A few weeks ago we had an extraordinary day out to the town of Bermeo on the Biscay coast about 25 miles away from Bilbao. (I’m only just getting round to writing about it now: I have quite a backlog of things to write about.)
It was a superb summer day in September – hot sun, brilliant blue skies – and we decided this would be the perfect day to return to the Urdaibai estuary, north-east of Bilbao, an ‘area of outstanding natural beauty’, as we call them in the UK.
We’d been there a few weeks before, on a car journey with Pietro’s boss and family to the cliff-side fishing village of Elantxobe (see earlier post). This time, we took the train that heads to Gernika (Guernica) at the bottom of the estuary and then trundles along the estuary to Bermeo, the town at the river mouth by the sea. (Gernika is of course a most important historical site, and we’re planning a visit there one day, but on this occasion we were drawn to the sea.)
Bermeo was more important than Bilbao in medieval times, and at one point the ‘capital’ of Vizcaya, the Biscay region. It’s now a small town of about 18,000 inhabitants, with an extensive harbour. Fishing has been at the heart of Bermeo life for many centuries.
It was a superb summer day in September – hot sun, brilliant blue skies – and we decided this would be the perfect day to return to the Urdaibai estuary, north-east of Bilbao, an ‘area of outstanding natural beauty’, as we call them in the UK.
We’d been there a few weeks before, on a car journey with Pietro’s boss and family to the cliff-side fishing village of Elantxobe (see earlier post). This time, we took the train that heads to Gernika (Guernica) at the bottom of the estuary and then trundles along the estuary to Bermeo, the town at the river mouth by the sea. (Gernika is of course a most important historical site, and we’re planning a visit there one day, but on this occasion we were drawn to the sea.)
Bermeo was more important than Bilbao in medieval times, and at one point the ‘capital’ of Vizcaya, the Biscay region. It’s now a small town of about 18,000 inhabitants, with an extensive harbour. Fishing has been at the heart of Bermeo life for many centuries.
It’s a very pretty place. We sat by the sea, eating pintxos (including a rather amazing piece of fresh barbecued tuna, no doubt caught that day) and watched the boats sparkling on the sea. We went to the fishing museum in the old medieval tower-house and read about the long history of Basque fishing. We wondered through the narrow medieval streets up and at the top of the hillside. We admired the view over to the cliffs at Elantxobe on the other side of the estuary.
But what made the day extraordinary was that it turned out to be the first day of the town’s fiesta. We discovered that this meant that there would be a massive community feast and a boating regatta, both of which turned out to be exceptionally interesting and impressive.
The place was packed with thousands of Vizcayans from Bermeo and the surrounding towns and villages, every single one of them wearing blue (which turned out to be the colour of the local boat team) including the blue neckerchiefs that are typically worn at fiestas..(I’ve already commented in a previous post on the very marked mono-ethnicity and cultural homogeneity of this occasion: it’s rare to be in a place with so many hundreds of people all looking the same and wearing the same.) There were the usual fiesta bands on the streets, and hundreds of people eating and drinking outside the tabernas.
The place was packed with thousands of Vizcayans from Bermeo and the surrounding towns and villages, every single one of them wearing blue (which turned out to be the colour of the local boat team) including the blue neckerchiefs that are typically worn at fiestas..(I’ve already commented in a previous post on the very marked mono-ethnicity and cultural homogeneity of this occasion: it’s rare to be in a place with so many hundreds of people all looking the same and wearing the same.) There were the usual fiesta bands on the streets, and hundreds of people eating and drinking outside the tabernas.
Many people were heading up from the harbour towards the cliff-top overlooking the harbour. We followed, and found a vast communal meal going on. Hundreds of tables had been erected on the green on the clifftop. The whole population of the town seemed to be there, and everyone was picnicking together in extended family and friendship groups.
I haven’t yet written about the Basque mania for food – I will – but it was certainly on display here, with many of these community groups gathered around large portable stoves where people were cooking large quantities of Basque delicacies. These communal cooking sessions are a major part of Basque fiestas. We especially saw a great deal of the extraordinary black dish ‘txipirones en su tinta’ (squid in its own ink) being cooked and eaten (- a dish that rather turns my stomach as I have a deep aversion, no doubt rooted in the Jewish laws of kashrut, to any form of seafood that doesn’t look like a proper fish – i.e. slimy things in shells and all those horrid squelchy things like squid and octopus.)
I haven’t yet written about the Basque mania for food – I will – but it was certainly on display here, with many of these community groups gathered around large portable stoves where people were cooking large quantities of Basque delicacies. These communal cooking sessions are a major part of Basque fiestas. We especially saw a great deal of the extraordinary black dish ‘txipirones en su tinta’ (squid in its own ink) being cooked and eaten (- a dish that rather turns my stomach as I have a deep aversion, no doubt rooted in the Jewish laws of kashrut, to any form of seafood that doesn’t look like a proper fish – i.e. slimy things in shells and all those horrid squelchy things like squid and octopus.)
Anyway, after marvelling at this communal extravaganza – and regretting that we weren’t part of it – we headed back down to the harbour for lunch. After that, there were still a couple of hours before the regatta began at six, so we decided to head off to the neighbouring village of Mundaka, five minutes away on the train.
