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Surf & Wine Weekend: Basque Country

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Description

Basque Country  ·  3–7 September 2026

Surf.
Eat.
Drink.
Repeat.

Our first surf trip. Our favourite corner of Spain.

Aia, Gipuzkoa  ·  4 Nights  ·  Only 16 Spots

Claim Your Spot
🏄 Surf every morning · 4 nights · Private farmhouse · Zarautz surf beach · Only 16 spots
What you get

Everything included.

✓ 4 nights at Orortegi farmhouse — en-suite rooms
✓ Txakoli wine tasting in Getaria
✓ Guided surf sessions every morning — boards and wetsuits provided
✓ Cider house dinner — cod, txuleta, cider poured from the barrel
✓ Private chef — breakfasts, lunches and dinners at the house
✓ All local transfers during the trip
✓ Guided pintxos crawl through San Sebastián's Parte Vieja
✓ The best crew you'll ever meet. Obviously.

Not included: flights, getting to Aia, and surf lessons — available at additional cost if you want them. Boards and wetsuits are on us.

The place

The Basques do everything better. It's not even close.

Forget everything you think you know about Spanish food. The Basques don't do olive oil and sunshine. They do grey skies and fat — fat rendered from beef aged so long it's practically archaeological, fat from the salt cod that's been pulling their fishing boats out into the Bay of Biscay for five hundred years. They pile their bar counters high with pintxos at seven in the evening and consider it a perfectly normal use of a Tuesday.

Then they counter every single bite with txakoli. A bone-dry, searingly acidic white wine grown on coastal slopes that literally catch the seaspray off the Atlantic. You taste the ocean in the glass. It's poured from height to wake it up — hits you cold and fizzing and cuts straight through whatever the Basques just did to your arteries. It is the correct wine for the moment. It is always the correct wine for the moment.

This is a culture with more Michelin stars per head than anywhere on earth, where everyone is a chef, where the laws of fat and salt are taken extremely seriously and then immediately corrected with acid. The cideries are full. The pintxos bars are full. The cider flows from barrels, the txuleta steaks are the size of a small geological event, and nobody is in a hurry to stop eating.

The landscape matches the ambition. Green hills — real green, Atlantic green, it rains properly here — roll straight down into the Bay of Biscay. Zarautz sits on a two-kilometre sweep of beach with consistent swell coming in off the open ocean. Behind it: Pagoeta Natural Park, txakoli vineyards clinging to coastal slopes, the kind of countryside that makes you want to do something with your hands.

We're going in September. Sixteen of us. Boards in the water every morning, all of the above on our doorstep every night. First SDSW surf trip. We saved the best place for it.

Txakoli vineyards above the Bay of Biscay, Getaria, Basque Country

Txakoli vineyards, Getaria. The vines catch the seaspray off the Atlantic.

7:30am

Boards Out

Down to Zarautz. Into the water. Your guide knows exactly where to put you.

12:30pm

Back to Base

Chef's already got lunch on. The farmhouse terrace has views to Zarautz, Orio and San Sebastián.

Afternoon

Your call

Explore, nap, walk Pagoeta Natural Park, do whatever the Basque afternoon demands.

Evening

Eat like a Basque

Cider houses. Pintxos bars. Txakoli bodegas. The Basques eat better than anyone else on earth.

Day by day

The full long weekend.

  • Wednesday 3 September

    Arrival

    Get in. Drop your bag. Take in that terrace view — Zarautz and Orio laid out below you, the Atlantic beyond. Welcome dinner at the farmhouse. Meet the crew. Don't stay up too late: you're in the water tomorrow morning.

  • Thursday 4 September

    Zarautz

    Morning surf session on Zarautz beach — two kilometres of consistent Atlantic break, one of the best surf beaches in Spain. Boards and wetsuits sorted, guide in the water with you. Lunch on the sand. Afternoon free. Evening: a traditional cider house — salt cod, txuleta steak, and cider poured from height straight from the barrel. This is how the Basques do it.

  • Friday 5 September

    San Sebastián

    Another morning in the water. Then into the city — a walk through Donostia's old town, along La Concha, through streets that look like they were designed for the specific purpose of making you feel good about being alive. Then: the Parte Vieja. Guided pintxos crawl through the best bars in one of the best food cities in the world. The right places, the right bites, the right order.

  • Saturday 6 September

    Txakoli & Farewell

    Final morning surf. Then a coastal walk from Orio to Getaria — one of the most beautiful stretches of coastline in northern Spain. Wine tasting at a txakoli bodega in Getaria, the home of txakoli, poured from height the way it's meant to be. Back to the farmhouse for the farewell feast. The chef saves the best for last.

  • Sunday 7 September

    Departure

    Breakfast at the house. Slow goodbyes. Go home sunburned, very well fed, and making plans to come back.

Basque Country surf and wine Basque Country surf and wine Basque Country surf and wine Basque Country surf and wine
Orortegi farmhouse, Aia, Basque Country

Where we stay

Orortegi

A new-build Basque caserío in the hills above the coast, inside Pagoeta Natural Park. Six en-suite rooms, a big kitchen, an open fireplace, and a terrace with one of the best views in Gipuzkoa — Zarautz, Orio and San Sebastián all laid out below you.

1km from the village of Aia. 5km from Zarautz beach. The kind of place you don't want to leave.

6 en-suite rooms Up to 16 guests Private farmhouse Views to Zarautz & Orio Pagoeta Natural Park Terrace + fireplace

Only 16 spots. Returning SDSW crew get first access — if you've travelled with us before, message us on WhatsApp and we'll hold your spot before it opens publicly.

€500

Per person

4 nights · 3–7 September 2026

All meals · Surf sessions · All experiences

Local transfers included

Flights and surf lessons not included. Lessons available at additional cost.

Questions

FAQ

No. We have complete beginners every year on our ski trips who've never strapped on a board, and the same applies here. The surf guide knows Zarautz inside out and will match you to conditions and a spot in the water that suits your level. If you've never surfed before, that's fine. If you rip, also fine.

Guided sessions and equipment (board + wetsuit) are included in the €500. One-on-one instruction is available at an additional cost — message us before the trip if you want lessons lined up and we'll sort it.

No one's going to drag you out of bed. The sessions are guided and the equipment is there if you want it. If you'd rather spend a morning on the terrace with a coffee looking out at the people who did surf, that's a legitimate life choice and we respect it.

Both, which is the entire point. We're in the Basque Country — arguably the best food and drink region in Europe. We surf in the morning, we eat and drink like we mean it by night. Txakoli, cider, pintxos, txuleta. No conflict whatsoever.

Orortegi has 6 en-suite rooms — some doubles, some twins — across a new-build caserío that we have exclusively for our group. Total capacity is up to 16. Rooms are allocated on a first-come basis. If you have specific preferences (twin vs double, travelling with someone), let us know when you book.

We'll do our best to pair solo travellers in twin rooms. If you want a room to yourself, message us and we'll check availability and cost. Most SDSW trips attract a lot of solo travellers, so you'll be in good company.

The nearest airports are San Sebastián (SSQ, small, limited routes) and Bilbao (BIO, ~1 hour away). Most of the crew flies into Bilbao. We'll share group transfer options once the trip fills — or hire a car if you want the freedom to explore the coast.

Full details will be in your booking confirmation. As a general rule: cancellations more than 60 days out get a refund minus a deposit. Inside 60 days we'll do our best to find a replacement for your spot. Message us if your situation changes — we're humans, not a policy document.