July 12 - July 15, 2019
This past weekend, my friends and I decided to go to San Sebastian! We had previously planned to go the weekend before, but we had a lot of issues trying to book our bus tickets, which we thought would be the easiest part, so instead we decided to go this past weekend. We fortunately got our airbnb host to allow us to change the dates of our stay to this past weekend so we were able to go.
Our bus was set to leave the Oviedo bus station at 11:30am. We got to the station 5 minutes before we were supposed to board, and the bus wasn't at the platform it originally said it would be at. We also didn't know which bus was ours, because it wasn't on the screen of departures, so we thought we were screwed lol. We tried to ask the information desk for help and they were barely any help, but luckily the bus just hadn't arrived yet... it was late. We finally made it onto the bus. It was about a 3 hour ride before we made it to Bilbao, which is where we had a transfer. We had about 30 minutes before our next bus arrived, but since we almost missed our last bus, we tried to make sure we cued up earlier when the bus arrived. We were towards the back of the line and waited about 10 minutes before being told that we were in line for the WRONG bus because it wasn't the ALSA bus company, even though the departure screen said it was the right one. Our actual bus was seconds from leaving, like starting to reverse and leave the station lmao, but don't worry we made it.
About 3 hours later, we made it to San Sebastian wooo! It was honestly a miracle. We took a taxi from the station to our airbnb which was right across the street from Zurriola beach, which is the surf beach. Even though it was overcast the entire city was so pretty. I didn't really include pictures of the views because I didn't take many, I mostly filmed it, but you can google pictures of it, idk if you knew that or not ;)
Later, after relaxing for a while, we decided to get dinner and walk around the old town. The airbnb host had made pincho guides and recommended multiple places for us to go and try which was helpful, except for the fact that he had failed to mention some places required you make a reservation prior to going. The old town is huge in comparison to the old town in Oviedo. There were so many more people our age, which we never really see in Oviedo either so it was refreshing to not be the only young people. All the buildings were so old and amazing and it just kept going. After walking around and trying to go to a few different food places and failing we decided on this really cute Italian restaurant called "Raviolina." The people that worked there were super nice and the entire restaurant was really cozy and aesthetic. This entire trip I have been trying to find lemonade, and they had homemade lemonade there which was perfect. We got a bottle of lemonade for the table and they brought it in the CUTEST bottle (that you can see in the last picture), we all wanted to keep the bottle. I just got a Margherita pizza and added mushrooms and it was delicious. I was craving something without meat which is really not me usually, but I have so much pork all the time in Oviedo that I think I'll probably be going vegetarian by the time I come back home because I'm getting so sick of it lol.
But anwayssss, after dinner we walked around for a little longer. We were told there was free live music near the water, so we went to check it out. There were so many people and a lot of police too which was nice, but we were very confused at the music. It was just 100% traditional music which was just not what we were expecting and people were just sitting around, so we decided to get ice cream for dessert. I have been looking for mint chip ice cream in Spain which has also been more difficult to find than I thought, but we finally found a place that had it :)
We were all so tired after traveling all day, but felt like we should try and see how the nightlife was in San Sebastian, because it is apparently known for their party scene. We were really contemplating it, but it was only 12am, and since Spaniards loveeee to just never sleep and they start going out at 2am we just were not cut out for it. On top of that, being comfy in bed and in sweats sounds 10000x better than having a mediocre time out ALWAYS. Period. It was definitely the best decision made all day.
The next morning, we we woke up around 9:30am because we had to check out of our airbnb by 11:30am, but we wanted to make sure we got to go to the beach. It was pretty overcast in the morning, while we were at the beach, but got super hot and sunny as we had to leave the beach to check out of the Airbnb...of course, but regardless it was relaxing.
After checking out of the airbnb, we decided to walk around other parts of the city that we didn't get to see the previous night. It was a really beautiful day. While we were walking I noticed a double decker bus tour, which is super cliche and tourist-y but I felt like we had to do it. We also had been walking around with all of our luggage so I was tired I'll say it. The bus tour tickets were only 12 euros each and it was good for the entire day. It made 15 different stops, and you get on and off whenever you wanted, but the entire duration of the tour around the city was only about 45 minutes. I really loved it and recommend it no matter how cliche it is.
Once we had completed the tour we had about 1.5 hours until our bus was going to depart. We were starving so we decided to go get lunch at "La Viña," a pincho bar and restaurant that apparently is known for their amazing cheesecake. Everyone was hyping it up so much, but I personally was not a big fan and would 100% prefer cheesecake from the Cheesecake Factory, but I'm glad I got to experience it lol. The cheesecake wasn't really cold because they don't refrigerate many things. They also make the cake in a certain way that makes it kind of burnt around the edges. It also had an interesting consistency, which was not what I'm used to. I really tried to love it, and I wanted to love it, but just couldn't. Don't believe the hype, but still go try it.
Since getting the bill in Spain takes hella long, we didn't leave the restaurant until 40 minutes before we had to board the bus. I personally am the type of person to want to be at places really early, especially when it comes to flights, etc. when traveling because I get stressed if I'm late, so as you can imagine ya girl was stressed af, BUT we made it! We ended up getting back to Oviedo at 11:30pm and we were exhausted to say the least.
Overall, it was a really fun weekend and DEFINITELY an adventure. I'm so glad we decided to plan the trip, and even though things didn't go our way majority of the time, I wouldn't change any of it. San Sebastian is so surreal, I wanna go back already. I completely see why it's my host mom's favorite place in all of Spain!
Photo Details...
1. Pretty self-explanatory unless you're dumb ;)
2. Somewhere in old town ha
3. A really old place in old town. These details don't even help lmao my b
4. The best presentation of lemonade I've ever seen in my life from the Raviolina restaurant :)
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