To Bilbao

I must be getting old.
When I first went off on an adventure to Greece in college, I wrote tomes in mass emails every time I came within a few feet of an Internet-connected computer. In China, even my 50th trip to the fresh market was worth writing home about. In Spain, I drafted blog entries on my phone to post whenever a Wi-Fi signal made itself known. And in the past two weeks, I have written approximately nothing. Below, I will attempt to reclaim my youth by reveling in the wonder of small things. Bear with me -- it seems that I am out of practice.

Mom's and my trip started in Germany. I came to Stuttgart to collaborate closely with a friend and fellow PhD student. My collaboration with her has worked wonders. What would easily take me a week to do on my own gets done in an hour when she is in the room. But then one thing led to another, and suddenly she was in the US while I was in Bilbao, Spain. Life is funny like that. Hence, I have more to tell about than just how beautiful the view is from the office I was planning to work from.

Before going to Germany, I asked my nephew what he wanted me to bring back to him from our travels. If you know TWC, then you know that this was a silly question for me to ask. Similar to, "So, are you looking forward to getting vaccinated today?", I felt almost thoughtless for having asked. For those of you who have not had the pleasure of meeting TWC, the answer his loved ones have already anticipated was "Angry Birds". Given that the child has two armies of Angry Birds, this did not seem like a very special gift.

So, anyway, I didn't see any Angry Birds in Germany. I did in Bilbao, though -- our first stop of several in Europe. This Angry Bird was a strange one, too -- Nico, a canary from Rio de Janeiro. He will be our guide through the rest of the trip, because rather than give TWC one more toy for his collection, I will try to give him a story, too.

This is Nico.

We arrived in Germany too late in October for its Oktoberfest, but we got to Bilbao just in time for its own version of the volksfest, dirndls and all.

We didn't really partake in the celebrations, though. We walked around Bilbao, taking in the sights in the old quarter and along the river. If you've never been to Bilbao, it is a city nestled in a valley in Northern Spain's Basque country. Not the whole city is in the valley; some of it has crawled up the mountainside and is most easily accessed from a train running straight up the mountain. We experienced this train our last night in Bilbao, but the pictures came out looking like any other low-quality night picture: pretty much just blue and black. But we did get photos of other sights. We were in Bilbao during some unspecified Basque holiday when nearly everything was closed. Fortunately, we love people watching, and the people of Bilbao were definitely ready to put on a show, paddle surfing down the river, skateboarding in the public skatepark, and just generally enjoying themselves outdoors.

Bilbao has both very old and very new sections. The old section of town differed from the newer part of town mostly by its narrower streets, many old churches, and classic architecture.

 Since the 1990's, when Bilbao was chosen as the new home of another Guggenheim Museum, Bilbao has had an especially bustling new section of the city. The Guggenheim is a great museum to visit (Jess and I spent a good part of one day there two years ago), but nothing inside is quite as impressive as the building itself. Do an image search of "Guggenheim Bilbao" if you want to see what I mean.

With such a trendy art museum, it should be no surprise that Bilbao has all kinds of trendy stores with excellent window shopping opportunities. Nico -- who wears a pop bottle cap as a hat -- appears to have been particularly intrigued by the hat store options.

It also seemed as though others tried to be a part of making Bilbao a city full of strange and awe-inspiring examples of architectural achievement. Someone, for example, added a roaring lion to the top of  one building. Nico had some fun with that.

 Nico also found one of his favorite movie stars in Bilbao. These two are cute together, aren't they?

One thing I love love love about Europe: nothing is easier than finding a cafe that serves espresso ground by a Mazzer, pulled by a Gaggia, and served proudly in a heated demitasse. Coffee here is almost always an espresso. A good espresso. Oh, how I love it.

Coming soon: our trip to Biarritz and Paris. =)