Faustino Azpiazu “Sakabi” took this path of people to learn the small sound of going to Elgeta, who then lived in Eibar. We are on the threshold of war, and there is an hour and a half walk from the farmhouse of Sakabia, which is the birthplace, to the heights of Azkarate. Take the bus there and go to Elgoibar. Train from Elgoibar to Eibar.

Every time he returned from Eibar to his house, it was the world that came in that little sound on his back: pasodobles, foxes, tango airs. And of course, the fandangos, the porrusaldas, the lightsabers, the trikitixes. A two-and-a-half hour walk to do two sessions in the room of a guesthouse next to the Plaza de Unciaga. And the same with the train of six o'clock in the afternoon, walking the road back home. Always the sound on the back.

The affair, I would have said. It's a hobby.

It was the same affair that had driven him years earlier to the Madariaga neighborhood. It was there that “Madarixa Txikxe” showed José Manuel Aranbar the first pieces. And the Madariaga that Peralta and Elgoibar have distributed has been something for the trikitixa. It was a good square. The world came together to dance. Sounds in the part of Peralta. People gathered for the Baltseo in the Elgoibar. Among them, guarding the parallel of “dignity and good manners”, sheriff. The reason: when the sounders played the bound, the dance was free in Elgoibar and not in Peralta. The ban will last until 1955, when the mayor, Pedro Alberdi “Perón Menor”, gave permission to celebrate the installation of the first stone of the Azkoitia Zubillaga foundry. In return, the parish priest removed the chair that the council had from the parish.

More from Madarixa Aittola

Currently there is no trick melody in Madariaga. For years, the two sales offices in front of the fronton were closed. Then the new bar opened. He is also locked in. The sounds of people have gone as the hot smells of broth and cooked meat have cooled down. Hopefully, someone will be on one of the two fronts. And more than pedestrians, there are cars going up and down, many of them from mountaineers who go to Izarraitz. As in other free places, those who attend will find only the shadows of the past.

We are on our way to Sakabia. Upwards from Madaria, there is a slope to the top of Aittola. The accommodation is now there, on the cross where the track that comes through Olaso from Peralta joins the Otarraco. Our path is superior, not apart from the first beech trees and shepherd’s huts. But it’s worth taking a detour to the Otarra, next to the Larraskanda well, if only to see the wide rocks on the way to the antenna. Planted on the ground, some more than two meters high, the beautiful stone slabs form a spectacular enclosure. It is not common to see such structures in the coastal mountainous area.

What has been done needs to be dismantled in order to get to the old path. We'll take over as soon as we figure it out. The eyes hit the sky, on the right side a cabin turned into a society of friends appears in the belly of the depths, and on the left a well. You're screwing up, and you have to. Take a stone and throw it, let it pass through the clean air, make an effort to reach the other side of the well. In vain. In vain. Like Sakabi, as the men and women who have gone through this road have done for years, you will throw it, you will throw it too hard, but you will not reach the other extreme. Measure it using your foot: It's 75 steps long. Guarding the well, in addition to the countertops, two Neolithic mounds that were discovered in 1958 for science. The old eles say that if instead of stones they are thrown by boats, they are now waiting to be picked up by someone in the mud of Maricuar, buried under water.

He can’t stop, but he walks in the footsteps of Sakabi’s feet. The shade of the trees is closer to us, we have passed the black Zaczpe, the beauty of the Stars comes to fill our eyes. Since it was built a few years ago, the area has been suffocated by a car park. This is where the four wheels are left to tackle Erlo, Xoxote and Kakutari without much fatigue. It's just a pass from Aittola.

On the way to Lastur

And because the road looks for the river from now on, I think Sakabi’s bellows will be relieved to return from Eibar. We leave the cross of Aittola behind and we are in the esplanade of Mugarri. Sakabi knocked eleven times, climbing on the roof of the local cottage, accompanied by Egañazpi, in the Sanjuanes or in the Octabeta of the Corpus. They were times when time was measured differently. Now, even on purpose, the rosemary is not shadowed by them. Others are now the fun molds of mountain people. There has been a ripping of the espadrilles, espadrilles and shoes of the hour. Because that trikitixa has been the only means of contact for the shadows that accompany us here on the road, to have fun, to break the daily march. Persecuted by the Church, no further from folklore, the joy of life first.

But we have to go on. Old Aittola's in the hole. Zulago Soldier, Golcibar and Sastarro. There's Ekain. We have before us the menacing peaks of Izarraiz, so similar that people even confuse them, Sesiarte and Agido. Raw Karehaitz, a more intricate climb by Agido. In the rocky labyrinth without mountaineers, the scent of the beech trees of the Arrón Hondo, there is a snowhole that deserves a visit. Without his hat, it’s not as spectacular as Xoxot’s, but even after 80 years since the last workers left, it’s not hard to still notice someone, snow hovering in holes in the winter, to go down to Zestoa in the summer so that the vacationers in the spa could have fresh ice cream.

We're in Lastur soon. Foals will appear to you on the road, sheep in search of abundance in the sargoric summer. But first, the road will pass through New Aittola. This is where Sakabi was honored in December 1962 by friends and family of the Arbizkua Valley. After lunch, this one played the longest piece, El sitio de Zaragoza. As soon as it’s finished, next door Pedro Gelatxo: “Would you play again?” And Faustino immediately answers, “yes to the sound if you don’t miss anything.” From

Aittola Nuevo, to the right, the farm of Hahor Sakabia. This is where Faustino Azpiazu was born and where he lived until his marriage to Azpeitia. Many roads came to Sakabia in a time of need. Sakabian has been cured for generations of herbs and ointments, mainly typhus and pulmonia, but also some rheumatics. A path that must always be followed in secrecy, for fear of accusations.

“What about Faustino, the Bellos-and you want to

start?” “No, I sound.”

Lastur, the world

And the little sound has tended to Lastur in Sakabia. The stream will accompany you all the way, you will have the grazing cows watching. There's nothing like letting old photos talk. If it is not during the Sanikolas carnival, it has always been a tradition to take portraits in Lasturko Square. It’s been over 60 years since they were in front of the camera. Except for some of the Rarans, they're all gone. The boys and girls of the valley appear in full force in old photographic papers, always dressed in a tie, long skirt and white espadrilles, elegant. Among them, the only man able to play with time: the sound player. In one appears Jacinto Rivas, Elgeta. In the other, the old Little Room. Almost always, Faustino Azpiazu, Sakabi, became local. This is the trio that introduced the Biscay trikitixa in Gipuzkoa in Lastur.

For San Sebastián, the province’s Far Westa has been all this until not long ago. In that September 1970 in the Plaza de la Trinidad I of the Trikitileros. At the time of the tournament, six couples from Urolalde showed up. Sakabi and Egañazpii took the prize home. Now buses from San Sebastian, Bilbao and everywhere arrive every weekend at Lasturko Square, full of people who want to eat there and play with grazing cows. Since we have created theme parks, time treats us differently. We've finished the road. Where are the shadows, I don’t know, but it’s not difficult, with enthusiasm, to hear their sounds as you walk in videos in the rains in this mountain bar.