Gaztelugatxe

Gaztelugatxe is a fantastic day trip from Bilbao by bus to Bakio and a ~1h walk. A striking place with strong winds, stormy waves and a jagged coast. The Basque name, where “gaztelu” means castle, has two meanings: “the rock castle” and “inaccessible castle”.

Donostia

The city officially bears the bilingual name “Donostia / San Sebastián”. It’s not obvious, but the names have the same meaning (don means saint in Basque). Why not use just one name, depending on which language is used if both names are semantically equivalent? The biggest Basque city uses that system, although the names are very similar: Bilbao and Bilbo. However, a name like “Bilbo / Bilbao” would’ve been awkward, suggesting that the use of a bilingual name requires significant syntactic distinction. The capital of the Basque Country solves this problem in a different way, with a hyphen: Vitoria-Gasteiz, which is more elegant. This suggests that semantically equivalent names are connected by a slash, signifying equivalence, otherwise the names are connected by a hyphen. Unfortunately, this idea is shattered by an exception: Pamplona / Iruña. I have no theories left.

Donostia is classy. Not my type of thing, but I spent a whole week here, doing multiple day trips.

Hondarribia

Hondarribia is a border town with a lovely historical part with distinct Basque architecture.

Zarautz

Zarautz is a town popular with surfers. I came here to walk along the coast.

Getaria

A 1h walk along the coast from Zarautz is the fishing village of Getaria. It is known as the birthplace of Juan Sebastian Elcano, the explorer who completed the first circumnavigation of the globe during the Magellan expedition, and of Cristobal Balenciaga, founder of the fashion brand.