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We have booked Parador de Hondarribia for the wedding.

Here is the tentative schedule for the day (you should consider eating breakfast beforehand due to the meal times at 2:30, 4:30, and 8:00):

10:00 am to 12:00 pm: “Carcassonne in a Castle” in the Salon

You are welcome to come to the wedding in order to play some board games and relax while we are setting up. We will be bringing Carcassonne, Exploding Kittens, Monty Python Fluxx, and Two Rooms and a Boom. We invite you to bring your own castle or European themed games!

12:00 pm – 2:00 pm : “Guestbook Signing and Mingling” in the Salon

Everyone is invited to arrive and sign their page of our guestbook and mingle. Be prepared to be mentally and physically challenged! You should know your favorite color and avian airspeeds.

2:00 pm – 2:30 pm: Ceremony in Courtyard

The ceremony will be held in the courtyard as depicted below.

2:30 pm – 4:00 pm: Pintxo lunch in Courtyard

The Pintxo lunch will be served by Divinus Catering.

4:30 pm – 6 pm: Cake and Cupcakes on the Terrace

Join us for the wedding cake and cupcakes on the terrace as created by Oh Sugar Dreams.

8:00 pm – 10:00 pm: Dinner at Restaurante Gran Sol, Hondarribia

All guests are invited to join us for a casual dinner at Restaurante Gran Sol. You can stay with us and watch the sunset on the terrace then walk to the restaurant together, or you can enjoy the local area before dinner. For example, you could take a ferry to France!

 

Hi,

We just wanted to pass along an update for our daily schedule in case it was useful before we get out the final hour-by-hour wedding schedule.

We’re going to be arriving in San Sebastian to make preparations on August the 22nd while staying in an Airbnb-like arrangement. On the 27th we’re transferring to the Parador de Hondarribia to make final preparations and will be staying there for the the night of the wedding as well.  We will be staying at the Astoria7 on the nights of the 29th through the 31st fully intending on joining many of you for fun events like kayaking/paddleboarding in the San Sebastian Bay on the 29th and a hike around San Juan de Gaztelugatxe on the 31st.

A heads-up also about getting between San Sebastian and the wedding site. Generally, we’ve been recommending guests stay in the San Sebastian area since this is where the majority of the tourist sites are (but feel free to join us in Hondarribia as well depending on your travel style). However, this does mean that transportation will be needed, this link gives a few good suggestions, we’ve personally used a taxi from the airport and the Euskotren Trena is also an affordable way to get to Irun but a short cab ride or moderate walk will be needed to get from Irun to Hondarribia. We also encourage you to use the forum to exchange contact information with other guests in order to share carpool/taxi costs.

We are organising a group event for kayak and stand up paddle to Santa Clara Island on Aug. 29th. Please let us know if you are interested in joining. So far we have about 8 ppl who are interested. You can find out the type of kayak/paddle and other information from the links.

 

 

As many of you seasoned travellers know, Europe is extremely safe from the perspective of violent crimes. In many cases, you’ll be much safer when travelling than when at home. That said, tourists in Europe can be a easy target of many petty crimes. Barcelona, as featured in “scam city” , is a pickpocketer’s haven as they work in groups or individually to prey on millions of tourists visiting the city. Denis and I have been lucky that among our many trips to Europe we have never lost any belongings to theft.

which has the following anti-theft features:

A highlight is the difficult-to-detach strap which can be secured to a table or other immovable object when you’re not moving around.

They also carry anti-cut camera straps that we replaced our DSLR strips with:

We also use money pouches to carry our passport and backup credit card, in case of robbery.

All that said, we’re not entirely sure whether these actually kept us safe or were the equivalent of tiger repelling rocks, but we certainly feel like they’re helpful in this regrettably non-sponsored post 😉

 

San Juan de Gaztelugatxe, whose name means “castle rock” in Basque (“gaztelu” = castle + “aitz” = rock), is a definite “must” if you are visiting the Basque Country. It is an island located just off the shore along the Bay of Biscay, 35 km east from Bilbao. The island is cone-shaped and features a tiny church on its highest point that is dedicated to John the Baptist. Although not proven, it has been said that he even set foot on the island.

You can click on this link to see how other travellers have gone from Bilbao to San Juan de Gaztelugatxe:

https://www.tripadvisor.ca/ShowTopic-g187454-i517-k8454231-My_report_San_Juan_de_Gaztelugatxe_from_Bilbao_by_bus-Bilbao_Province_of_Vizcaya_Basque_Coun.html

Quick heads up, there’s a Parts Unknown on San Sebastian on Sunday if you have access to cable in one way or another

A hopefully helpful note from feedback this time:

For accommodation, we don’t really have a specific hotel in mind yet. Instead, there’s a great selection of hotels in San Sebastian (or Donostia) and we’ve heard great things about Airbnb. For larger groups, there are also some interesting choices via https://www.homeaway.es/

For amusement, there’s the lightly themed Astoria 7 where you can stay in a room named after a random movie star.

To get between Irun (the venue), the airport, and San Sebastian, there are a variety of options.  There’s the local commuter train first (because trains are awesome) which costs roughly 2.45 euroes and the local bus looks similar. It looks like taxis cost roughly $50 Canadian.

More info on the local train system/GO train equivalent  but do keep in mind that the venue, train station, and airport are not next to each other. More info to come.