There are witches in the hills . . . (by Michelle)

On our way back to Madrid we stopped to explore Pamplona for a few days. We stayed in another casa rural (country home) in a lovely small town called Etxauri where we had fun trying out the pelota court which is a sort of outdoor handball court that EVERY Basque village has no matter how small.

One fun outing was to the witch caves (the Cowboy Junkies song was stuck in my head all day) near Zugarramurdi, a very small village in the Pyrenees Mountains near the French border where dozens of women confessed to practicing witchcraft (after imprisonment and torture) during the Inquisition. The caves were believed to have been their secret meeting spot for experiences too sordid to explain on a family-friendly blog. The caves have a peaceful spirit now and were quite beautiful. The kids had fun exploring. The village had just opened a "witch" museum which was compelling and interesting.

My other favorite "explore" around Pamplona was the Oteiza Museum which is housed partially in Jorge Oteiza's rural home and partly in a very modern museum-building that was added onto the home. Oteiza was a Basque sculptor, artist, and poet who died a few years ago. Part of the fun was the interesting building itself. As the picture of Simon depicts (I promise he didn't pose for this picture), modern art and architecture can be challenging sometimes, but it was great museum.