The Quest for Gravy: When the Yorkshire girl went to Spain.: Jamontecas, sexy patos and beaches.

Another week, another blog. The weather was grim to say the least last week and I didn't really leave the flat other than to go for a run until Thursday, where as usual I went to conversation tandem group. Now sad news this week, the people who own the bar and also run conversation group are having to close the bar, which means this week may have potentially been my last group unless they find somewhere else.

Friday evening we decided to go out for dinner. It being Spain this meant leaving the flat at 10pm. We ate at Tierra Astur which is one of the most famous and most popular restaurants in Oviedo, mainly known for the sidra and tapas, which were both tasty. We then headed out to a few bars, had an argument with probably the oldest man in Oviedo and then drunk some more. Good night had by all.

Santillana del Mar

Now on Saturday I had signed up for a trip to Cantabria, Asturias' neighbouring region with AEGEE, essentially the international students association. This involved me waking up at 7, following the previous nights antics which was painful to say the least however, I made it to the bus in one piece. We visited Playa de Gulpiyuri first, which is a beach to you non hispanohablante folk, then onto Santillana del Mar, which I would describe as a Spanish version of York, which was very pretty and extremely Spanish. We then hopped back on the coach to visit the Altamira caves, or cuevas if you like, which is famous for it's cave paintings, we were given a tour of the cave and all the paintings in it, most of which were bison, following this I started seeing bison in the shapes of clouds and car windows.

Playa de las conchas

We eventually arrived in Santander which I have promptly decided is my new favourite city in Spain. We arrived at the hostel and dumped our bags before going on a rather dark city tour. There was some form of truckers convention on that weekend and they were driving down the main street serenading the people of Santander with their tuneful horns (read- pissing everyone off). Then tapas. Now, I don't claim to be a tapas conossieur (or the spanish equivalent) but let's say I've had better tapas, and we're still waiting for our jamon iberico to arrive, 3 days later, which for a place which cannily named itself 'jamonteca' was a little ironic. What use is a Jamon-less, Jamonteca I ask? All washed down with a fair amount of alcohol and a man dressed up as a duck, all you could want from a night really.

Awkward face.

On the Sunday following breakfast we took the coach to La playa de las conchas, or shell beach, which was so very pretty. I should point out at this point that when I went home 5 weeks ago, I left my camera and I am very much missing it, but did manage a few edgy photos with my phone so all was not lost! We walked from here to La Magdalena, which has amazing views of the coastline, lighthouse and a big palace.

We visited another small coastal town on the way before getting to 'bufones del pría' which is on top of a cliff and is where caves have formed underneath and when water rushes into them, it forces the air out of the holes on top of the cliff and creates a dragon-esque rumble and occasionally sprays water, fun. Then arrived back, shattered in Oviedo.