Being a graceful young lady of poise and dignity, of course I tumbled off my bike a metre from the Spanish border. I attempted to mount the gutter over the bridge and misjudged the angle doing a slowmotion collapse sideways at someone’s feet. They stepped over me and continued their journey. A grazed elbow was much shallower than the wound to my pride as I wobbled into Irun.

We were sad to leave alexandra and bidart, despite the bathroom “not in very good state” which had a giant hole into the roof space. It all just added to the character, although we were itching to give the upstairs a good reno. Over breakfast she told us she didn’t mind living alone in that old place except that once she thought she had ghosts but it turned out to be skunks in the roof in heat and she only called the police once or twice a year because of strange noises in the night.

We had travelled through some lovely french towns and then hit the heat of midday and the Spanish pyrannees. It wasn’t spain as we imagined it, the signs were all in basque, a curious language with an abundance of X, K, Z and Us. Basque flags fluttered in every other window. Alexandre had told us the french basque’s weren’t as vindictive as the Spanish basque. Our Spanish host later told us that the area had a flush of tourism because that always happens when there is an Era terrorist ceasefire. Hmm…there was a history lesson for us.

As we settled in to our airbnb I heard some strange roaring coming from nearby. The circus was in town and set up in a small parking lot around the corner. Everyday the animals (not whatever was roaring) were let loose in the grass to feed. It was quite surreal to see a suburban area park covered in miniature horses, camels, llamas and ponies, Maite had seen a zebra. Of course the idea of a circus with trained animals doesn’t sit right, but I have to admit the sight of it was entertaining in a surreal out of place way. On our way passed a miniature foal even tried to follow us home and we had to loop back to lead him back to his mama. Spain was full of surprises.