Veganizing "Friends": Three Kinds of Potatoes (& Mario's tots!)by Randi / September 23, 2013
Strolling in Lisbon, in view of the 25 de Abril Bridge
A few years ago, I traveled all through Portugal. This post will focus on my favorite part, Lisbon.
Lisbon gives you excitement and attractions of a big city but in a smaller, calmer (and cheaper) package than, say, cities in Spain. In fact, it reminded me a lot of certain parts of Spain, but on a smaller scale. It’s like how New York compares to Philadelphia, although I don’t think Lisbon could match Philly’s crime rate if it tried. Anyway! It’s a lovely city to visit, with great sights, nice people, and good food. In fact, Lisbon is where I learned to love olives! Prettayyy cool.
Lisbon gives you excitement and attractions of a big city but in a smaller, calmer (and cheaper) package than, say, cities in Spain. In fact, it reminded me a lot of certain parts of Spain, but on a smaller scale. It’s like how New York compares to Philadelphia, although I don’t think Lisbon could match Philly’s crime rate if it tried. Anyway! It’s a lovely city to visit, with great sights, nice people, and good food. In fact, Lisbon is where I learned to love olives! Prettayyy cool.
Torre de Belem
One of the coolest parts of Lisbon is the Torre de Belem, or Belem Tower. Overlooking the Tagus River, Belem Tower was constructed in 1515, commissioned to be a part of the defense system of Lisbon and a gateway to the city. The gray stonework cuts an imposing figure against the often cloudy view of the water, providing a real Medieval feel, separated from the modern city life. You can climb all through the tower and see various examples of canons and other weaponry. And, of course, there’s a gift shop, where you can buy a 3D replica puzzle of this Tower with about 3000 teeny tiny little wooden pieces that all look alike and your boyfriend can buy it and spend months trying to construct it all over the living room and you can find wood fragments in random places nearly two years later if you want. It’s a nice puzzle. (And he finished it, go him!)
 Torre up close  Me in a chimney. I was quite silly back then. Good thing I outgrew that. I’m just kidding. I really didn’t. Really really. |
 Nothing I love more that photos taken through holes in walls  View of the Belem Tower as we leave towards the Monastery |
Near the Belem neighborhood of Lisbon is the Mosteiro dos Jerónimos, the Hieronymites Monastery, originally built in 1459 for monks of the Order of Christ who helped pilgrims in the region. It was also the site of the 2007 Treaty of Lisbon, which provided for reform of the European Union. Like the Belem Tower, it’s a UNESCO World Heritage Site, and boasts a beautiful courtyard.
Monastery from below
Praça do Império (Empire Square), in front of the monastery
Also in this area is the Monument to the Discoveries, representing Portuguese exploration. It was built for the 1940 Portuguese World Fair, but was destroyed shortly thereafter. Luckily, in 1958, the government decreed that a permanent monument should be rebuilt. The one standing now is larger than the original model. As monuments go, this one has a pretty interesting facade, with 33 statues positioned along the lower ramp, honoring important people from the discoveries, including Vasco da Gama, Ferdinand Magellan, Pedro Escobar, and lots more I didn’t learn about in elementary school.
After exploring the Belem section of Lisbon, it’s definitely time to climb up to the Castelo de São Jorge, the Moorish castle that overlooks the city of Lisbon. It’s considered a Medieval castle, but fortification of this hill in some form dates back to before the 2nd century. As the major tourist attraction, the castle will likely be crowded. Try to visit it at the end of the day, so if you spend enough time there, you get to see the view before and during sunset. It’s so beautiful. Instead of sunset pictures, however, we have more silly pictures of me in the light at the castle.
 O’er the ramparts we walked |
 I am in a tree |
Measuring for when I move in?
