Back to France

After an enjoyable three days in Oviedo, we were ready to get back on the road. Our destination was a beachy town just back into France, St. Jean de Luz. On the way however, we wanted to give the Guggenheim in Bilbao a proper visit, not just the drive by we had had a few nights earlier.

In Bilbao we parked the car at the local mall and walked over to the museum. As you approach it, you are greeted by a huge "sculpture" of a dog, made entirely out of flowers. It stands about three stories high and is pretty impressive. The story goes that it was originally supposed to be displayed at the museum just for the opening, and then it would tour; but the people of Bilbao just couldn't let it go and insisted it join the permanent collection, so it did.

We took gobs of pictures of the museum from every angle. The museum itself is an architectural piece of art. It is made out of titanium and incorporates many fluid lines giving it a feeling of motion. As neat as I thought it looked, it was Sara who could really appreciate its artistic significance.

From Bilbao we had an uneventful drive to St. Jean de Luz (thanks penny). As we rolled into town, we saw that every Tues night they have a Pelote match and some display of Basque culture. Pelote is sometimes referred to as Hi Li... it consists of two, three person teams who use large scooped basket type "gloves" to throw a hard ball off a wall. Each team alternates shots until one misses or hits it out of bounds. It's sort of hard to explain but it was a lot of fun to watch.

After walking along the beach for a little while we headed off to the Pelote courts. When we first arrived at the match, we were told that we could purchase English instructions. As neither of us really had any idea how the game was played, we thought that it would be well worth the one euro price. We purchased the program from an old, beret wearing Frenchman at the gate. He told us we would get along great seeing as how we spoke "American". It turns out that he spent a number of years in the US working as an engineer. He even spent some time in Virginia.

As I said, I found the match very entertaining to watch. But almost as much fun, if not more, was that the program seller mc-ed the event, singing french songs and telling jokes in between points. Sara took a bunch of videos of him, and I think she has a not so secret crush on him which I'm sure she'll deny. The match ended 35 to 29, after which there was a dance troop for our entertainment. It appeared as though they were still working out the kinks in their program, so after watching a few dances, we snuck out between acts and headed back to the hotel for a good nights rest.