Day 7

In the morning, we ate breakfast at the hotel, then checked out and boarded our bus at 8:30. After driving for two and a half hours, we first arrived at the sea-side town of Camillas. There, we visited a house built by the famous architect, Antoni Gaudi, for an old, wealthy man who died only seven days after moving into his new house. For this reason, this house was called: Gaudi's Folly. Right next to this house was El Palacio de Sobrelleno, the palace built in the same era for el Marques de Comillas. Next, we walked to the University of Comillas, which was situated on a tall hill, overlooking the town. There we enjoyed a scenic view of the beach and the sea. After taking more photos of the town from atop the hill, we hiked down through the town to the beach, where we had lunch. After lunch, we drove for a few more hours to El Museo de Altamira, where we visited a full-scale replica of the cave where the first paintings by Homo sapiens ever recorded were found. These were crude paintings of bulls, deer, and horses, painted throughout several different periods. We then learned about the ancestors and development of modern-day humans. Bones, ancient tools, and other artifacts from the prehistoric period were on display in the exhibit. Finally, we drove to the beautiful, industrial city of Bilbao. With a metropolitan population of two million, Bilbao seemed much bigger than the city of Oviedo (~250,000), where we had stayed the previous two nights. In Bilbao, we checked in to our hotel, the Ibis, struggled with logging into the wifi network, then embarked on a short tour of the city despite light rain. On our walk, we were able to view the modern exterior of the Guggenheim museum of Bilbao, which was designed by Frank Gehry, the architect for the famous Walt Disney Concert hall in Los Angeles. On our walk, we also walked past the Campo Volatín footbridge, a modern, beautiful, arcing, white bridge designed by the renowned Spanish architect, Santiago Calatrava, who also designed the Milwaukee art museum and the subway station at the World Trade Center in New York City. When the rain grew harder, we sprinted to a nearby supermarket, soaked, to buy food for our breakfast and lunch the next day. Then we ate dinner at a restaurant named La Kazeta. After having cheesecake and flan for dessert, we returned to our hotel to rest for the train the next day.

Por Jason y Michael.