Sunday February 25... I decided to come to Bilbao for one reason: to see the Guggenheim Museum. So in
the morning, I walked to the Guggenheim in light rain. I stopped at a pastry shop on the way, and used
my feeble Spanish to order a croissant. The Guggenheim Museum in Bilbao is breath taking. It was here
I realized what part of my trip to date I enjoyed. The architecture. It was one of the big reasons I
enjoyed Sevilla and Granada so much, and the Guggenheim is an amazing building.
One benefit of coming on Sunday is they give free audioguides on Friday to Sunday. The audioguide gave
a description of most of the works and there is a 25-minute part on just the architecture of the building,
with descriptions inside and outside the building. The guide on the works included commentary from the
artists themselves, so you understand why modern art is interesting and what they were trying to
accomplish. Because of most of the art in the Guggenheim, you would normally look at and say "is that
really art?" (no puns on my name allowed here). But with the explanation, it made so much more sense.
Afterwards it was pretty late and I couldn't find an open restaurant, using and not using my guidebook.
So I resorted to a late lunch at Burger King. I walked around Bilbao some more. It is a very beautiful
city because of the river and hills around it. It has a brand new metro system (due to the museum) and
it is trying to move away from its origins as an industrial city. One of the interesting things about
Bilbao is that is in the Basque region of Spain, and therefore, most street signs are in Basque and
then Spanish.
For dinner, I went to a seafood restaurant near the hotel. I tried to order a Basque dinner: bacalao al
pil pil (salt cod cooked with garlic and chillies) and txacoli (crisp, slightly tart white wine of
the region). The fish was okay, but the wine was pretty good.
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