Our bus driver from Bilbao is fearless: she slips through narrow medieval village streets and switchbacks over steep passes without hesitation. We land at last in Beasain, a factory town where our friend Steve teaches, and he picks us up in time to watch his sons Jon & Benat finish soccer practice, then we wind up to their village of Idiazabal. In Basque country houses have names and last hundreds of years -- we are visiting Buztindegi, where Steve's wife Axun Aldonando's family has lived forever. Over dinner with her brother and the boys the conversation is a cheerful mix of English, Basque, and Spanish. Steve & Axun live in her aunt's house across the field -- the moon lights our way to bed. The next afternoon they lead us on a long walk over the hills to visit another uncle's house where grape vines grow up the walls, and then we climb to the ancient walled town of Segura, where signs in Basque explain how people lived 1000 years ago. Over the doors are pinned sunflower thistels, and that same Basque sun symbol of health and protection is etched in the old stone, and in the cheese mold in the museum. Sheep (the source of the cheese) are everywhere on the green hills above us. We're headed for a cider house on the road to Zerain, and we pass a branch of the Camino de Santiago pilgrimage route. We joke that we are on the Camino de Sidra - the Trail of Cider. The cider house is a well-restored stone structure above the orchard, framed by a traditional pointed hay stack and the peak of Txindoki mountain across the valley of Idiazabal. Our host at the cider house graciously teaches us how to catch the stream of cider arcing from the barrel so that it foams like champagne -- better flavor and the alcohol goes straight to you brain! Ancient Basque sailors were famous for never getting scurvy, so they could go to sea for months to hunt whales or fish off the Grand Banks of that continent to the west that Columbus would later "discover". Instead of water they carried casks of cider, rich in vitamin C and B vitamins. As he explains this our 70-year old host draws another glass, "for his health".
The full moon shines on Txidoki as we leave. This morning our heads are a little thick from much cider and laughter, but we'll walk it off on the road to the Idiazabal village cheese museum. Tomorrow Axun and Steve will drive us over the Pyrenees to France, to Saint Jean Pied de Port, where we'll begin our Camino de Santiago walk.
The full moon shines on Txidoki as we leave. This morning our heads are a little thick from much cider and laughter, but we'll walk it off on the road to the Idiazabal village cheese museum. Tomorrow Axun and Steve will drive us over the Pyrenees to France, to Saint Jean Pied de Port, where we'll begin our Camino de Santiago walk.
