A festivus for the rest of us

Who cares if one successful professional at an industry event tells another successful professional that they think that they're great and then that successful professional returns the compliment (very likely adding that they think they love them) and that, like everyone else who has spoken that night, they are thrilled even honoured to be there? Not many you'd think, certainly not the stuff of TV spectaculars right? Wrong! Such was the content of the oh so self congratulatory opening 'gala' of the San Sebastian International Film Festival (which I watched the other night – on TV, no cocktails and chit chat with botox brigade for me.).

Now I love cinema, I like a movie – some of them make a difference some of them make a profit I can like both -but a 1.5 hour TV show dedicated to watching rich, famous and successful people congratulating similarly rich, famous and successful people was a big ask. I sat through this rectum twisting tedium in the hope of learning something about the films to be shown at the Festival which runs for ten days attracting some pretty good talent, however the most I learnt was that Woody Allen thinks that Javier Bardem is an excellent actor (no shit Woody is that why you cast him as the lead in your latest movie?) and that his co-star can't speak a word of Spanish and isn't about to learn any.

Despite this entertainment crime of an opening night there are some excellent films being shown at the festival and I am looking forward to seeing a couple this week. On Wednesday night I'm off to see 'Tiro en la Cabeza' about a seemingly ordinary guy who kills two cops, then to round off the hilarity I'm hoping to get a ticket for 'The boy in the striped pajamas' about the holocaust. Ben Stiller is here but I don't think he's in either of them. I'll let you know the winner of the Juanathan prize at the end of the week and of course I'm simply thrilled and actually quite honoured to be here – I love all thank you, thank you, thank you...

MADrid

It wasn't really MAD although it was rad.

With Andrew visiting San Sebastian wasn't big enough for the both of us, so the both of us went somewhere bigger – Madrid.

I would be lying if I said Madrid wasn't awash with beautiful women, so I won't. Also Madrid in summer is well supplied with alfresco dining and drinking options all the better for the beautiful women of Madrid to catch a glimpse of me as I sip stylishly at my espresso – or so I imagine. If that wasn't enough entertainment for one lifetime there is also more high quality art than you can possibly eat and food that should be hung in the Louvre (or Prado in this case). There are also palaces, and fine shops, and more bars, then some restaurants, odd lifts and some more bars – suffice it to say that we had a good time.

The stand out however had to be the Sherry bar that one late night we stumbled into demanding Armenac.

It is an odd bar that wont allow you to take photos but they would not. The till was a hand cranker from the 30s, the sherry was served from the barrel into anonymous brown bottles then chilled in an ice bucket at the bar. The ancient staff marked your tab in chalk on the bar in front of you as you drank and whole place had the sepia tint from the exhalations of a hundred years of smokers.

Andrew and I became connoisseurs of differently aged sherry whilst admiring the faded posters advertising the world sherry festivals of the fifties and sixties. The din of a busy Madrid evening was inaudible replaced by the murmurings of the gaggle of local sherry lovers clustered around the end of the bar. A quite magical experience but on leaving you were left with the nagging suspicion that if you ever attempted to return you would not be able to find that bar again, and no one in the street would ever have heard of it....

A revolution in hiking comfort

I think its safe to say that more people would have conquered Everest had they thought to bring an umbrella. If, like me, you have taken time out from your drug infused orgy-fest of a lifestyle to nose around the odd camping/outdoor fun shop you'd know that the umbrella (or para-agua as they delightfully call it in Spanish) is not a common sight. Things are about to change. Thanks to the willingness of one Andrew Portors to shrug off convention and innovate the umbrella will soon be seen proudly deployed by the many Gortex fetishists that festoon our crags and dales – who, to a man, will be smiling with quiet astonishment at the comfort that the umbrella can bring to an otherwise soggy hike, wondering no doubt 'why the f**k didn't i think of that?'

The site of the umbrella revelation was “The Picos de Europa” a quite breathtaking mountain range that leaps from sea level to 2500m in just 15 kilometers making for plenty of vertical landscape with precipitous drops and soaring skylines. For the day walker as were Andrew, myself and our provider of tents Mairi, there is a great walk through the Picos along the Cares gorge. This walk has been made possible by the construction early in the last century of a small aqueduct that, for reasons I haven't been able to grasp' was cut into the side of the gorge half way up massive cliffs along with an access path in an engineering feat of mind-boggling awkwardness for benefits of dubious quality – that was our route.

The Spanish have a very adult approach to heath and safety issues in the mountains which boils down to one sign waring that stick figures can fall off ledges. They then invite you to walk 12kms on a sometimes very narrow path cut into the mountainside with drops of dizzying depth beckoning just centimeters away – no rails, no fenced off areas, if you go up to the tall places and fall off 'em that's your problem – all very refreshing.

I can't remember a more staggering walk – more Lord of the Rings than Lord of the Rings – if you are ever in Northern Spain with a pair of sturdy shoes you could find no better place to put them through their paces. Oh and there were goats too. Ok not in itself an amazing highlight after all they were not bears (and there are bears in those mountains) but nonetheless an unexpected encounter with a frisky mountain goat two foot from a swallowing chasm can be invigorating.