EL MUSEO DE ARTE EN BILBAO
- Hannah McDonald
- Jun 10, 2017
- 4 min read
This morning everyone met up at the bus stop. Today's group included the juniors, some of the students from Ireland, and a teacher from La Cunza. The day started out with an hour and a half bus ride, without extra stops, to Bilbao. I wish I could tell you about what I saw along the way, but I fell asleep almost immediately after leaving the city.
Arriving in Bilbao, I immediately noticed the heat. My host mother said it would be hot today. We started by walking around the art museum. It had very unique architecture and several pieces of art surrounding it. There were street vendors and street performs along the sides of the sidewalk as well. At one entrance of the museum there was a giant dog made of flowers. My host mother said it was a dog anyways. From the back it looked like a cat because of its ears.
The heat getting to many of the group members, we rushed into a gelato shop across the street. This was the fanciest gelato shop I had seen. They scoop the ice cream into a flower shape. Although I can't tell you how it tasted, it sure looked pretty.
We entered the art museum at 12:30 pm and got to go around it ourselves. There were three levels, but the second level was closed as a new exhibition was being put in. The first floor was filled with 3-D art and a film. It was all modern art, and some of it was very interesting. In one of the rooms, you simply walked through the art because it was made out of large sheets of metal. There were several pieces in this room, some that spiraled you around and some that curved but remained in one direction. It is a difficult layout to explain. On the third floor, there were paintings. Makaela and I walked into one room with four giant paintings, each equally breath taking. This was my favorite room. Another room had contemporary paintings: ones Makaela and I didn't fully understand because we thought we could paint them. One was simply all black with a white rectangle in the lower left hand corner. Outside there was a patio where you could see pieces that were also visible from the street. One resembled stacked marbles, another flowers, and a third a spider. Other's may see something else, but that is what I saw. There was even steam blowing below the patio to add to the artistic effect.
After the art museum, we headed to the old part of town. We walked along the river to get there, and there appeared to be some sort of Stand Up Paddle Boarding competition going on. We saw a few in the river, but there were several tents along the river and what appeared to be teams here and there. By this point, I was dragging along. Lunch is eaten so late in Spain: it was about 2:30 and all I had eaten was a light breakfast. Arriving in the old part of town, we had a few hours of free time to eat lunch and go in some shops. Makaela and I ate the lunches our host mothers packed us, then started down the streets. We found a cute shop with bread, pastries, smoothies, and coffees. Makaela and I each got a smoothie, which was delicious. It was my "gelato" for the day. We popped our head into a couple cute shops, but returned to the park shortly after. We found a sunny spot to sit, rest up, and wait for the bus. The breeze had cold the day down, and it was really nice about.
The bus came to pick us back up at 4:30. Again, I feel asleep shortly after getting on, so I didn't see the scenery along the way.
Back in San Sebastian, we were free for the evening. Makaela and I headed over to the surfing beach to stop by the bread shop again and watch the surfers. It was a beautiful evening, and lots of people were out. The beach was packed. Seems like the place to be on a Saturday evening. After watching for awhile, we went into a few small shops along the beach. After having looked up our dinner spot earlier, we walked over and were waiting for them to open at 8:00 pm. Many of the restaurants here are open in the afternoon, close around 2:00 pm or 3:00 pm, and reopen between 7:30 pm and 8:30 pm. Once again, we ironically picked an Italian spot. It was actually very good. I had salmon ravioli, and Makaela basically had a Margarita Pizza ravioli.
Completely stuffed, we walked over to La Concha beach for sunset. On our way, we saw Faye and Victoria, who are from Germany and in our La Cunza group, and asked if they wanted to come along. The four of us walked through town to the beach as the sun was starting to set. The streets were full of people and the sky was beautiful. The city was very much alive. We put our feet in the ocean, took pictures, and watched the sunset. It was such a gorgeous night.
Walking back up from the beach, there were tents up, music, and lots of people. Many of the people had bibs and race clothes on, so I guessed there was some sort of race during the day and this was part of the celebration at the end. We listened to the music for awhile and hung out in the square. Saturday nights are lively here in San Sebastian, and what a beautiful one it was.
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