Soto de Luina to San Sebastian

Playa del Silencio

When we left Soto de Luina (with all clean clothes!) we decided to start our day with a visit to a beach; surprise! Playa del Silencio is quite different to the other beaches we have seen so far. It is a steep 10 minute or so minute walk down from the car park. The beach itself is beautiful in a rugged, stony kind of way. It is peaceful and there were few others around. We disturbed the peace with shrieking, singing, and crying, threw stones into the sea then hiked back up the hill; no small task with two children who weren't keen to walk!

Cudillero

The next stop was Cudillero, a cute fishing village for a picnic, coffee and quick play in the playground, which consisted of a slide. Eleanor told us it was the best playground in the kingdom. I am not sure what the judging criteria were, but was not convinced myself!

Santillana del Mar

We spent the night at Santillana del Mar; more cute! We set off to find dinner at about 7pm only to find that no restaurants served meals before 8pm. Thank goodness for a biscuit and playground as distractions!

The next morning we walked around the old city. Adrian visited the torture museum, primarily an exhibition of instruments used during the Spanish inquisition, and discovered things he didn't want to know about humanity. We stopped by Le Cueva de Altamira, a cave containing prehistoric paintings of bison, human hands etc. the cave itself is no longer open to the public, but they have built a replica. The cave and museum were interesting to us, but Eleanor and Leo weren't impressed (it is very difficult to explain 16,500 years ago to a three-year-old who is reasonably new to the concepts of tomorrow and yesterday) so we didn't stay long.

From there we drove straight to San Sebastian. Wow! Why have we not been here sooner?

Navigation around the city is a challenge to say the least, there is a confusing one way system with the added complication of pedestrianised streets, but we found our hotel in the end. We are a street back from Playa de Gros, the surf beach. Our room has a view (between two buildings) of the sea, much to Leo's excitement.

I am going to stop now and devote a whole new page to San Sebastian. Rant warning!