You may have noticed in some of the early pictures that the 25 de Abril bridge looks an awful lot like San Francisco’s Golden Gate bridge. In fact, this bridge was built by the same company that built SanFran’s Bay Bridge, not the Golden Gate! The Bay Bridge and the 25 de Abril are thus considered sister bridges. Perhaps the Bay Bridge people wanted to prank its rival Golden Gaters and decided to make a copy in Portugal? Good one! This bridge is called the Ponte 25 de Abril in honor of the Carnation Revolution, the military coup that overthrew the regime of Estado Novo in 1974.
Lisbon has old-fashioned trams! You must take one. It’s pretty fun.
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One of my favorite things to photograph when traveling is street art. How cool is this graffiti I saw around downtown Lisbon?
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Ok, now we’re getting into nightlife in Lisbon. First and foremost, you must – MUST – see some authentic fado music. Fado, a cultural staple of Portugal, dates back to early 1800s at least. The music is depressing, haunting but beautiful. It’s kind of the European version of the Southern blues. Fado is often described by the Portuguese word for loss and the resulting personal damage. This is all very depressing, but the music is lovely. You’ll see signs outside of establishments advertising that they’ll have fado some nights, so keep your eyes open. Do that anyway if you’re walking around.
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Praça de Dom Pedro IV, the main square downtown
There’s also a vibrant nightlife in downtown Lisbon, with people about as late as I was out (which isn’t saying much but still). Our favorite thing to do downtown at night was get ginjinha, a liqueur made from sour cherries and sugar. It’s served in little shot glasses with a few sour cherries at the bottom. I actually drank and enjoyed this (it is bitter and strong!) because I wanted to get to the fruit, obvs. There was this adorable stand frequented by locals called A Ginjinha, where you queue up behind a single counter and get your drink.
 In line for ginjinha Well, that was boyfriend’s favorite thing to do downtown at night. Mine was to buy paper cones full of plain roasted chestnuts from the plethora of vendors all over the main squares. Oh my goodness, these chestnuts were amaaaazing. I miss them. I’d go back to Lisbon just for the chestnuts. Speaking of food, I didn’t do much restaurant research before going, but we did have a great meal at Terra Restaurante Natural, which has a vegetarian buffet with many great vegan options. This was before I blogged, and before Instagram made taking pictures of your food cool, so all I have is a picture of the ice cream. Suffice it to say, they had vegan ice cream.
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I really enjoyed Lisbon overall. It felt relaxed but still hip, and I would love to go back (and get more chestnuts). Stay tuned for posts about the rest of Portugal – we saw it all!
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In Bruges: Man Alive It’s Like a Forking Fairytale
come with meeee and you’ll beeeee in a wooooorld of chocolate shops and bridges
HOT DAMN Bruges is adorabullllll. I finally went to this charming lil baby city in Belgium recently and I gotta say, just based on the human-to-chocolate-shop ratio alone, it’s one of my favorite places. The scenery is pretty great too, and other people would rave about the beer, the food (though not the vegan food – you must do research and know where to go), the beer, the quaint old-timey vibe, the beer, and the delightful ease of a visit. I am mostly enamored of the chocolate. OH and the cone-shaped fruit candy too. See I have more than one interest. At this time of year, the Christmas markets are all over Belgium, and while Bruges’s didn’t have anything of particular interest for me, it was still a pretty sight, not that the town needed any help in that department.
We were supposed to go to Bruges this past summer for the bank holiday weekend, but we had to reschedule because of TINGS, I tell ya, TINGS. Honestly, it was fine that we had one less day to spend. I’m not saying more time wouldn’t be nice here, but having all of Saturday, one night, and then Sunday morning was plenty for seeing the highlights and getting a feel for the town. Also it was suuupes crowded. I think it’s always full of tourists, but now that it’s Christmas-market season, it’s packed. (Doesn’t detract from its loveliness! You got nowhere to go!) We’re usually go-go-go travelers, so I think it worked out that we had less time since this is the opposite of a go-go-go place.
