Donostia San Sebastian: a full tummy, a great view and a happy toddler too!

San Sebastian, what can I say. I think I've fallen in love with this pretty little city. We weren't even planning to go there (planning, what planning?), but a couple of weeks ago, when I mentioned that we were getting the ferry into Bilbao, my friend Sarah said that her husband had proposed to her in San Se (as the locals call it), and it was really pretty, and then I mentioned it to my uncle, Roger, who's pretty well travelled when it comes to Spain and he agreed. So that was it, we went to San Se.

View of La Concha beach at sunset, taken from the harbour

And what a treat we've had. Situated on the northern coast, with an uninterrupted view out to the Bay of Biscay, only 20km from the border with France, in the Basque region, San Sebastian enjoys a mild climate, and is a favourite holiday spot of the Spanish. It's mid November, and we've experienced temperatures of between 16 and 24 degrees. You can't often say much better than that for the Northern Hem at this time of year.

The city is sprawling; with three beaches and numerous suburbs. We stayed in the Gros neighbourhood, in a cool but spooky apartment overlooking the Zurriola beach, the one favoured by surfers, as it's out of San Se bay. I reckon it could give Bondi a run for it's money, and we enjoyed building, and destroying sandcastles there, as well as a quick and unplanned, fully clothed, dip into the surf by a certain miss Hobo, who stepped off an ankle deep sand shelf and landed in water up to her chest. It probably wasn't my best parenting moment when I laughed once Mr Traveller had whipped her up into his arms, but thankfully, true to character, she took it all with a smile.

The centre of the city is made up with a shopping district, with some pretty good shops (well, it was my birthday while we were there!), the working harbour/beachfront, and the Parte Vieja (old town) which was full of spectacular medieval architecture, and had me walking around with a crick in my neck, it was so amazing to look up at.

Looking through the Parte Vieja to the cathedral

But the Old Town has another reason to bask in it's utter brilliance, and that is one of the big reasons that SanSe is often referred to as the gastronomic capital of Spain: Pintxos.And loving food in the way that we do, us Travellers couldn't get enough of these magnificent morsels that we found on bar after bar after bar.

Jamon pintxos with huge legs of Jamon hanging behind the bar in the background

Most people will be familiar with tapas, and pintxos (pronounced pinchos) are the basques version of tapas - rumoured to be the best on offer. The bars in the parte vieja offer a veritable feast of pintxos; some just a simple piece of bread or a croissant filled with the delectable jamon, others much more elaborate, such as the Mackobe - a mini kobe burger in a ketchup bun served with plantain chips.

Classic pintxos include a piece of bread and a 'spear'to hold the topping in place. This one had goats cheese, walnuts, and, according to the barmaid 'sugared fruit', I suspect it was quince, but any pintxos expert who can verify would be most welcome!

The done thing in San Sebastian is a pintxos crawl - visiting a succession of bars, having a drink and one or two pintxos in each place. We took sandwiches for the Littlest hobo (no room for allergies at the bar, but children were very welcome) and managed three bars in any one session - I think we would probably be classified as pintxos lightweights.

The whole bar area was covered with pintxos - at a guess 20 varieties to choose from

San Sebastian was a really child friendly city. Not only did we enjoy the beaches, but there were play areas around every corner too, and the Littlest Hobo's particular favourite, a merry-go-round, built in 1900, complete with groovy Spanish pop music, right on the sea front. Handily enough, it was right next to the Parte Vieja, so everyone was happy! There are also a couple of great attractions for kids - the funicular railway, which we walked to, but sadly it was closed for refurbishment, and a hands on science museum that we read a lot of positive reports about, but didn't actually make it out to. The Spanish take their children everywhere, which means that they are always made welcome. The biggest problem we experienced was with timings - the littlest Hobo is used to eating dinner by 6 and being in bed sometime between 7 and 8, and the playgrounds are still heaving at that time; culturally, they just shape their day to the beat of a different drum. This wasn't a big issue per se, but it made eating out in the evenings near impossible; by the time the restaurants were open (it seemed to be 8pm onwards) the littlest Hobo was ready to flop into bed. This made me thankful again that we stay in self catering accommodation and we can make our days work for us. 

San Se merry-go-round

Romantic San Se takes you in and envelopes you in warm fuzzies. For somewhere that wasn't even on the radar until 2 weeks ago, I really enjoyed our time there. We originally only booked for three nights, but decided to extend after we arrived. I would definitely go again, although might book a different apartment next time, lest our night time visitor felt the need to return!

Any port in a storm - 24 hours on the Cap Finistere ferry

Brittany Ferries Cap Finistere

When we first planned to head to Spain from the UK our trip was going to be 7-9 weeks long so it made sense to take the car. Being a bit cautious of sea-faring vessels, I initially assumed that we would take the short ferry crossing across the English channel to France and then drive, but after our 4 hour ferry crossing from Roslare to Pembroke in September I admitted that Mr Traveller might actually be on to a winning idea. Primarily, the Littlest Hobo would have the freedom to roam around and explore in a way that appeals to any toddler and makes far more sense than having them strapped in a seat for hours and hours on end. .

