The Puppy, a huge flower covered (they say about 38,000 flowers) sculpture by Jeff Koons, was our meeting place for our morning tour:

It was an easy half hour walk and the meeting went off without a hitch. Mikel, who was a total pleasure to be with, was born and raised here in Bilbao and knows every inch. First stop was one hour in the magnificent Guggenheim museum. We spent a while with the amazing huge steel sculpture called The Matter of Time by Richard Serra:

These massive steel structures are free-standing, unteathered curving walls of metal, perfectly designed, perfectly balanced, and like the museum itself, something special. One of many wow moments we enjoyed in this glorious museum. We then sailed through some highlights of the rest of the museum to get an overview, and will to return later in the week for the deeper dive it deserves.

Outside is an installation of rising mist in a moat, around another sculpture. Juxtaposed with the titanium tiled museum exterior and the red bridge in the background, it was quite a sight!

From there we walked through the downtown area while Mikel filled us with information. Too bad my old brain can’t remember half of what he said! Then we started on the pintxos part of the tour. Savory pintxos are like a small open face sandwich with a toothpick holding it together. There are seemingly hundreds of places to get them and hundreds of flavor varieties. Mikel told us that the custom is to just eat one with a small glass of wine or beer and move on. The variety of tastes and presentations was enormous. At the first spot we had glasses of a local, fresh dry white wine called Txakoli–perfect pairing. We went to Mikel’s favorite chorizo spot, where we drank a young unoaked Rioja, and a special place for delicious mushroom pintxos:

We went to the big Ribera Market for just a few minutes and then to a beautiful view spot on the bridge. The market building is on the right and the great variety of colorful Bilbao architecture on the left:

We said goodbye to Mikel, who was a great guide–the four hours just flew by, but we were both ready for nap time.

After a good rest, we headed out to flaneur around the old town, window shopping and finally got some supplies for dinner. I made us a vegetable soup and although it was pretty bland, it satisfied us as did this whole first day in Bilbao.