Rishi and Bens' Adventures in Spain!!

Some more photos for you all! We have been so busy having a good time that we havnt been able to post very often, so here is a multiple post for the three places mentioned above.

We were lucky enough to snare some sunshine in Santander and visit some of the beautiful beaches there. Since we ventured north we have struck a few days of rain, but I guess you cant have a whole month of perfect weather! Even when it did rain we managed to have a great time as the bars here are so fantastic. We DID find one bar though that has to have a photo posted. Ben was so thrilled to find this place in the middle of Santander old town..... he conjured up the Steve Irwin accent just for this pic

and no....... we did not go and have a fosters!! Instead we walked a few streets over and found this great wine bar. It actually called itself a wine museum. All the walls and the ceiling were covered in really old wine bottles (full of wine!). We managed to have a few glasses aswell :-)

From Santander we travelled along the north coast eastwards to Castro Urdiales. It was a super cute small fishing village. It had some great pincho bars aswell, and we caught a few rays before the rain set in for the night.

We had a great time in Bilbao. Not only did we get to visit the Guggenheim (el goog!) which is an amazing building in a great location, but the city itself was a real surprise. Most people only stay the night and say it is an Industrial town with little to offer, but it is great for walking around and there are some really nice streets and parklands. We took a funicular to the top of a nearby hill and got a great view. Oh yes..... and we also had a fantastic night out in the local plaza which was PACKED with pinchos bars. It was a saturday night and the place was crowded. Lots of Spanish bucks and hens nights seemed to be going on. So here are the pics!

Ben and el goog

Ben IN el goog!

Pincho Pincho Pincho!

Beautiful seaside fishing village of Ribadesella where we spent three days relaxing and enjoying the sunshine.

Best fun ever! We spent the day canoing down the Sella river through rapids for 16km!!

Mmmmm lunch non-backpacker style! (we break the rules sometimes)

Some more photos....

Wine at the modern art gallery in Leon

A great bar we found in Oviedo

Ben enjoying his first serve of Chocolate con Churros. Mmmmmmm Churros

Bike trip out of Oviedo to visit a pre-romanesque church

Boys will be boys!

More riding in Oviedo. A great bike path, which used to be a train line! You even get to go through the tunnels!

Next stop was Burgos! This was our first stop on the trail of the pilgrims, El Camino de Santiago. There were so many of them! We were suprised though to find so many of them on our bus! I always thought they were supposed to walk. hehehe. Burgos was a beautiful city. Most photos you see of it show its great river, parklands, cathedral and impressive entrance but we have something different to show you.

One of our favourite sights in Spain is in the early evening when the elderly people go out for a walk and to socialise. They are so cool! They never stay home. Here is a photo of one of the chairs in the plaza:

Another cool image is of a wedding we happened to stumble apon. Apparently fireworks are a must in every Spanish wedding. They are so loud!!!

Hi Everyone!

An update, and some more photos from Zaragoza Spain. Zaragoza was full of suprises. At first sight it did not appeal to us all that much. Its a very big city, EXTREMELY hot and not as ´pretty´as some of the other places we have visited. But on closer inspection it had quite a bit to offer. The main tourist attraction here is the Basillica de Nuestra Señora del pillar. Here is a view from the top:

Pilgrims come here to kiss the stone which apparently the Virgin Mary touched. We didnt do this... but we did climb to the top and had a very windy experience!

One of the best things about Zaragoza is all of the little plazas that can be found if you walk through the maze of streets. We had a great one just outside of the pension we were staying at.

A great spot to enjoy a beer on a hot afternoon. Also a good time for people watching, as everyone goes out around 5pm for drinks and socialising. Including the kids! They play all night on the streets till about midnight.

We had our first real tapa crawl night in Zaragoza. It was great! First we found this fantastic place that only serves sardines. It was really cheap and a great feed.

This was followed by a trip to the famous tapa street in Zaragoza. Here is a photo of the two most popular places. They were both packed when we got there!

First up we had mussels, which werent really very good. Then we went to the calamari place which specialises in fried calamari ring sandwiches doused in a bucket of mayonaise style sauce. We opted out on the sandwich, but had the calamari. It was really good, but made us feel sick afterwards! hehehe

Zaragoza also had a nice market

and the Aljaferia, which was a Muslim palace in its time

We also discovered here that Ben goes craaaazy during siesta! He really was ready for his next beer here

The best thing ever happened on our last day when we had a few hours to kill before going to catch our next train. I saw some people dressed up walking down the street and was wondering what they were doing when all the sudden there were heaps of them! It turned out to be the International Folk Festival and we got to watch a great parade with music and dancing. Lots of countries were represented, but sadly not Australia. We were tempted to break out the didgeridoos but alas we left them at home. The costumes were really beautiful and full of colour and it was really cool to see. The streets were lined with locals young and old who wanted to catch a glimpse of what was going on.