Mundaka is beautiful, a medieval village clustered around a harbour with wonderful views over the estuary, famed apparently for its surfing waves. Pietro had a swim in the harbour (losing his glasses in the process – see earlier post).
Mundaka is beautiful, a medieval village clustered around a harbour with wonderful views over the estuary, famed apparently for its surfing waves. Pietro had a swim in the harbour (losing his glasses in the process – see earlier post).
As we prepared to leave, a rowing boat with an extremely professional-looking team of rowers sailed out of the harbour at top speed, heading down the estuary towards Bermeo. ‘Aha’, we thought, ‘they must be going to the Bermeo regatta’.
We had no idea what the regatta would consist of or what kind of event it would be, but we headed back to Bermeo on the train to find out.
We had no idea what the regatta would consist of or what kind of event it would be, but we headed back to Bermeo on the train to find out.
It turned out to be rather like the Oxford and Cambridge boat race, a major sporting event covered by the tv network, part of a prestigious Northern Spanish rowing league competition called the ‘Liga San Miguel’. Every town and village on the Spanish north coast (from the Basque Country to Galicia) has a team, and it’s all – like everything Basque, it seems – done at the very highest level of skill and commitment with huge cultural pride. (See www.ligasanmiguel.com for more - and you can see a 3 minute video of one of the races we saw here: www.eitb.com/es/videos/detalle/953612/video-remo--kaiku-arrasa-bermeo-gana-liga-san-miguel)
As you will know, I am not a sport aficionado: my first act of each day is (or was, back home) to pick the newspaper up and throw the sports section in the bin. Nevertheless, I did find this fascinating – and even I could see that it made the Ox and Cam Race look like a bit like a trundle round the garden.
The main difference is that the race takes place on a very choppy Atlantic Ocean, quite different from the genteel waters of Putney. I could see too that the rowers – all of them born and bred in the Basque Country – were highly trained and fit, and worked together as a team like the crew of a Greek trireme. (Below, pictures from the internet).
The main difference is that the race takes place on a very choppy Atlantic Ocean, quite different from the genteel waters of Putney. I could see too that the rowers – all of them born and bred in the Basque Country – were highly trained and fit, and worked together as a team like the crew of a Greek trireme. (Below, pictures from the internet).
Then, the races themselves. This sport developed from fishing; the rowers were the fishermen of the Basque coast, the boats were traineras (the trawlers from which they would net shoals of fish), and the races were modelled on the loops the boats did in order to trap a shoal of fish in their nets. So the teams row towards a buoy and then row round the buoy and back again – and then round several more times: no simple rowing in a straight line up a river… And it’s all very, very fast, because the boats had to be very, very fast to net the fish and get them back to sell as quickly as possible. (Below, a screenshot from the internet).
Hundreds of people made their way to the harbour mouth to watch the races on the open sea just outside the harbour, the audience thronging precariously and rather terrifyingly on the precipitous harbour walls. Needless to say, I insisted (fear of heights again) we watch safely on the big screen on the quay set up to relay the race to the crowd who had decided not to venture out. I took a few blurry photos of the distant activity with the zoom lens…
The sun set as we took the train back up the Urdaibai estuary and home to Bilbao: another day of brilliant blue skies, warm sunshine sparkling on water, and yet more discoveries in Basque culture.
Meanwhile, returning to the early November present - there’s been a lot of rain (though every other day still seems to produce wonderful blue skies) – and temperatures have gone down (though only a week ago we had 18 degrees one afternoon). And there’s been an election.
Out of 75 seats, the Basque Nationalist Party (Christian-Democrat-style centre-ish) won 27 seats; the left nationalist Basque Party (Euskal Herria Bildu) won 21 seats; the Basque Socialist Party (also pretty nationalist) won 16 seats; the Conservatives won 10 seats; the anti-nationalist centre party UPYD won 1 seat. So 48 of the 75 seats went to explicit nationalists, with a further 21 going to the nationalist-leaning socialists. 37 went to socialists, 28 to centrists, and 10 to tories.
The main shift in this vote was away from the socialists and towards the nationalists, apparently intended to show Madrid that where Catalunya goes the Basque Country is likely to follow. And there’ll be a crucial election in Catalunya in 3 weeks’ time. Watch this space.
Out of 75 seats, the Basque Nationalist Party (Christian-Democrat-style centre-ish) won 27 seats; the left nationalist Basque Party (Euskal Herria Bildu) won 21 seats; the Basque Socialist Party (also pretty nationalist) won 16 seats; the Conservatives won 10 seats; the anti-nationalist centre party UPYD won 1 seat. So 48 of the 75 seats went to explicit nationalists, with a further 21 going to the nationalist-leaning socialists. 37 went to socialists, 28 to centrists, and 10 to tories.
The main shift in this vote was away from the socialists and towards the nationalists, apparently intended to show Madrid that where Catalunya goes the Basque Country is likely to follow. And there’ll be a crucial election in Catalunya in 3 weeks’ time. Watch this space.