Our first stop once we arrived was, naturally, THE BLOOD OF CHRIST CHURCH. This place is seriously called Procession of the Holy Blood, because apparently the blood of Christ is in a vial and you walk by it one by one with a guard watching. Considering all the vials of blood I’ve seen, this one definitely ranks high and isn’t going to come back telling me I have another auto-immune disorder, so.
There’s actually a line-guard to make sure everyone stays in line orderly and like doesn’t make a fuss, don’t make a fuss, and then there’s a lady standing with the vial at the top of the altar/stage and you say ‘hi’ and ‘thanks I guess’ to her as you look at the ancient glass vial. Since you cannot take photos of the blood of Christ (it’s like a vampire it can’t have its essence captured), I’ll splain: it is a very ancient glass vial covered with gems and crusted over with…well I guess with the holy spirit?
It’s 2.50 euro for the museum inside the blood church, but it’s free to see the blood vial in the church. Not sure what’s in the museum part, probably like information on where the blood came from and all that lore which you will not get from me.
(the song is called “Charming”)
After we saw the blood of Christ, we went to see him as a lil baby with his mama at the Church of Our Lady, or the Onze-Lieve-Vrouwekerk if you nasty. This church/museum houses the famous Michelangelo sculpture Madonna of Bruges, which depicts the Virgin Mary and her magical baby. It’s a lovely sculpture, but the whole alcove it stands in is currently under construction. Thankfully, the museum knew that visitors were coming just for that so there is a hole in the scaffolding so you can still see it.
I’m not sharing a great picture (we do have some of them) because GREAT ART can only be APPRECIATED in PERSON ask Bette Midler
The best thing is the information on the wall for this piece. It begins “Contrary to the habits early in the sixteenth century, Our Lady does not look tender and sweet here, but rather glum and sad. She thinks deeply and expresses the fear that her large and naked child will soon run away.” LARGE AND NAKED CHILD. I sent this to Rob Delaney obviously, the king of large and naked children.
So that’s the main thing in the Onke museum, but there are other treats that make it worth the ticket price (which I just checked and it was only 4 euro so go nuts). Across from the sculpture, there’s a painting that made us go ‘huh, that looks like a Caravaggio’ (and by ‘us’ I mean ‘husbo’ because I am just like ‘oh art’) and it WAS! And also was not. Facts: This painting, The Disciples at Emmaus, was long attributed to Caravaggio because, as husbo can attest to, it looks like his work. However, experts now believe it’s the work of Hendrik Ter Brugghen in the style of Caravaggio; he liked to copy him. Fun fact we learned, Caravaggio’s first name was Michelangelo too! He must have been pissed!
(Oh dear, upon further investigation it looks like Caravaggio was not his last name but the town he grew up in??? and it’s a ‘da Caravaggio’ situation like ‘da Vinci’ which ISN’T LEONARDO’S LAST NAME it means FROM VINCI and oh my god I really really hope Michelangelo Merisi is okay with everyone referring to him by the name of his town ahhhh.) (Okay upon even further investigation it appears Caravaggio was a murderer? so call him what you want.)
Here’s a scenery interlude for making it through the museum bits.
As you can see, taking little boat rides around the canals is a Big Thing, though no one sings (however, they do use an intense microphone setup that we could hear in our hotel room; luckily they stop tours at night). I decided not to join in the fun though, because I guess I hate fun. No I think I had good reasons: a) it was cold to be stuck in a boat b) I get seasick (okay man it’s not ‘the sea’ but you never know) and c) the best pictures are of the boats on the canals, not from the boats.
How about a quick look at the Christmas market? Just a quick one because it was pretty meh for me. In the main square, there were the familiar wooden stalls of European winter markets with the familiar wares: fried meats and fish and fries, alcohol, more non-vegan food, touristy gifts that put “Bruges” on magnets and towels and shirts and ornaments &c., and more alcohol. It was pretty-ish, but overrun with drunk men who had no idea whose space they were intruding into so we peaced rather quickly.
I mean I’m not going to share pictures of meat stalls (which was all the food, except for the cheese) and bar stalls so there’s really nothing left except woollen socks and ornamenti. The belfry looks great though; maybe we should climb that later.
