Here are the few brave souls who decided to try it. I mean, they came all the way out here just to surf. Why not try and catch a few waves? Oh yeah, because it sucks, it's cold, and the waves are breaking in two feet of water. It's hard to capture action shots with the point and shoot digital camera so I captured some dude's leg sticking straight up. I have no idea what was happening before this.
There was no point in sticking around in the rain so we headed south toward Biarritz, having no idea what was in store for us there.
The place is absolutely absurd. It's over the top fancy with expensive hotels, shops, and restaurants all right on the beach. The break would have been great on a longboard, and a few kids were ripping on their 5'8"s. Unfortunately, slow waist-high waves don't quite generate enough power to push my 190 pound frame on a short board. I should have rented a long board and given it a go...oh well. It was just as well to watch (although I can't wait to get back to Cali and get some swell *fingers crossed for August*).
There were only two decent surfers out. These little groms (buddies apparently, I saw them load up all their stuff into a beater van) were pulling out some impressive roundhouses where all I saw was slow mush without much face. It's good to be a little surfer.
This photographer convinced these little girls (and their parents) that he was going to take some photos of them. The little girls were more than content to have him primp their hair and make them feel like models. Either he's found a bizarre niche market (what little girl doesn't want to pretend she's a model?) or he's just a perve.
They don't beat around the bush here. You want fancy? We got "Fancy".
Once we finished with Biarritz, we headed down to the road into Spain and on to Pamplona. The border crossing was a cinch. Once in Spain, we flew down the free ways.
We were taking tunnels at Mach 9.
Another weird language? First it was Gaelic and now it's Basque. Southern France and Northern Spain make up the Basque region. The language involves lots of z's and x's and is otherwise impossible to make out. Technically, it's a language isolate (totally distinct from any known language) which I learned a great deal about in Linguistics 110 this past fall. Thanks Harvard. I knew you would come in handy one day.
FEET!
Oh my god, we're driving in the middle of the busiest avenue in Pamplona! Is this even legal? 50 points per pedestrian you say?
While technically legal, we were the ONLY car driving straight into the middle of the main plaza in Pamplona. Insanity. Drunk people were everywhere.
By the grace of God, we somehow found a hotel nearby (right during the festival of San Fermin -- the running of the bulls and all that) which should have been impossible. Feeling altogether out of place since we weren't wearing red and white (probably 99% of people here participate in this thing, it's impressive), we went low key with the evening and didn't explore all that much. Getting to bed was another matter since the noise continued all night. Thank goodness I had saved the ear plugs from the airplane. Gotta thank my mom for that tip.
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