Couple photoshoot in San Sebastián

The session is a walk through one neighbourhood in low light, and San Sebastián asks you to choose the neighbourhood more than the hour. Gros, across the river, is the surfers’ side: the Zurriola beach, the glass cubes of the Kursaal, a younger crowd in the bars. The Parte Vieja is stone and narrow lanes under the bulk of Monte Urgull. The bay between them is soft at every hour, so a couple photoshoot here can follow your own day instead of the sun. Where the hour does count is at the very end. If you want the sky to change colour behind you, the Peine del Viento at the western tip of the bay is the one place in town that faces the sunset, and that is where we finish. Bring a layer even in July: the wind off the sea after dark is cool.

When to book in San Sebastián

Light is rarely the problem on this bay; people and weather are. On a summer weekend the promenade is busy from late morning, so a start at eight or nine, or a late one in June when the sun sets near ten, gives you the balustrade with room to breathe. Spring and autumn are quieter at any hour, and the autumn swell at the Peine del Viento and along the Paseo Nuevo is a reason in itself to come in October. Between October and May roughly one session in four meets rain. It tends to come in bands, so on the day we watch the radar and shift the start by an hour rather than cancel. If the sunset at the Peine matters to you, check the time for your date: it runs from before six in December to almost ten at the end of June.