Here’s the best thing we saw:
No not you lady, I don’t even know you
Before, between, and after the sights we visited, we bought chocolate. We bought a lot of chocolate, and sadly, even though it has been like a week, I’m out. My favorite shop was La Belgique Gourmande, because the staff was helpful AND they didn’t even have to be – their bowls of various chocolates were really well marked with all allergens!!! Eeee! I love a good labeling system!
The funniest thing was that, by our second day in Belgium, we learned that this is pretty much the most popular chain of chocolate shoppes in the whole damn country and we were treating it like a tiny little artisan find, HILARIOUS. Who cares, I love that they have more of these in Brussels (next post) than Starbucks in NYC. We shopped at three of them.
Below you can see the best chocolate they make that I should have gotten 100 pieces of instead of 100 grams. It’s like Ferrero Rocher with an amazing hazelnut butter filling but there’s no dairy! You can see on the tag their allergen legend, which shows that this contains nuts and soy, and NOO DAIRY! woot! I love them for this guidance! I love labels. Except for people, obvs.
We also bought some-but-not-enough of the famous Belgian fruit candy called cuberdons, which is like little cone-shaped pate de fruits and they are really good! They are also accidentally vegan so go nuts! Although I’d avoid the cherry because it tasted like medicine. We learned that these famous candies are only really found in Belgium because they don’t last long enough to export; the quality would suffer and people would be like ‘these aren’t so great’ instead of like ‘moar pleeeease.’
Alright, time for another sightseeing adventure before we get to the food. On Sunday morning, before we left Bruges for Brussels, we planned to climb the belfry in the main square. It’s one of the city’s most prominent landmarks, and is heavily responsible for the historic centre of Bruges attaining UNESCO world heritage status. The bell tower was built in 1240 but rebuilt after a fire in 1280…which is still super super old. There were several fires over the years, including one that wiped out the spire that was never rebuilt, so the tower today is shorter than it once was.
Here it is at night, GORGE.
And here in the daytime:
Unfortunately, the day we climbed it – the only slot we had available – was foggy mcfoggerton senior. Visibility was like, maybe three inches in front of you. Once you got a foot off the ground NOPE couldn’t see shite. Even the ticket man was like ‘are you sure you want to climb today…’ and we were like ‘no but we have no choice.’ We had to climb the thing, because we climb things (except ice mountains) so it had to be during the fog.
Kind of hilarious! It reminded us of our INCREDIBLE (as in cannot believe it) experience in Huangshan, when we climbed all day up a mountain in China and saw literally nothing. We had fun though; we do like climbing towers, and it’s good exercise (more on that below) (I mean sort of, like 2 words).
Alright, y’all bitches made it. It’s time for the vegan food. So, the food in Belgium is not surprisingly not the greatest for vegans, unless you like living on frites (that means fries), which I do not, because – hot take alert – fries aren’t that great. The HappyCow app is indispensable for Bruges, alerting us to the vegetarian restaurants or at least the veg-friendly ones. We only had two meals in Bruges but we had experiences (run-ins) with a few restaurants.
First, I took advice from HappyCow reviews and went to Brasserie Forestiere restaurant for lunch, a slightly upscale (meaning, expensive (as all of Bruges is) and doesn’t do tap water oof) cafe that promised to know what vegan meant and in fact has a tofu wrap on the menu. It was fine, they definitely do and that’s definitely true, but it was mostly soy sauce and a lot bell peppers, which I don’t like, so if I knew better I would have chosen the falafel place ‘t Brugs Pitahuis (I get the pitahouse part and I guess I can accept Brugs but I do NOT get the ‘t business (I understand that it’s their abbreviation for the word for ‘the’ but still it’s difficult for me)). But then again, I do get falafel all the time since I live next to a Pilpel (best falafel in London alert) so I’m not mad. I’m especially not mad because the pile of peppers came with a side salad AND a scoop of avocado/guacamole (best not to ask), and you know how much I love a surprise salad. And salad in general. Why do I love salad so much? Hot tip: mix the whole avo scoop into the wrap and everything is better.
