Spain, sun and climbing

It's been a wet cold winter here in sw France.  Something that doesn't make me very happy.  We are outdoors people.  We bike, run, hike and climb.  When it's cold and rainy we can't do these things and start to go a bit crazy being trapped in the house.

We checked the weather for an area in Spain we wanted to visit for the amazing climbing.  It's in Catalunya and the tiny village is Santa Engracia.  It's just over the Pyrenees, 5 hours from our house and there is tons of climbing all around.  It was sunny and warm....so we hopped in the car and headed down for a few days.

There aren't many places to stay in this area.  It's pretty remote, but luckily we found Casa Mauri.  The owner, Jane,  bought the place in 2011.  It's a large restored farmhouse, broken up into her residence, and 3 other houses that she lets out.  Santa Engracia is the highest point in the area, you drive up a windy road 15 minutes until you reach the tiny village.  There are probably 50 people in the village, but during this time of year maybe 5.  It was so beautiful and you looked out over the valley to beautiful sunrises and sunsets.  The accommodations are clean and have everything you need (fully equipped kitchen and linens).  The prices are extremely reasonable and she takes dogs!

the church in Santa Engracia just outside our house

View of the valley from our terrace

walking through almond groves on the way to the cliff

sun, warm and great climbing

just look at those blue skies!

the kids

and this is what we came back to

We climbed 3 days in a row.  And had an amazing time.  We stayed for 4 nights and had hoped to possibly stay longer, but Jane had other guests coming in, so we had to head home to more rain and cold.  We plan on going back in February for sure.  

Hello Countryside

The new digs.

This summer we rented (for 8 weeks) a lovely house in the country about 15 minutes from our village.  It was perfect for the business and the kids and the dogs.  We also rented it for our culinary retreat too.  It's not cheap and we still had to pay rent at our house in the village, even though we weren't staying there.  And we had to basically move out of our old place and move into the summer house, which was a pain.

We decided to approach the owners about renting the house year-round.  It made sense, will save money and we were itching to get out of the village.  Not that our village isn't beautiful, but we are always out of the village, either hiking, climbing, running or biking and being in the country makes up happy.  The house had been on the market to sell (out of our price range) but after some discussion the owners decided to take it off the market for a year and rent it to us at a really good price.

We moved in the first week of November and are really happy up here.  I say "up" because we are on one of the highest points around "haute" is part of our hamlets name.  We have 2 other houses around, but not next door and it's quiet and peaceful.  We have a big fenced in yard for the dogs and hiking trails all over too.  We close up most of the house during the winter (4 bedrooms upstairs and the gite next door) because it would cost us a fortune to heat.  We've spent the last few weeks making our mark on the place, putting up our pictures/Bruce's paintings, bringing in our furniture, etc...

Do I miss living in the village?  No.  The only thing I do miss is being able to walk to our little market when I realize I'm out of something, but I'm sure I'll get over that fast.  We love it here, it already feels like home.

Kitchen area (my new piano de cuisson too)

Living room

Looking into the living room from the outside

From our yard on a clear day we can see the Pyrenees.

The Basque Country

I know it's been a long time since I've updated the blog and I'm going to try and update it more regularly.  This summer was very busy, we had 2 amazing groups come for our teen art camps (3 weeks each).  Kids from U.S., England, Switzerland, Spain, Greece, Turkey, Columbia and France.  Some were return students (one has come for the past 3 summers) and some were new.  It's non-stop, 24x7 for us, but we love it.

During one of the camps we got an email from our good friends E&K in Los Angeles.  They wanted us to meet them in The Basque Country - San Sebastian and Bilbao, Spain for 5 days.  It's only 3 hours from us, if they were going to be so close we had to go see them.  Plus we had never been to the area and both really wanted to see the Museo Guggenheim and it was a few days after my birthday, so it was good excuse to celebrate.

We started in San Sebastian, a lovely seaside town.  We rented bikes, Bruce surfed, we shopped and ate pintxa (like Tapas) and had some good wine.  Weather was perfect and it was relaxing and great to spend time with E&C.  After 3 days in San Sebastian, we left for Bilbao.

View of San Sebastian from our hotel balcony

Bruce & Kevin

Pintxa spread

Hanging by the sea in San Sebastian

Bilbao had a very different vibe, but we both really liked the city.  We had a private tour of the Guggenheim too, which was really nice, it wasn't a tour of the artwork, but a tour of the building and an overview of how it was built, etc.  It was really interesting.  We ate at some really nice restaurants and did some shopping too.  The weather wasn't as nice here, cold and rainy, but we didn't let that stop us.

Me & Erica

A few glasses of wine

Outside the Guggenheim at night

My man

The Guggenheim

It's hard to say goodbye to your best friends...but we know we'll see them very soon (or at least on Skype once a week).  We had a great time and would go back to both places in a second.  The people were so lovely and nice and both cities had loads to offer.  If you haven't been, I'd highly recommend you go.