THE SPANISH SEASIDE

Hokitika Guardian, 26 October 1929, Page 6

THE SPANISH SEASIDE

By IIISHARD GApULL

SANTANDER, August 26

The smart world knows San Sebastian, but if you would see real Spain at tne seaside you will push a little farther along tms same noble coast of Northern Spain.

The seasiders at Santander are out-and-out Spanish; a stranger is conspicuous. Not that the courteous Spanish crowd stares, but he knows that he belongs as little to the scene ;as .would a Spaniard* Jat Lyme Regis ?or ' Ilfracombe.

To Santander come Spanish families from the grilling inland towns in

search of breezes from the Atlantic. Hrere are the Queen of Spain and her children settled down for a long stay in the palace built on a peninsula that juts out into the sea.

This is a superb rocky coast, with occasional coves and sandy loaches Detween the granite cliffs. The,holid-ay-making Spaniard, as seen at Sardinero (thp seaside of Santander), is a family man. There are smart villas and one of the most luxurio-s hotels in Europe here; but the crowd Is not yet cosmopolitan enough—is too .Spanish, too occupied with the childten (how Spain swarms with children—’ the liveliest; must precocious and charming little imps!)—to be desperate smart.

You look down from, the 'cliffs on one of another of. .the beaches and see a multitude of black, glossy heads. There is hardly a hat on the beach. The Englishman calls this climate hot, and would think himself inviting sunstroke if lie behaved Spanish fash ; on. But the Asturian coast is cool—for Spain; and the Spaniard seems to : believe in sun—for the liuir.

Hardly for the rest of the body. Santander discountenances sun-bathing. Santander is highly proper, is indeed still Victorian. You are required to cloak yourself thoroughly between the dressing boxes and the sea’s edge. The police are there in force to see that you behave! Few women bathe, and those few are,quite voluminously clad. The sea is warm,, it is almost hot. You go in and stay in, and when out you cannot resign yourself to being out and go in again. The beach is thick with a jolly, good-tempered, democratic crowd, and you could not wish to see better manners. Perhaps there are rather many hawkers—but they do, not hawk aggressively,. and take “no” philosophically. It is a gay-looking crowd, thanlcs to the girls, who three out of four are dressed in one shade or another of scarlet or bright cerise. But a great deal of black is worn.’ Nearly all the elder women are iri black, and a good ■many of the men. Whole family parties in black—Sunday black—are obviously peasants come in from the country for a' sight of the gay life. There northern Spanish faces tell of hard work, seriousness, a quiet sense ..of run, and plenty of .character. It is a good race.

Sailors from the men-o’-war in the harbour (Santander has a magnificant narbour, rather suggestive of Plymouth and Devonport) add tojthe variety of the scene, smartly clad in white from top to toe. It fhere is a characteristic of-this crowd it is their 6asy contentment with the simplest seaside pleasures • : the sun, the malashite sea, . the busy children about them. ~ Santander-Sardinero might be voted dull by some in comparison with Blackpool. But come to Santander, whoever would make the ecquainfance of a simple, charming, courteous people; whoever would enjoy miles of cliff promenades commanding the great rafiges of the Asturian mountains ; who would like to shop in a perfectly wonderful fruit market all blazing with peaches and plums and apricots; who in a word, would like a, seaside place that' is “different.”

And I would not suggest’for a minute that Santander lacks resources. Tf the beach should seem tame, the bull-ring i_s at least not that. Then the hinterland,- has its wild, unspoilt charm and- also" its surprises—witness the strange old town of Santillana, once the capital of the province-, now forgotten in a dip in the hills, and incredibly picturesque. How many of the Englishmen who know the out-of-the-way Italian towns —San Gimignano, Volterra, Montepulciano—have even heard of Santillana?