Yesterday, we ended up making our way to the beach in Getaria, Spain. It was a twenty minute drive, one which allowed us views of pristine, green countryside and natural artifacts peppering the ocean road. The many houses and high-rises lining the scenic shoreline inspired nostalgia of my Australian childhood, and made me even more eager to dip my toes in the inviting, crystal-blue waters of the Atlantic.
We arrived at Getaria Beach at around three-thirty in the afternoon, after a lazy morning of scrambled eggs and Spanish bread. The beach itself was gorgeous; not too busy, with enough sand for everyone to be out of their neighbours earshot, with a vagabond couple camping between the alcoves of a bridge, with countless Spanish women sunbathing topless whilst balancing their babies on their bellies.
A single lifeguard watched over the sandy oasis, his eyes scanning the picturesque surroundings every few minutes. Between the silence of the beach, and the stillness of the water--bar three local boys, paddle boarding between the spaces left by vacant boats--made for the perfect, peaceful summer day. My hardest decision was whether to invest in a "clasico" ice cream, or a "nuevo" one (I chose the classic, for the record).
The stillness of such a day completely reminded me of why I love summer.
After spending four hours listening to the gentle surf, we meandered through the streets of the small town which happened to be inhabited by some kind of fete. Bars and cafes were bustling, and plenty of people surrounded the outside of a handball court as four young men slapped the ball back and fourth in unison with the cheers and hums erupting from the audience. It was an entirely different side to Getaria that was completely invisible from the seclusion of the beach.
But we loved it all the same.
For dinner (beginning at the relatively early time of 8.30pm), we ate at a locally renowned seafood restaurant that overlooked the fishing inlet of the bay. A Basque-country delicacy, turbot, was the order of the night. It was deliciously adorned with a gentle fried garlic and olive oil medley, and perfectly unfishy flavour sensation. It was a delicate white fish experience that I would definitely have again. However, before that deliciousness attacked our willing palettes, we were treated to another beast altogether. Ordered on the recommendation of our waitress (who afterwards confided in us that the dish was not, by any means, her favourite dish), we decided to try goose barnacles, referred to as "percebes" in Spain. They arrived looking awfully freaky, having been only boiled and not decorated with any amount of flavour, and since we had absolutely no clue how to begin to eat them, we were helped by an eager busboy who explained that, in order to avoid wearing the juices of the ocean, we needed to "open them" away from us.
So we did.
Well, after eating four percebes, I can comfortably say that I probably won't be doing it again! I'm very glad that I can add them to my list of "The Weirdest and Strangest Foods I've Ever Eaten" (which comfortably includes the likes of chicken feet, jellyfish tentacles, and apripeaches), but the taste is something I am even more glad to rid my mouth of! It was a mixture between seawater, that dirty sand that gets caught between the layers of one's sandwich at the beach, and the smell of dead sea creatures at the fish market, most likely because the prime purpose of the goose barnacle is to be a "filter-feeding crustacean that live[s] attached to hard surfaces of rocks and flotsam in the ocean intertidal zone." (Thanks, Wikipedia.)
An interesting experience indeed.
Like I said--the perfect, peaceful summer day!
Relaxation in a tasty little nutshell.
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Send mail, travel a lot--
~ Ms. Always Traveling
