Northern Spain - place to stay july

[Duchess]

Hello, haven't posted here for ages.

We are a family of 4 (2 adults and 2 well behaved children 9 + 6) wishing to stay in Northern Spain around mid July. We plan to drive down from our place in Bordeaux. What I am looking for is a either hotel or apartment with pools/activities for the children, you know the evening entertainment and stuff for kids during the day. We would like to go for maybe 5 nights, but am not sure whether this is possible in Spain as I know in France usually has the Sat to Sat changeover, not sure this is applies for Spain. Any recommendations of places we could stay at would be very much appreciated. I've googled loads and am simply blinded. I've seen Lloret de mar etc, which I am nervous about as I'm not sure whether it will just be a Brits Abroad type place. This is so difficult as these places usually make hubby and I cringe, but the kids will love this type of thing, so we would tolerate to keep them happy. Or does anyone have any golden nuggets of info of where is good to go where we would all be happy
Thanks and much appreciated
Duchess

[CSE]

I see you mention Lloret, do you want to go to the Mediterranean coast or are you willing to stay on the Atlantic/Biscay area? For us the second option is much nicer. Although you will find Brits and other foreign tourists they will not be in the crowds you may find on the Med.
Maybe the lack of entertainment parks may not suit you, but for us it is a big plus.
I think you may have some difficulty in finding an apartment for 5 days. But a small hotel/casa rural should be willing to accept your booking.
Let us know if you want more information on our suggested coastline.

[Duchess]

Thanks Ian and Irene, Yes we would certainly look at that area, it would be much easier for us to get to as well. Any recommendations which you have would be great.
Duchess

[CSE]

This is a quick guide to give you some sort of taster for the area.
A few days could be spent near to Bilbao and a few days further down the coast in San Sebastian.
Along the coast there are some very nice beaches and inland beautiful mountainous countryside.
To find accommodation In Spain we recommend
http://www.toprural.com/
As you are more likely to find a smaller establishment which is flexible with their dates.
Here are several web sites which cover tourism in the Basque country, some do not have any English.
http://www.destinospaisvasco.com/home.php
http://www.turismoa.euskadi.net/s11-12254/es/
http://www.alavaturismo.com/es/index.php
http://www.gipuzkoaturismo.net/
http://www.bizkaia.net/home2/Temas/Deta ... &Idioma=CA
Hopefully from this you can find something that you like.

[Partridge]

There is a great little restaurant in the fishing village by us ran by a lovely lady called Anna, she is from San Sebastian and tells us we must go there as the region is beautiful.

We love Anna, she always has a warm welcome, wears the brightest red lipstick I've ever seen and loves to take my OH out the back (no jokes please) to pull fish out of the bucket, give it a good prod for freshness and decide which one to cook, closest thing to a menu she has

[Duchess]

Thank you so much! Will look into the links. Great!
Duchess

[Duchess]

Thank you so much! Will look into the links. Great!
Duchess