Anyway, it was decent and incredibly filling, but a wrap it was not. A wrap has LITERALLY one requirement:
And this clearly failed that. I wouldn’t call this cornucopia of onions and peppers spilling out of an open shell a wrap. Of course I did try to pick it up and eat it as intended, which was forking hilarious (it did not work).
If you’re into that sort of thing, you’ll pass the Frites Museum on the walk back from Forestiere to the main square. Yes, it’s an entire museum dedicated to fries. No, we did not go but knock yourself out.
For our one dinner in town, we were eager to try the all-vegetarian restaurant Des Plaats. However, the guy who greeted us was kind of a dick. Fun fact that we did not know: You cannot eat dinner in Bruges without a reservation. And I don’t just mean at this little dick boy’s restaurant; I mean everywhere. We were turned away from several places that were ‘fully booked’ even though they were absolutely empty at the time. Bruges just WILL NOT FEED YOU without a reservation, which okay, I understand, it’s crowded, but we didn’t know. Except instead of just saying ‘no, we’re fully booked sorry’, the Des Plaats bellend was like supes rude, unnecessarily. Fork his boring plaats anyway.
Luckily, one restaurant remained to check out, one I’m not sure why we didn’t go to first since it’s entirely vegan: de Brugsche Tafel, a small family-run restaurant that has a small but solid menu and two adorable kids helping their parents out. I wanted to hug them I was so happy they agreed to feed us. It was great, too, and we were happy to support a family.
We read a lot of good reviews about the ramen, but they had two specials that sounded good: the mushroom palak with basmati rice, and vegetables in vindaloo sauce, so both Indian-esque dishes. To fit super well with that theme, we got bruschetta to start (I’m funny). The bruschetta was on regular sliced bread, which is funny, but toasted, so it all worked out. It was one the garlickiest foods I’ve ever eaten and I FORKING LOVED it. Husbo, who is less garlic-oriented, said it was almost too garlicky, but I, a person with eye-tal blood who has garlic coming through her pores at most times, do not think so.
The mains were great; I think the mushroom palak is the winner but overall everything was, as the Brits say about food which I just do not understand but I guess I have to now, ‘nice.’ A weird thing we both noticed was that they didn’t use any beans, tofu, seitan, &c. Usually we see this lack of protein sources at restaurants that aren’t vegan, especially if they’re trying fancy tasting menus, but not at all vegan places, so that was quite odd.
The best part about de Brugsche Tafel (aside from the hospitality, the ability to feed us without buying into the Bruges Booking Malarkey, the family-helping jawn, and the fact that every once in a while we’d see the tiny little girl child climb CLIMB up onto chairs to remove empty dishes from other tables and it was hilarious and adorable) is that THEY HAVE VEGAN BELGIAN WAFFLES.
Baby’s first vegan Belgian waffle! Granted it’s my first time being back in Belgium since being vegan but still, wowee! I remember when I was first in Brussels, I guess 15 years ago, and I had a street waffle with maybe speculoos? and it was great obvs but this was EXCELLENT. The waffle part was so amazing it didn’t even need the chocolate sauce (but I wanted it). They are 4 euro and this little carton was the to-go container but whatever I ate it as soon as we got outside and it was magical.
As for our lodging, that was a bit of a predicament. Very, very few hotels in Bruges will let you book for just one night. The place we were going to stay in in August was going to be for two nights, so they wouldn’t let us change it to one. (Well, then they said ‘for you, we will make an exception!’ and offered a one-night rate…at the price of two nights. Cool guys.) Luckily, we found the adorable restaurant and inn Hotel Duc de Bourgogne. It’s right on the canal, super quaint and old-fashioned and perfect for the broogie vibe. The old-fashionedness means there weren’t enough outlets, and I wish each room could control its own heating, but there were no real problems on those fronts. The staff was super nice and accommodating.
