Mosheehy

We are a family of 5 (kids 10, 12, 17, good hikers) looking to plan 5 days round trip from St. Jean de Luz into the Picos/Asturias area, including some beach and hiking time. Thinking we'd leave from St. Jean de Luz. on Sat. am, go to Bilbao, see museum etc and stay overnight, or move on to a beach town (Ribadasella?) then spend Mon, tues, and weds nights in the interior a bit, maybe Potes area or Cangas de Onis, to do some hiking and exploring. Maybe good to make Cangas a base for beach and hiking? Open to other ideas on good base sites. Drive back to St. J on Thurs for train back to Paris. Would love to see some fun beaches (interesting rock formations/caves, some easy waves for boogie boarding would be great), but also get out into the country for some walks, food, maybe a cheese cave..... So many wonderful places to go--hard to know! Thanks so much for your advise and expertise. Always appreciated!!

Robert2016

What time of the year are you planning on doing this?

Ribadesella is fine for the beach, but Potes is best for trekking through the PIcos. Hotel del Oso would make an excellent base for exploring the Picos.

ribeirasacra

I gave you an answer on Trip Advisor, please read the details I took the time to give you.

kja

FWIW, I thought Bilbao worth FAR more than a day, and for FAR more than the Guggenheim. You can learn what I did there by looking at my trip report – just click on my screen name to find it.

I tthought the informaton in this link very helpful when planning my walks in the area:
http://www.walkingasturias.com/categ...cos-de-europa/

If you haven’t already looked at it, I strongly recommend the Michelin Green Guide for the area.

Enjoy!

isabel

I just came back from five weeks in Northern Spain. For what you say and given your time frame I'd do two bases. In the mountains I stayed in Potes and really liked it. It was central to a lot of the 'best' scenery and it was a nice little town itself with lots of restaurant options places to walk around in the evenings.

The 'best' (best is a relative word, I mean I liked it best) interesting rock formations are near Ribeado. Cathedral Beach (andiamo.zenfolio.com/p491113002 ). The problem is it is SO good that it can get crowded. That, combined with the fact that to walk around on the beach it needs to be low tide means that at times you need reservations, which you can make for free, easily on line. We planned it so as to go on a day when low tide was at 9 a.m., meaning it was best between 7-11. We got there just after 8, almost deserted, no one checking reservations. It was wonderful. When we left two hours later there were a couple of tour buses and they were checking reservations. The town of Ribeado itself is nice, and there is a walk to a lighthouse we really enjoyed. (http://andiamo.zenfolio.com/p491113002)

kimhe

Take a look at Llanes, one of our old favourites: http://llanes.es/en

And when in Bilbao, I suggest you also take your time for the excellent Fine Arts museum close to Guggenheim, and soak up the atmosphere and the fabulous pintxos in the Casco viejo/Old town:
https://www.museobilbao.com/in/

A pintxos crawl is almost a must in this culinary heartland of not just Spain, but all of Europe. More than 30 Michelin star restaurants in the small Basque Country with only a little more than 2 million inhabitants, and some seven-eight of them are considere among the very best in the world. But the best thing about the Basque food culture is the quality of what you get in any place you happen to walk into. And the pintxos culture is a backbone of it all. http://www.euskoguide.com/food-drink...ntxos-pinchos/

Casco viejo in Bilbao: https://www.lonelyplanet.com/spain/b.../419023/360739
http://www.bilbaoturismo.net/BilbaoTurismo/en/historia

Going for pintxos in the Old town:
https://tourism.euskadi.eus/en/pintx...aa30-12375/en/
https://www.theguardian.com/travel/2...-country-spain

ribeirasacra

Sadly the OP never came back to this or TA.