Although I had gone to bed at almost midnight the night before, I woke up at 7am today. I went to the benches where my parents had relaxed yesterday and wrote poetry for forty minutes overlooking the silver-etched Bay of Biscay as dawn painted the sky. Mama, Daddy, and Olivia joined me at 7:45 and we watched the sun come up together. The perfect picture was complete with food, of course; my parents had brought cheese sandwiches and bread with nocilla for breakfast. While Mama went back to the hotel to pack up the room, my dad, sister, and I went a walk. Olivia and I walked with our dad to a hidden dirt trail that he had discovered yesterday, and on the way we saw birds! We saw a beautiful gull, the species which I, to this day, do not know. It had a coral-colored billed and feet, with a bit of black marking on its face. Gulls no me dicen mucho (an expression which pretty much means that gulls aren't my cup of tea), but I was actually interested in this unknown species. When we all reached the uphill trail, Daddy went running up it (haha, running up hills? no thanks) while O and I stayed at the beginning of the dirt road and birded. We searched and searched for a bird singing a beautiful and quite loud song. Finally, we found it--a Robin! European Robins are very different than their American counterparts: they are not thrushes like American Robins, although they used be considered such; they are much smaller, have more orangey-red breasts than red, are sexually monomorphic. (That means that you can't tell the difference between the male and female by plumage; American Robins are sexually dimorphic since the males have bolder colors than the females. This is most apparent in their heads, since males have black heads while females' heads are more gray.) So, when Olivia and I saw this lifer species, we did our usual lifer routine that consists of jumping up and down, singing, and screaming obscenities (yes, this is necessary when an exciting lifer is seen).
We had to quickly walk back to the hotel, shower, and get ready to meet Manuel at 9:30am to go to his workshop. I was so excited!
(Sorry to leave y'all hanging like this, but I can't write about the workshop and exhibition yet. I wrote a really long document a few days after Manuel gave us the wonderful tour of his work, and that document is currently in the US. So, I'm gonna wait until I receive it until I describe that part of the day.)
After seeing the awe-inspiring artworks, we went back to the hotel and moved all of our stuff to the car. We parked our car in a busy area, then went to eat lunch at a restaurant. Daddy and I got the same appetizer: risotto with a tomato sauce that was delicious. Honestly, we both agreed that the sauce was reminiscent of that of Spaghettios--shout out to my childhood :)--which was awesome! Mama and Olivia also got the same appetizer, a pea and potato soup. For my meal, I got an artichoke and ham dish, but really I envied Olivia's plate of mouth-watering sauteed chicken breast sprinkled with coarse salt, and fried potatoes on the side. Mama got callos, if I remember correctly, and Daddy just ate a few bites from everyone's plates. For dessert, I got a luscious cheesecake with a blueberry sauce on top, and a raspberry sauce on the side. Olivia got a gypsy cake that reminded Mama of her childhood, and Mama went the healthy route and got freshly cut pineapple.
Once we had stuffed ourselves with a marvelous meal, we walked it off by hiking partway up a mountain overlooking both Getaria and the bay. As we walked, we noticed numerous life-like faces carved in the mountain's rock. Could Manuel have taken his skill directly to the earth of Getaria? After admiring a beautiful view, we turned back without reaching the top. We still had to stop by the beach that we had visited six years ago and then head to the Pyrenees.
My family, being special, took the "scenic" route to the beach. The consisted of climbing atop big-ass concrete blocks half-submerged in the surf, making our way toward the shore from the sea. It was exhilarating, and really fun to do it with my family. Once we reached the shore, I dipped my feet into the sea. Mama wrote "Getaria" on a rock and we all took a picture with it, like we did six years ago. Now, it was off to our rustic house in the Pyrenees!
After finally reaching the house late into the night, the sky ink-black and the stars writing bright stories above us, Olivia and I collapsed into bed while our parents unpacked everything and chatted with the sweet woman who owned the house.
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