I am officially *on vacation* so now I have time to update on the last 5 (?) or so months that I have disappeared from here.

I can’t tell you what happened in March, or April, or May, but going as far back as June, I can tell you that we went on two great trips to the north of Spain, in July we spent a night in a big house with a great pool with views over looking the mountains, and excellent friends, and in July we also spent a couple of nights in Malaga.

A Long Weekend in Santander

Back in early June, we spent three nights in Santander, up in the north of Spain. It was breathtakingly beautiful with crisp cool air and completely blue skies. We went for our friends Nicky and Ivan’s wedding which was beautiful and a lot of fun. The food was delicious, the music was bumpin’ and the ceremony was lovely.

Once the wedding festivities were finished, we headed off to San Sebastian for relaxation, pintxos, and wonderful cool sunshine. We walked along the coast, tried very good and not-so-good pintxos, drank beer, stayed up way too late talking and laughing, and had a fun time.

Of course we had to try the basque cheesecake. We went to one of the most popular places to try it – don’t know the name – and it was delicious. People weren’t as impressed as I was – I though it was great. So creamy and light. Disregard that I look dead in the photo below. Just look at the cake!

We also spent a day in Biarritz, a little French town just 22 miles from the border with Spain. You know, when it Rome. It was fancy schmancy and even better than I imagined (I didn’t imagine anything at all so I was pleasantly surprised – I highly suggest going about life in this way). I took too many pictures of this blue-green water.

Here is a picture of us in front of our hotel:

I’m just kidding, though that hotel was very, very nice. It’s actually a Hyatt property! We just stopped for a super expensive drink and laughed about how we were bringing the fanciness down a notch or two. The two people that were sitting in our section out on the balcony got moved to a new section once we sat down. It made us laugh.

We spent the day walking around, taking in the views, had some crepes for lunch (when in Rome, again), and had a very expensive, but mediocre ice cream in a little cafe.

The way home from Biarritz was supposed to be a quick 40 minutes, but thanks to the farmer protests happening exactly on that day, half of our group got caught in a 5 hour traffic block! Luckily, we were not in that car so we dutifully waited for our friends at a bar and did our best to look sad about their terrible luck. (We really were sad – what a horrible experience for them!).

While we waited for them, we also went up the see the incredible views of San Sebastian.

The last day was spent walking along the coast, soaking up the sunshine, and enjoying our last pinxos of the trip.

A Weekend in Santander & Burgos

A couple of weeks after our jaunt in San Sebastian, we headed up north for yet another wedding, this time near Santander, Cantabria. We checked into a tiny hotel in the middle of nowhere, Luis took a cap nap in the car and then we headed off to the pre-wedding party where we played ping pong and foosball.

The next day was the wedding itself. It took place at this beautiful arboretum and despite being in Cantabria, which is famous for rain, the weather was perfect – sunny and cool.

Speaking of perfect – the food was delicious. I ate about 10 of these little steak tartar things and helped myself to various trips to the cheese bar.

The food at this wedding was the best food I have ever had. The waiters would come around looking for me in order to give me special food that no one else got since I don’t some of the things that they served. Cantabrian anchovies, croquettes, cheeses, soups, steak… We stayed at the wedding until about 2 am (that’s when it ended) and walked about 30 seconds back to the hotel. New way to go to weddings –> always stay next to the venue!

We all checked out of the hotel the next day and made our ways to various destinations. Luis and were planning to head back to Madrid, but stopped along the way to say hello to the cows of Cantabria and take in some clean air.

Google took us down some winding dirt road that they promised would save us about 40 minutes on our trip back to the highway, but as it turned out, it was a road for farm equipment and definitely not a car. We had to turn around and make the long, windy, bumpy trip back to the highway where we cruised over to Burgos for a quick beer/ tapa stop. You know, energy for the trip back.

Both weekends were just what we needed to combat the Madrid heat!

This post is getting too long, but I’ll be back with pictures from our night away with friends in Avila and our weekend in Malaga. Probably soon, but maybe in 3-6 months. 🙂