Now that’s an intro that’ll be hard to beat.

We bid goodbye to Andalucía and arrived in Bilbao and the Basque Country safe and sound and on time thanks to Vueling, which gave me a nice bit of homesickness with its inflight magazine cover.

Navigating the airport was painless and we were soon in a Prius cab driven by a kind, lovely lady who was all smiles, eager to show off her city and gave us pointers on what’s happening in the next three days. It wasn’t 15 minutes later that we were in front of our hotel and, despite the hard-to-miss phallic symbol in the atrium, marveling at the minimalist modern touches, completely opposite of  Hotel Alfonso but just as nice. Check-in was quick and friendly, staff has been great so far, WiFi faultless, and the room has the jaw-dropping view that went beyond even my expectations. Hello Bilbao!