The hotel/restaurant is the white building on this canal. One of those windows was ours!
Aside from the loveliness and the chocolate, the best part about Bruges is the dog-human ratio. EVERYONE WHO LIVES THERE HAS A DOG. We saw so many adorbsy puppos my head almost sploded. I took lots of pics (more in my instagram stories, Bruges highlight) but here are my best friends I made:
Ok bye babies!
The Legend of Bilbao Baggins: Rain, Dogs, More Rain, More Dogs
As soon as we stepped off the airport bus near our hotel in Bilbao, the pouring rain turned to hail. It was hailing on us. Serious, scary balls of hail pounding on us like we’ve never before experienced. What a lovely welcome, Bilbao!
Luckily, the hail stopped that night, but the rain continued for almost our entire visit. That sucks, but although Bilbao isn’t as pretty in the rain as Paris is, it was still a solid trip in a nice city. Now, those adjectives might seem decidedly underwhelming, but I mean them with all my heart without going overboard with praise. Also, Gabrielle Union was wrong and you cannot just be whelmed in Europe.
Luckily, the hail stopped that night, but the rain continued for almost our entire visit. That sucks, but although Bilbao isn’t as pretty in the rain as Paris is, it was still a solid trip in a nice city. Now, those adjectives might seem decidedly underwhelming, but I mean them with all my heart without going overboard with praise. Also, Gabrielle Union was wrong and you cannot just be whelmed in Europe.
Fighter of the night man!
Landing in Bilbao, Spain, I thought I was sooo clever calling it Bilbao Baggins, like The Hobbit. Of course, five minutes later, we see on the road signs that, in the Basque language, Bilbao is ‘Bilbo’. So, not as clever as I thought. By the way, that Basque language is quite something. It’s a language isolate – meaning it has no discernible relationship to any other language. ON EARTH. That’s freaking wild. When you’re in Europe, you’re like, hey man, hit me with the romance languages, I’ll figure it out, they’re all close enough. But then in this region between Spain and France, all rules and prior knowledge go out the window and you are left staring at some hybrid of Japanese and Klingon where every 4th letter is a ‘k’ and every 6th letter is an ‘x’. It is CRAZY and crazy interesting. Where did they come from! How is the language not related to any other spoken on the planet? (That Klingon thing doesn’t seem too far-fetched now, does it? (Husband has me watching too much Star Trek.)) Everyone speaks regular Spanish though, but not many people we encountered in restaurants, shops, and train stations spoke English. So prepare some Spanish! I’ll get you started with some necessary phrases: “Donde esta la biblioteca? Me llamo T-bone la araña discoteca!”
OH LOOK IT’S THE ACTUAL ARAÑA DISCOTECA!
OH LOOK IT’S THE ACTUAL ARAÑA DISCOTECA!
If you know “Community“, or me at all, then you know that when I saw this giant spider outside the famous Bilbao Guggenheim (more on that below), I exclaimed “Ahh! It’s the araña discoteca!” (“What. It’s 2009.”) Now, this is where my talents of persuasion? lying? convincing myself that things are real? paid off. Husband is finding out only right now, as he reads this upon publishing, that I was making up my Bilbao history: When we walked up to this, he said “What??? It’s a giant spider! What the heck!” or something like that. And iiiiii said, “It’s called the araña discoteca. I read about it. Important in Spanish history.” Oh my god I’m awful. But good. So there we have it.
The disco spider stands (dances?) near Bilbao’s spectacular Guggenheim museum. Designed by Frank Gehry, it evokes the feeling of the water it’s on, with its wave-like sides and its shimmering fish-like scales. The building is gorgeous and larger than you can imagine, and although the atrium is splendid as well, the best part is the exterior view. Paying to get into this modern art museum seems almost silly when the best art is free to see outside.
