This weekend we stayed in the convent which is next door to the school. Some who know me may find it surprising that I, being the chain smoking, hard drinking, Lord´s name in vain taking kind of guy that I am, would elect to stay in a house of nuns. I only dealt with one, Encarna, who was elderly and kind. My room was small but had a great bathroom. I met the parish priest, Juan Mari, and he drove us up to one of the mountains and we hiked for a few hours early Sunday morning. But the xirimiri forced us to go back.
We walked one town over to Beasain and we were delighted to find that nothing was open. We walked up the highway to Lazkaomendi, which has one restaurant and other than that, is just farm houses. We walked to a small town past Lazkaomendi, Zaldibia. We´re in beautiful country. We ate in the restaurant in Lazkaomendi and an old bertsolari sang to us.
This is by far a better ¨Basque Country¨ experience than you can enjoy in a big city like Bilbao or Donosti. Everybody speaks Basque and outside of this small city, it´s very rural. When not in class, all there is to do here is walk around, speak Basque, eat, drink and smoke cigarrettes. But, those are pretty much my favorite things to do anywhere, so what better place than here, eh?