Solitude in San Sebastian, Spain

It was a time in my life where I was always in Spain and enjoyed promoting Spanish tourism. A long, complicated and arduous project concluded that week and I was in dire need of a holiday. I thought why not go to Madrid and hang out with my friend Olivia? Visit Seville and see the hometown of my spiritual adviser. It would be a good idea to meet the family of our business partners in Salamanca too. But for me? Truly, the trip for myself was visiting the Basque country, specifically San Sebastian and Bilbao. 

Then and now, I still have a split personality of being torn between food and development (I thought it was called government and politics when I was younger). Pais Vasco appealed to me on two fronts. First, my curiosity about its autonomous government and concerns about ETA - an armed nationalist separatist organization that then sought independence from Spain aside from its earlier function of just promoting Basque culture. Second, related to culture, is the food. There's tapas and then there's pintxos - the cornerstone of northern Spain's culture - differentiated from tapas because everything is held together on a spike with the bread opposed to just small plates as it is with tapas. 

So there I was after Prague, Madrid, Seville, and Salamanca, on a train by myself to Donostia-San Sebastian. It was a trip without plans except to rest and enjoy. I only had a hotel booked and didn't even arrange for transfers. Travelling solo was not novelty or cool to me. It was simply no big deal. I used to believe that if I wait for a companion to do something, I'll never get around to doing it. 

To get our geographical bearings in order, San Sebastian is a coastal city in the Basque country of Spain, about 12 miles to the French border around the Atlantic ocean. In several occasions, it took turns with Gipuzkoa as the capital.  Its iconic landmark is La Concha bay (shaped like a shell) and my hotel was right before you reached Igueldo, which was a great place to see the rest of the bay. 

I was aware San Sebastian is one of the cities with the highest concentration of Michelin stars per capita but I didn't make reservations for any. After my walking and bus tours, I just moved from one bar to another, having a pintxo or two, leaving trails of table napkins and toothpicks on the floor as it is done in Spain. Unlike Madrid, I also saw a lot of shops and bars selling bacalao (dried cod) in so many ways too. Such a pity I couldn't bring home slabs of bacalao that my mom could cook so well!

Since one of my names is Cristina, a particular friend often joked that I am royalty by virtue of my name. Countless European kingdoms had a queen named Cristina and Spain was no exception. Spanish Queen Cristina frequented San Sebastian and made it her summer refuge between the 19th and 20th centuries putting it on the holiday map. A number of edifices are named in her honor around San Sebastian. 

I visited during a time when digital cameras had limited memory space and Facebook wasn't a norm that's why my pictures don't give it any justice nor could I aptly describe how much San Sebastian appeals to me. It had history, culture, food, mountains, beaches, rivers, bridges and benches - all things that endear me to a place. I left the region with cookbooks, dictionaries, maps and all sorts of anything Basque now gathering dust at home. In one word,  I was overwhelmed. 

And it was right there on the way down from the Igueldo mountain passing by La Concha beach returning to the old town did I realize it's no fun to experience the best of life alone. Aside from the fact that you can order more and be with someone in pictures, it's having the chance to share the experience and have someone to relate to. We all could share our experiences with others in different ways but to be there together with someone special is another. To have a partner in life is another. 

I had a friend who never returned to a place he enjoyed because he was afraid he'll never have the same great experience again. Coincidentally, my life changed after that trip and I haven't been back either. Thankfully, the next time I return to Spain, I will be with a partner whose heritage hails from Gipuzkoa. We can talk about history like we did at the Lobkwicz Palace in Prague (it has the largest collection of 16th century Spanish portraits outside Spain). And this time, we will make reservations to experience and eat everything together.