The disco spider stands (dances?) near Bilbao’s spectacular Guggenheim museum. Designed by Frank Gehry, it evokes the feeling of the water it’s on, with its wave-like sides and its shimmering fish-like scales. The building is gorgeous and larger than you can imagine, and although the atrium is splendid as well, the best part is the exterior view. Paying to get into this modern art museum seems almost silly when the best art is free to see outside.
As a mountain of steel makes its way to the sea
Right?? It’s beautiful! Now, there isn’t much to do in Bilbao after you see this lovely building, so you might think, hey I guess I have to go inside. But…um…you don’t? The aforementioned atrium is gorgeous but the actual art hanging on these lovely walls? Balls. It’s all balls. I’m not the biggest modern art aficionado (could you guess?), but I can appreciate it, most of the time. Most of this stuff, however, was ridonkulous. Like if a toddler threw a bottle of paint at a wall. (Or his poop.) Or if a psychopath took a knife to some leather chairs. (There were actual destroyed leather seat cushions hanging on the wall.) One exhibit was just an old car’s motor. Unaltered. A car motor. How is this art! Someone tell me! The only item in the entire cavernous museo that I thought wow this is nice was a log by Ai Weiwei that somehow had a tiny picture of China drilled through it. That was awesome. The 2-D primary color blocked walls? Not so much.
There’s also this. A whole floor of this. The stuff of nightmares.
Luckily, there’s more fun external art to behold at this site. My very favorite thing about Bilbao was how dog-friendly it is. Everywhere we went, people had their dogs with them. (Rarely on leashes, which makes me absolutely nuts because I always frantically try to figure out who belongs to unleashed dogs in case someone is lost and I need to take care of them. So stressful. Just use leashes!) People who have seen me around dogs know that I go kind of nuts talking to them in my special dog voice (a high-pitched squeak that I cannot control), so all weekend in Bilbao was like me on helium. Doggies everywhere! It was amazing! I like to think that the very famous Flower Dog by Jeff Koons, standing proudly and beautifully outside the main entrance to the Guggenheim, is a symbol of how dog-friendly this city is. It’s possibly the most dog-friendly city I’ve ever been to. (And therefore the biggest point in its favor.)
PUPPIEEEEE!
More puppieeeee! That’s not me. (Move bi#$* get out da way!)
Me with a puppy!
Once you see the Gugs, you’ve done what you’re supposed to do in Bilbao! So now what? Well, stroll along the river in the rain and smile at how pleasant the little city is. It will be raining, I promise you. Oh it was on the trip that I was like ‘Ohhhhh the rain in Spain is mainly on THIS plain, that’s what they were talking bouttttt!’ Revelation. It made me okay with raining all weekend to feel like a part of a musical.
Then what? Well stroll some more. See some dogs and, if you’re like me, try to pet them and play with them but then realize that these dogs freaking speak Spanish so they don’t know what you are saying when you say “HI PUPPY YOU ARE SO CUTE! YES YOU ARE SO CUTE!” and their humans really have no idea probably what you are saying either or what the heck is wrong with you talking that high-pitched so you can try to adjust your language mid-freak-out and say “Hola….perro?? Tu es…um….HII PUPPYYYYY!” That’s pretty much how it went. 100x per day.
Walk over to the old town, as every good European city has, and wonder as your wander about the tiny streets and are lucky enough to catch adorable sights like this:
Then what? Well stroll some more. See some dogs and, if you’re like me, try to pet them and play with them but then realize that these dogs freaking speak Spanish so they don’t know what you are saying when you say “HI PUPPY YOU ARE SO CUTE! YES YOU ARE SO CUTE!” and their humans really have no idea probably what you are saying either or what the heck is wrong with you talking that high-pitched so you can try to adjust your language mid-freak-out and say “Hola….perro?? Tu es…um….HII PUPPYYYYY!” That’s pretty much how it went. 100x per day.
Walk over to the old town, as every good European city has, and wonder as your wander about the tiny streets and are lucky enough to catch adorable sights like this:
How cute is this! Does the building management make sure all the tenants have colorful umbrellas or like do Spanish people just know how to be adorable?