Cost wise, it was probably about even - to drive we would’ve had the shorter ferry crossing, fuel costs for 14 hours driving (not cheap with European prices) and probably two overnight stops with that length of journey, possibly three if the thought of 3 days of constant travel just seemed too ridiculous. Flying and then hiring a car would’ve taken us way out the ballpark. The ferry to Spain took 24 hours, and cost approx £400 give or take £50 depending on the date we crossed and the cabin we chose.

Our Outside 2/4 birth en-suite cabin

Now that P&O have discontinued this route, Brittany Ferries offer the only option from the UK to Spain - they run two ferries - Cap Finistere and Pont-Aven, and a couple of different routes. We opted for a Portsmouth to Bilbao crossing on the Cap Finistere, which is the smaller of the two ferries. Initially we booked a luxury cabin, the top one offered, which came with a double bed, a tv and a lot more space than any of the others, and planned for the Littlest Hobo to sleep on a fantastic kids air bed that friends lent us. After a bit of a stuff up on my behalf though, (and for those who know us, yes honestly, it was all my fault and nothing to do with Mr Traveller!), we ended up with a 4 birth outside cabin and a refund of £40! I was pleasantly surprised by the cabin, which was on the 8th deck, although there wasn’t a lot of floor space, there was enough room to move about, the beds were a decent size, and Mr Traveller only felt marginally claustrophobic up there on the top bunk. The Littlest Hobo’s bed side even fitted, which was a big plus once it got a bit choppy! The room was en suite, with a surprisingly good shower. The room was well lit, with two plug sockets and piped music available. There was a thermostat to adjust the temperature as you wished, and a large port hole with great black-out curtains.

Dinky-di shower

En-suite bathroom

I couldn’t find much about our ferry online, apart from what Brittany Ferries had on their own site, and a single review on trip advisor which was pretty negative, so I didn’t have high expectations. The food in particular had received bad press, and if our experience on Brittany Ferries was anything to go on, I wasn‘t expecting any sort of gastronomic sensation, I was just hoping it wouldn‘t lead to any gastroenteritis either! The first evening we ate at the Salad Bar which was up on the 10th (top) deck, as the main restaurant couldn’t serve food until 6.30, which proved to be too long a wait for the Littlest Hobo. It was actually surprisingly tasty, if simple, fare. For breakfast, the Littlest Hobo and I had a full cooked brekkie in the main restaurant which was great value given that under 5’s eat free, then took Mr Traveller some breakfast bits and pieces that we’d bought in the Bon Marche café shop. All in all, I thought the food was okay, given we were, after all, on a ferry not a cruise.

The other thing I’d been unsure of was the children’s facilities on board - I knew there would be something but not sure what. We quickly discovered the children’s play area on the top deck, which claimed to be for supervised 5-12 year olds, but was perfectly suited to our two-and-a-bit year old and I can’t imagine any twelve year old comfortably using it. The area is covered, but it was a bit too chilly when we were leaving the UK to stay out there for any length of time, although it was great in the warm sunshine the next day. I had been hoping to see an indoor soft play area for small kids like we’d experienced with Irish Ferries, but there wasn’t one. As the Littlest Hobo appeared to be the only child on our crossing (really, I’m not exaggerating for dramatic effect, she really was the only one) she was able to choose which movies we watched in the children’s area, although a few adults gathered around to watch with us once Toy Story 3 was rolling. They also gave her a kids toy box with any food ordered, which contained plasticy, easy to break toys aimed at kids who were a few years older than the Littlest Hobo, but they kept her so happily amused that we barely broke into her backpack of toys that accompanies us on our travels.

Childrens play area on the top deck

Somebody was enjoying it

Mr Traveller has been known to get a bit queasy when out on anything more than a millpond, and the Littlest Hobo had projectile vomited on our last ferry journey (which we suspected to be for reasons other than the ferry, especially given she’d known ferries as a regular form of local public transport for the first 20 months of her life in Sydney, but weren’t sure), so I was curious to see how we would get on going  across the notorious Bay of Biscay, especially as we’d ended up travelling in mid November as opposed to our initially planned early October departure. When we first left Portsmouth all was well, and by the time we went to bed some 3 or 4 hours into the journey, things were getting a little bit rocky, and we’d identified that bending over forward was definitely best avoided, but we all went off to sleep without too much hassle. As far as I recall, the horrendous rocking started at around 11pm - 6 hours into our trip, and reached it’s peak around 2-3am when we were all awake and feeling the brunt of the extreme rocking and rolling. At that point I was thinking never again, but in hindsight now it seems less dramatic, although I am glad we’re driving up through France on our way back, and I won’t be rushing to suggest another 24 hour ferry in the near future. We got off the boat about 4 hours ago and I still feel like I’m bobbing about as I lie stretched out in my wisely booked room on my comfortable bed in Bilbao.