San Sebastian

San Sebastian is in northeastern Spain, next to the border with France.  It was not in our travel plan but in order for us to go from Madrid to Paris, it was best for us to stop in San Sebastian, take the local tram to Hendaye, which is just across the border in France, and then take the train to Paris.  We ended up spending a night and about a day in San Sebastian.
This place is considered Basque country.  The Basques' are a minority group in Spain that has been fighting for their autonomy for years.  In fact, their terrorist organization, ETA, has just announced that they will stop all violence after 50 years of fighting for their independence.  A lot of the people in this area speak Basque, which is a very different language from Spanish.
We were quite surprised as to how beautiful this city is.  It looks more like a northern European city than a Spanish town or city.  It's clean and most of the buildings are quite new and beautiful.  The city is very green as they get a lot of rain here and the streets are well maintained.
As in most coastal cities, I presume fishing is a big industry here.  I understand that they also grow a lot of vegetables here because of the rain.

Santiago de Compostela:  This city is at the northwestern tip of Spain.  It's the destination for the pilgrimage of the Way of St. James.  Legend has it that the apostle James was buried in this town.  We were thinking of going to this city but we ran out of time.  However, I understand that many pilgrims on the way to Santiago de Compostela pass through San Sebastian or one of the nearby towns.  I met one of the pilgrims while waiting for our train to Paris.  Pilgrims hang a shell on their backpack to indicate they are on this pilgrimage.  Below is a picture of the pilgrim I met and a close-up shot of the shell.

Town Hall

Waterfront

Fishermen in the Bahia de la Concha

A produce store

Lots of fish in the market

A Pilgrim to Santiago de Compostela

Shell indicating that she is a pilgrm