Mutriku, Spain and Family

This trip was a little different than the trips we have done before. This time we had a purpose other than just touring. Chris has learned a great deal about his Basque heritage since he started working on his family history in 2008. Chris had some contact information of a few family members in Spain. He has been trying to get information from them to help with the genealogy. He even sent money and a letter translated into Spanish asking for any help they could give on the family line. He never heard back at the time. 

However, this time as he reached out, he did hear back from one of the cousins who speaks English. When we started planning this trip, we thought it would be great to not only visit the town where Great Grandmother Petra was born, but to meet a relative or two. Chris wrote to his cousin who now lives in Barcelona and asked if she could arrange for us to meet one of the family members who still lives in the Basque Country. It turned out that her mother, Bagona, still lives in the area. It was arranged for us to meet Bagona and her friend who would act as a translator for us.

We flew to Bilbao, Spain and spent the night. The next day we drove our rental car down the mountain to the little fishing village of Mutriku which is the town where Chris's ancestors were from. His great grandmother emigrated to Idaho in the early 1900s. We drove around Mutriku a bit before we met up with Bagona. It is such a beautiful, lush village where the mountains meet the sea. We couldn't get over how beautiful this place is. I often wonder if Petra had any regrets leaving this beautiful place for . . . . Idaho!

Our first glimpse of Mutriku.

A terraced garden at the entrance of the village, overlooking a picturesque harbor.

The church where many of the family baptisms and marriages took place.

The city center. One street heads down and toward the harbor, the other heads up to more buildings.

Another picture of the town center. I love the bright colors.

One unique thing on the coast of this part of Spain is this rock formation called Flysche. It is very rare and not found in too many parts of the world. I thought it was really cool so we had to stop and take a few pictures of it on our way to pick up Bagona. Learn more about it and see better pictures here.

Bagona lives in another little village not too far away from Mutriku. This is Zarautz, a cozy little seaside tourist town. We met her here and she took us on a little walk around this beautiful town.

The P-shaped dark structure in the back is one of Bagona's late-husband's pieces of art that he donated to the town to welcome visitors. It is called "Cyclops". The opening of the "eye" changes based on which direction the observer is facing.

Bagona (in the red) and her friend, Consuello, who was our interpreter. You can see the cyclops in the background again, this time from a different angle.

After we toured Zarautz Bagona turned to us and said that we better get going to Mutriku because the "cousins" were waiting for us. We were very surprised at that, thinking Bagona would be the only family member we would meet. 

The Cousins

After we met the cousins, we all made our way to Town Hall. The man we met with had researched the family line and pulled out a 7-page pedigree chart of this family! He gave that to Chris to take home and also gave him a book on the history of Mutriku and told him where he could find more names online if he wanted to research further.

By this time it was well into the afternoon. Chris offered to buy everyone lunch but they had another surprise for us. The home where Chris's great grandmother was born and raised is still in the family! We had more cousins to meet there!

To be continued. . . . .