The most important districts of Bilbao
These are the district we will mostly talk about: Deusto, San Mamés, Indautxu, Moyua, Abando and Casco Viejo:
Taste Bilbao! (gastronomy)
One of the most important thing to do in Bilbao is taste the food. In the hole Basque Country there is a traditional food named Pintxo. The Pintxos (in Spanish, tapa) are made by traditional products of the Basque Country and a piece of bread behind them.
Abando
Abando is one of the main districts to eat that delicious Pintxos. One of the bests streets in there is Ledesma:
Ledesma
Ledesma Street has numerous bars to stop and taste the Pintxos. It is a large street made just for pedestrians to have a good time with friends and eat and drink typical products from the Basque Country. There are some famous bars in there:
There is another type of food you can also taste in Bilbao, so famous too: Spanish Omelette. There are a lot of ingredients you can put inside of an omelette, like ham, cheese, tuna… The place where you can find them is Ledesma Bar:
One of the traditional bars in Bilbao and a perfect meeting point during the relaxed moments of the day is the Café Iruña where you can drink some wines and eat some Pintxos, it is also the oldest bar of Bilbao:
Casco Viejo
It is another district where you can find a huge offer of good food made in Bilbao. The main place you can find good food is the Plaza Nueva, where are located the best bars, some of them are:
So if you come to Bilbao don’t forget to taste the Pintxos!
Another type of food you have to taste are desserts. There are three desserts made in Bilbao: Pastel de arroz (rice cake), Carolina (a type of cake made with cream) and bollo de mantequilla (butter cake):
Two of the typical bakeries there are Arrese and Martina de Zuricalday, where you can find all of the desserts mentioned before.
Discovering Bilbao! (routes and points of interest)
Instead of talking a lot about all of the points of interest Bilbao has, we’ve made a map with all of them and a bit of information about each, we hope you to enjoy discovering Bilbao even if it is just playing with a map:
Learning and enjoying Bilbao! (culture and fun)
Museums
- Guggenheim
The Guggenheim Museum Bilbao is a museum of modern and contemporary art, designed by Canadian-American architect Frank Ghery, and located in Bilbao. The museum was inaugurated on 18 October 1997 by former King Juan Carlos I of Spain. Built alongside the Nervion River, which runs through the city of Bilbao to the Cantabrian Sea, it is one of several museums belonging to the Solomon R. Guggenheim Foundation and features permanent and visiting exhibits of works by Spanish and international artists. It is one of the largest museums in Spain.
One of the most admired works of contemporary architecture, the building has been hailed as a “signal moment in the architectural culture”, because it represents “one of those rare moments when critics, academics, and the general public were all completely united about something.”The museum was the building most frequently named as one of the most important works completed since 1980 in the 2010 World Architecture Survey among architecture experts.
- Bellas Artes
The Bilbao Fine Arts Museum (Spanish: Museo de Bellas Artes de Bilbao, Basque: Bilboko Arte Ederren Museoa) is an art museum located in the city of Bilbao, Spain. The building of the museum is located entirely inside the city’s Doña Casilda Iturrizar park.
It is the second largest and most visited museum in the Basque Country, after the Bilbao Guggenheim Museum and one of the richest Spanish museums outside Madrid. It houses a valuable and quite comprehensive collection of Basque, Spanish and European art from the Middle Ages to contemporary, including paintings by old masters like El Greco, Cranach, Murillo, Goya, Van Dyck, Ruisdael and Bellotto, together with 19th century and modern: Sorolla, Mary Cassatt, Gauguin, Henri Le Sidaner, James Ensor, Peter Blake and Francis Bacon.
- Museo Vasco
The Basque Archaeological, Ethnographic and Historical Museum (in Euskera, Euskal Arkeologia, Etnografia eta Kondaira Museoa), also called in a more concise way Basque Museum of Bilbao / Euskal Museoa, is located in the Miguel de Unamuno square in Bilbao (Vizcaya, Basque Country , Spain). The Basque Museum says in its information, “has as a guiding principle of its cultural action the conservation and dissemination of the objects that shape their collections and which testify to the ways of life that the Basque people has developed throughout time” .
Azkuna Centre
Azkuna Zentroa (Basque for Azkuna Centre), previously known as Alhóndiga Bilbao, is a multi-purpose venue located in the city of Bilbao, Spain. It was designed by French designer Philippe Starck in collaboration with Thibaut Mathie and was opened to the public in stages between 18 May and 24 October 2010. The venue, labeled as a “Culture and Leisure Centre”, consist of a cinema multiplex, a fitness centre, a library, showrooms, an auditorium, shops, and a restaurant. In March 2015 its name was officially changed to Azkuna Zentroa in tribute to the late mayor of Bilbao Iñaki Azkuna.
Originally a wine warehouse (alhóndiga in Spanish), it was designed by Basque architect Ricardo Bastida and inaugurated in 1909. However, in the 1970s, a new warehouse was planned and the Alhóndiga was abandoned. Several projects were suggested, ranging from public housing, a museum of modern art, or even demolishing the entire building, but all were scrapped. Finally, in 1994 it was decided to renovate it and build a sports and culture centre. The Basque Government decided to declare the building “Public Property of Cultural Interest” in 1999.
Traditional Pary: Aste Nagusia (Big Week)
Aste Nagusia is the main festival of Bilbao, which is celebrated annually from 19 of August to 28 of August. Traditional activities like konparsas, gigantes, txupinazo, fireworks, concerts of basque music… and a lot of party! Marijaia is the official symbol of the holidays and since 1997 has an own song, known as “Badator Marijaia”. Marijaia is the figure of a plump lady with her arms forever raised in dance.
Athletic Club
Athletic Club as an institution, along with its supporters are characterized by their desire to defend values which are becoming increasingly uncommon in football and in sports overall in the 21st Century. Our pride, reflected to the hilt in the club’s policy concerning the Young Player’s Reserve, has become a uniting force which outweighs the discrepancies to be found in our daily lives, making our philosophy different to any other and different to the way football is understood throughout the world. The San Mamés Stadium is called La catedral del fútbol (The Football Cathedral).
The night
- Mazarredo
Mazarredo street is located on the center of the city in the district of Abando, to hang out with your friends in some bars and pubs.
Enjoy the night in the most famous discos in Bilbao:
Moving around Bilbao! (transports)
Transport — moving around Bilbao it’s easy with its public transport for citizens and tourists.
- Bilbao Subway: 2 lines
COME TO VISIT US, WE ARE WAITING FOR YOU!
