the Basque coast of Spain? British tourists nowadays
tend to fly in to Bilbao and rarely venture east towards San Sebastián. Few
British travel companies run holidays to the Basque Country any more or have
links with hotels there.
Industrially, Britain has had strong links with the place. At the end of
the 19th century, huge ships used to bring English coal to fuel the region's
heavy industry. Sons of the emerging bourgeoisie went to England to be
educated and so picked up the rules of football - hence Athletic Club
Bilbao. Conversely, when Real Sociedad (San Sebastián's team) won the
Spanish Cup for the first time in 1909, the goal-scorers were called
McGuinness and Simmons.
Xabier Eleizegi Uranga, head of tourism in Guipuzkoa (one of the Basque
Country's three provinces), told me that 80 per cent of tourists to the area
were from Spain and most foreign visitors were French. "The Camino de
Santiago [the pilgrim route to Santiago de Compostela] used to run along the
coast, too, but there were many attacks on the travellers, so nowadays
people travel on the inland route where there are more castles."
Imagining groups of Basques dressed as devils searching out exhausted
pilgrims to rob, I discovered that the last such attack was actually in the
19th century.
"The Basque coast, partly because of its royal connections [the monarchy
used to swim there], has always attracted high-quality tourists," explained
Uranga, offering no slur on the "stay-away" Brits. He described some of the
wonders of inland Euskadi, but I had heard that all along the coast were
little gems of beaches, hermitages and bizarre rock formations.
There are idiosyncratic villages such as Mutriku, which has the highest
house in the Basque Country and a full-sized football pitch just yards from
the harbour; or Getaria, which was home to Juan Sebastian Elcano, captain of
the only one of Ferdinand Magellan's ships to make it all the way back, and
where they celebrate his circumnavigation every four years by re-enacting
the landing (the next one is in August 2007).
My first coastal stop was Elant-xobe, a fishing village on the tip of a
headland, which is so steep that even the cobbles have begun tilting towards
the sea. Catching my breath outside the church, I found myself standing in
the middle of a pelota court. Ball games are pretty much compulsory in the
Basque Country, especially up against churches because they are the only
places with long-enough walls for a proper court. Up the hill from the
church was the local Basque political club with a wet flag drooping over the
door.
"It's an ikurriña," explained the secretary. "It's the Basque flag,
banned by Franco, but now everyone has one." It is a sort of Gucci version
of the Union Jack, with green replacing the blue, and is a common sight in
every Basque village.
At Ea (they say it used to have a proper name but the rain washed away
everything but a couple of vowels), there were huge banners all over the
village calling for Basque prisoners to be returned to their homeland.
Slightly scared, I cut down to the seafront where 25ft spray was surging up
over the harbour wall every 10 seconds. The aggressive sea makes the
coastline exciting and noisy, and forces people to run and shout at each
other as if they were permanently on the deck of a trawler.
I found a bar for a glass of txakoli (the strong, local white wine) and a
saucer of salt cod, both of which were staples for the whale hunters. In
some coastal towns, among them Zarautz, the entire population was once there
to catch whales and throughout the summer they hold offshore races in copies
of the whale-hunting boats. These 30ft traineras are now crewed by 13 locals
who keep fit by running along Zarautz's massive beach, dodging the lines of
pinstriped marquees for the Madrid holidaymakers who want to change
discreetly.
One txakoli was enough, but the lure of the lounge bar of the swish Hotel
de Londres y de Inglaterra on San Sebastián's seafront proved too strong. It
was full of French people. Pascal from Bayonne told me that the French
Basques like driving over from Biarritz because the food is better in Spain
and they can speak the language. He reckoned visitors are still put off
because of worries over security.
Some people believe things have changed since the Madrid station bombs
last year when, for a few hours, ETA was blamed for the explosions. It was
such a terrible blow to Spain's sanity that it changed the nation's view on
terrorism. Nevertheless, no one has been killed by ETA for almost two years.
Instead, every cliff edge, every white wall, every park bench and public
noticeboard is daubed with political slogans.
On the A8 motorway out of Bilbao, there is a sign reminding drivers not
to carry explosives on the motorway. It is a typically matter-of-fact
attitude to a violent struggle that has lasted since the civil war in the
Thirties. The reality is that many people strongly support the separatist
movement in the Basque Country.
Uranga told me that the Basque Country is now the safest region in Spain.
"There are a lot more police around and vandalism and delinquency just don't
seem to happen here like they do in other places."
On my last night I sat in a bar looking at the local "What's on" guide.
Right next to listings for film festivals, art exhibitions and a David Bowie
concert in Bilbao's bullring, was Lekeitio's "Gansos" festival. It involves
hanging a goose upside down over the dock while competitors leap across the
water and try to tear the goose's head off. |
