Donostia is a city of great fishing importance. One of the most traditional fishing activities was the capture of whales. On Mount Ulía we can see several watchtowers, which were used to observe and monitor the passage of whales. The most important of these watchtowers is the Peña de los Balleneros.
Although nowadays the weeds hardly allow us to see the sea from La Peña de los Balleneros, in the old days they used to make surveillance rounds, watching the Cantabrian Sea without rest. As soon as a group of cetaceans was sighted, the person in charge of the watch would warn the boats in the port and they would set off to catch the animal.

Donostia was not the only town that participated in the captures. Practically all the ports in Gipuzkoa went out in search of the animal and those who arrived first kept the prey.

Today the watchtowers of Monte Ulía are a quiet place from which to enjoy the scenery of the Basque coast. And who knows, maybe you’ll spot a whale… it’s not easy, but not impossible either. The last cetaceans seen just two miles from Donostia were a group of orcas, in September 2020. Who would have thought it, right?