Vivo en Bizkaia (y otros sitios tambien)

Having not entered anything in here for a while i thought i better had, just in case you are relying on this to find out what I am up to!

Well the reason I have not made any entries here are because not a huge amount has been going on. This blog is primarily for my travels, and i think if i started adding blog entries for my day to day life in Brighton it would become pretty dull pretty quickly.

Anyway....

I am now renting a lovely flat in West Hill Road, just near the station which is ideal for commuting (see below). I never thought I would find anywhere in Brighton better to live than Hanover but I have! Although it is uphill from Sainsbury's unfortunately.

For the moment I am mainly earning pennies as a freelance Information Architect, usually for companies in London. The money is good (providing the economy doesn't implode) and i can just about bear the early morning commutes and the routine because it will not be forever. To me it is a means to an end. Some contracts are for a few weeks, others for a few months and i try and have breaks in between.

But for me the photography is still the thing. When I had my little trip, now four and a half years ago, I had just returned to photography after an interval of 16 years and my first question my first morning in hospital was "Will I be able to take photographs again?" The answer was yes, although i didnt realise how much it would hurt at times, but i have adapted to that and am even investing in a different lighter camera system to relieve the strain on my wrist.

Of course the problem with the photography is that it is not easy to make money out of it. I do, but not a huge amount, but that is the path i have chosen and so that's the deal. If i don't like it i can always go and stack shelves in Sainsbury's.

Since returning from Bilbao my medium term goal has been to get to a stage where i can afford to go and shoot in different places in between contracts, and i am nearly there now. Once i can start doing that then I can, slowly and surely, increase my income from photography and one day stop doing web work altogether.

I have no idea how long this will take me, but after all, I haven't got anything else to do :)

Short trip. Details later.

Lunch with CC and T3 at Krasko the piano bar in Casco Viejo which was nice, althought CC had to shoot off to teach class.

However T3 and I have a feeling she might have been going for second lunch somewhere...

T3 and I then went shopping in FNAC (or is it pronounced FNAC?) but I seem to have all the gadgets I need - if this is possible - and I can't say the music selection was very stimulating. 

On a completely different subject I fell out of bed this morning! How the hell did I manage that? (And yes I was by myself before you ask...) 

Fortunately I fell out on my left side so the useful arm did its thing. Couldn't have fallen out of the right side as that would mean going through the wall. 

Monday morning - and the Bilbao weather is back to normal. Well, it's not raining yet but its grey and a bit miserable.

One of the best places to go in Bilbao on a Sunday morning is Plaza Nueva for the market.

Both habitual readers of this blog will know this one of my favourite things to do and in between two visits to Cafe Irun and one to Cafe Bar Bilbao California Chica and myself had a really nice time wandering around in the sunshine, although it was not as hot as yesterday.

 Book stalls at the Sunday market in Plaza Nueva

As you can see from the photo above the secondhand book sellers are always popular. You can get anything from cheap paperbacks to very expensive original editions of the most beautiful old books.

When we were in Cafe Iruna I had some difficulty in convincing CC that having four pinchos morunos each was quite a good lunch for most people! This was odd as only about half an hour earlier she had been telling me about her new portion control based diet... 

Saturday was a fabulous day in all respects.

The weather was absolutely gorgeous, hitting around 85 - 90 F with beautiful blue cloudless skies.

This made Bilbao about twice as hot as Brighton and twice as nice :) 

This is in complete contrast to when I was here just a month or so ago for Semana Santa when the weather was absolutely miserable and if it only rained I was lucky. But that's Bilbao.

Anyway the day started with Vespa Chica and myself discovering a new way to cut down on our mobile bills by opening our respective windows in el resi and just shouting at each other :) Much easier.

At around 12 VC - who now owns every Vespa thing available on the commercial market in England - and I went into Casco Viejo to meet up with her friends ( see pics below) and we spent a lovely afternoon just chatting in Plaza Nueva and sitting outside a bar in CV.

If there is a nicer way to spend a day I don't know what it is.

Drinking the Basque way in CV. 

 Amaia aka Vespa Chica con amigos

 Sorpresa!

I am the fat one on the right (estoy el gordo derecha) ...

Back in Bilbao otra vez, my journey yesterday with ClickAir only took four hours from my flat to the airport - and i think if i take the later train i could do it in three.

It takes me two hours to get to London.... Go consider.

Anyway despite spending a considerable time worrying about what combination of wet weather gear to bring - the sun is shining and it is 75F plus :)

After Semana Santa in Hotel Barcelo I am back in el resi now - and it is very nice to be back. And as ever I am afforded a welcome from people here the like of which I only get from my friends of many years standing in England.

The people here are soooooooooo nice. I mean really really nice.

And the good news is that Cafe Boulevard is finally being refurbished! (See pic above). How any self respecting Basque could have missed the opportunity to make money from this goldmine for the last year or so is beyond me. I should imagine it will be open for this years Aste Nagusia.

The Castilano switch in my head seems to be getting better as I had more involved conversations here yesterday, especially with Elli jefe del resi aqui, than I have had before without grasping for so many words. Must be my regular reading of El Pais at work :)

I love this place. 

My short Easter break in Bilbao made me realise two things:

(a) I need more breaks

(b) Easter is a bad time to go shopping in Euskadi

Following on from this I am going back to Bilbao at the end of the month for another long weekend and my spies in Mungia have checked that that weekend is public holiday free.