Another great treat was the stained glass in one of the train stations. Okay, this is where the language barrier got really rough. We needed to go to a nearby town for a fancy dinner (check back tomorrow!) and wanted to take the train. Well, we didn’t. We couldn’t get a straight answer from anyone (also, like, no one worked in the stations?? because Spain in the afternoon = sleepytime?) as to which was the correct station and which was the correct train and where to go and just f it, we took a taxi. Anyway, one of the stations – whichever it was – had this nice glass.
Another great treat was the stained glass in one of the train stations. Okay, this is where the language barrier got really rough. We needed to go to a nearby town for a fancy dinner (check back tomorrow!) and wanted to take the train. Well, we didn’t. We couldn’t get a straight answer from anyone (also, like, no one worked in the stations?? because Spain in the afternoon = sleepytime?) as to which was the correct station and which was the correct train and where to go and just f it, we took a taxi. Anyway, one of the stations – whichever it was – had this nice glass.
Bilbao also has a very cool suspension bridge that is pedestrian only AND is lined with like astroturf!! It’s so fun and squishy!
A really fun part of Bilbao is the funicular ride to the top of the hill. It’s a three-minute ride and costs like 70 cents or something crazy. It’s a scary steep climb, but so worth it for the views, although it will likely be foggy, and for one of my favorite sights, the fingerprint statue.
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doesn’t it look like there’s a crazy floating sky mountain like out of Avatar??
Why do I love this!
There were many lovely views around Bilbao. Near our hotel was a park with lots of fountains, which was nice but seemed redundant in the rain.
You’d think at night this park would be full of criminals and drug dealers but it was pretty safe.
There were also some hilarious things we came across. Down the street from our hotel, we found a weird mall. It was one of the only things in the city open on Sunday afternoon — but every single store in the mall was closed! So why was the actual building open to the public if every store was closed? Because one of the entryways had a few crappy kids’ rides, and every. single. child. in Bilbao was there with its family playing with the crappy toys. It was so so random. In this scary ghost mall was also this restaurant:
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Yes, this restaurant was called La Mafia, and every single seat in the place had a name written over it – a name of a character from “The Godfather” movies. I mean. That’s ballsy. And hilarious. And it’s inside a mall. It doesn’t get better.
Oh wait, YES IT DOES! Of course it gets better because Bilbao sells The Thermomix! If you aren’t familiar with The Katering Show, you must must must watch this right very now before continuing with your life, even your breathing. It’s the best thing out there. So, being a huge fan of the show, when I saw this gigantic ad for the actual real-life breathing (probably) machine that does it all but unnecessarily, well I freaked out! It’s real! It’s alive (probably)! And it’s beeyoootiful! No, it’s not, it’s frightening, but oh man how I adore it, if only for the jokes.
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Can you believe it’s real?
So, Bilbao may not have a lot of activities to do, but it’s a nice town to walk around in for a few days. If you go, you’ll have a nice, pleasant time, as long as you aren’t out very late when all the yoots come out of the woodwork and take over the city and all the streets like awful drunk ants. Ugh yoots. Anyway, during the day it’s nice. I wouldn’t go out of my way to go if you have limited time in Europe, but like if you live on the continent then why not. (Ringing endorsement!)
We’ll talk about the food for the next two days. See yaaa.
So, Bilbao may not have a lot of activities to do, but it’s a nice town to walk around in for a few days. If you go, you’ll have a nice, pleasant time, as long as you aren’t out very late when all the yoots come out of the woodwork and take over the city and all the streets like awful drunk ants. Ugh yoots. Anyway, during the day it’s nice. I wouldn’t go out of my way to go if you have limited time in Europe, but like if you live on the continent then why not. (Ringing endorsement!)
We’ll talk about the food for the next two days. See yaaa.
Freaking love this little pink and blue buildings.
Oh hey here’s a statue of John Adams on the main drag.
