My family and I (my parents from France and my wife and a 3 year old from the United States) stayed at Sylvie’s house for a long weekend in early June.
We had a fantastic time and the house was ideal for our purpose. We had dinner at the house a couple of times and enjoyed the traditional kitchen and the fantastic outdoor terrace. The living space is great with large windows overlooking part of Hendaye (tennis courts and cute houses), perfect for relaxing after a long day exploring the surroundings. Bedrooms and bathrooms are good, especially the two bedrooms facing each other (ideal for our kid that tends to wake up at night and find her way to our bed). The house had a washing machine which we used and worked great.
The house is ideally located. A short 10-minute walk to the main (and stunning) Hendaye beach. On the way to the beach you will find small shops (boulangerie, deli store, small supermarket etc) to fill the fridge. Going the direction opposite to the beach (20 minutes walk along a charming harbor front), you will find the city of Hendaye proper with a cute farmers market on Wednesday’s. Bikes are available to move even faster but we did not use them.
One highlight of our trip was taking the regional train from Hendaye to San Sebastian (5€ round-trip, 30 mins, with beautiful scenery and avoiding parking issues in San Sebastián). This Spanish/basque-run train starts from a small station next (on the left to) to the main French SNCF train station in Hendaye. San Sebastián itself was worth the entire trip to the Basque Country (city, beach, mountain, great restaurant-scene, and culture — all combined in one city!).
We also enjoyed our trip to Hondarribia (just across the river from Hendaye on the Spanish side) on a busy week-end night: amazing atmosphere with many many restaurants and people partying in the streets until well after midnight.
An other highlight was a day trip to Bilbao (by car 1h30 ride without traffic) to see the Gunggenheim museum (my parents did not enjoy the contemporary exhibits as much as we did). On the way back from Bilbao we took a small mountain road and stopped by the small basque town of Lekeitio. We enjoyed the beach there (perfect for small kids) and the lively streets including rock/punk bands playing outside directly in the streets!
Overall Sylvie’s house contributed greatly to a fun trip at the border of the French/Spanish Basque Country.