Donostia

by Lucy Donkin (Australia)

A leap into the unknown Spain

Here I was. In France. Waiting for my school year to begin. I still had four weeks to go and none of my roommates had arrived yet, what was a girl to do? Escape to the closest border of course. England? No, they speak English there. Switzerland? Surely not, I only had about €50 to my name. It had to be Spain, the perfect balance of cafes with freshly squeezed orange juice and grandpa’s playing cards in the park. Off I went to the nearest SNCF office. I was waiting in line for no more than 40 minutes when finally, a smartly dressed woman called my number in queue. Joyous day. I must have repeated the words ‘San Sebastian’ nearly as many times as she had heard ‘Bonjour’ that day but alas, she handed me the ticket to ‘Turin’? Sadly I had realised the booking error too late and by the time i turned around, the queue that I had joined about an hour prior had somehow doubled in length? I got out of there before someone ripped the ticket out of my bare hands. I got back home and after some quick google mapping, I found that Turin was a small town just outside of San Sebastian. A few suspicious forums claimed how easy it was to get across to San Sebastian yet I could not reach a consensus, was it a bus or another train that was best? I didn't have time, I packed and left. Half eaten sandwich in my left hand (telling myself i would eat the rest later, I don’t know why I lie to myself, I never do), headphones in my right, I was eagerly sitting in the window seat 23A, watching a couple disagree while both kids on ipads across the platform. A woman came and tapped me on the shoulder, she asked if I was able to move seats as this gentleman had pre booked this window seat. Ever polite me, I exclaimed 'bien sür!'. I was not as easy going ten minutes later when said gentlemen was ASLEEP and not making the most of the scenery outside as I would have. No less than 6 hours later, I woke up to a gentle tap on the shoulder and a not-so-gentle bright torch light in my eyes. I was being advised that my stop was coming up and I needed to grab my bag to get ready to jump off. As the snoozing train lulled into the stop, my legs reluctantly shuffled into gear. I was in a tiny train station in the middle of nowhere so I walked around to the other side of the platform and found a small elderly woman in a small box. I paid her €3.60 and headed across to hop on the train that had just pulled up to the station. As I was zooming past all these exotic sounding train stations, we reached one called Donostia. Just as I was soaking in all this bliss, I saw in very very fine print under Donostia - San Sebastian. I flustered to grab my bags and ran off the train, nearly missing my stop. I didn't have the address of the hostel so I found the nearest 'free wifi' sign at a cafe and ordered a coffee and some eggs. Making the most of Google maps, I found my hostel and headed over. As I dropped my bags at the entrance of the hostel, I looked up and drunk in the colours of a new city. This is where my adventure began.