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A pilot who has flown more than 750 times has revealed there’s one European city which is a ‘tremendous destination’ that’s well worth visiting – and flights start from £26.99

A pilot who has flown more than 750 times and visited more than 50 countries in just four years has revealed the European city that holidaymakers miss.

When it comes to booking a sun-soaked getaway, many of us are on the lookout for those destinations that go a little under the radar. Whether it’s to escape the onslaught of tourist crowds, packed attractions and lengthy queues, or to simply wander around a quieter location and explore somewhere new.

There’s a catalogue of beautiful European cities, brimming with charm and character, that are well worth venturing beyond the typical holiday hotspots. Yet, it’s not always easy to know where to go. But luckily for us, Wizz Air pilot Tom Copestake knows exactly what destination he’d recommend to holidaymakers.

READ MORE: EasyJet unveils nine new routes to beautiful destinations from UK airports with £24 faresREAD MORE: Spanish airports move flights and take action to tackle queue chaos for Brits

Speaking exclusively to the Mirror, Tom said: “I flew into Bilbao about two weeks ago – it’s a tremendous destination on the north coast. It was surrounded by what looked like amazing mountains or hills for hiking. I think there’s a lot of good walking in northern Spain.”

He continued: “I spoke to the ground handling agent in Bilbao, and he said how beautiful the area was and how we needed to stay and go exploring. There’s a place called San Sebastiá just down the road from Bilbao, which is apparently an amazing place to go and have a look at.”

Bilbao is a vibrant and colourful port city in northern Spain, with towering green mountains and a winding river valley running through its core. It’s known for its Basque heritage, innovative architecture, and world-class art.

Its most famous landmark is the curved Guggenheim Museum, designed by Frank Gehry, known for its contemporary art exhibitions and the ‘Puppy’ statue that towers over the city. Yet, against its ultramodern architecture, there’s the historic old town of Casco Viejo, which is made up of ancient medieval streets, the grand Santiago Cathedral, and Mercado de la Ribera – one of Europe’s largest covered food markets.

The city has a renowned food scene, with its local tapas, known as pintxos, being a notable highlight, alongside its selection of fresh seafood. Bilbao is also packed with lively bars, buzzing restaurants and cafés, so visitors can savour the flavours of its incredible cuisine, and soak up its vibrant atmosphere.

Aside from visiting the Guggenheim Museum, notable attractions include the Museum of Fine Arts of Bilbao, Zubizuri Bridge, also known as the ‘White Bridge’, and Artxanda Funicular, a mountain cable car offering breathtaking views. Nearby is also the Bizkaia Bridge, the world’s first to carry people and traffic on a high suspended gondola, and it’s also a UNESCO World Heritage site.

And it might just be the perfect time to visit, as Wizz Air launched new routes from London Luton to Bilbao this year, with flights starting from £26.99. They also welcomed a flurry of new Spanish routes, including to Barcelona, Madrid, Valencia, Alicante and Seville.

Sharing a closer insight into his job as a pilot, after recommending Bilbao, Tom acknowledged: “This is a customer service job that happens to be in the aviation industry, and I love the fact that each of the thousands of passengers I’ve flown has a story and a reason to travel.

“It might be for fun, to see family, or we have people who might be working in different countries. It’s really cool, and I love that so much.” He humbly added: “This job is a privilege”.

For more information on Wizz Air flights, or to book your next getaway, visit their website.

Do you have a travel story to share? Email webtravel@reachplc.com

MINNEAPOLIS — Airport security video shows another way federal agents are taking immigrants to detention centers — in some cases they’re using commercial flights, with escorts dressed like any other passenger.

Video obtained through a public records request shows a 5-year-old boy who became a face of the immigration crackdown in Minneapolis being flown with his father to Texas on a Delta Air Lines flight, just a day after they were taken into custody. He had been detained while wearing a bunny hat.

Adrian Conejo Arias and son Liam Conejo Ramos seemed calm in these recordings as they were being escorted through the Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport by a man and two women dressed in plain clothes. Since the father and boy didn’t appear to be in custody, their trip to San Antonio probably went unnoticed by fellow passengers.

The Trump administration, like its predecessors, is mostly using ICE Air Operations charter flights as it detains hundreds of thousands of people for deportation. Human rights monitors are trying to keep track as detainees are loaded onto planes in shackles in parts of airports the public can’t easily see.

The video of Liam and his father, they say, exposes another route that’s harder for rights monitors to document, despite happening in plain view inside the same airport terminals where Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents wearing tactical, military-style gear are now being deployed to support security checkpoints.

What happened in this case?

The father, who was seeking asylum from Ecuador, and son were detained by ICE officers in Minnesota on Jan. 20 and taken to Texas. They were released on a judge’s orders and returned to Minnesota, but then an immigration judge denied their asylum request. The family’s lawyer said they’re appealing.

The video that revealed their commercial airline travel was first obtained by Nick Benson, an aviation enthusiast and activist with MN 50501, a grassroots group involved in anti-ICE and No Kings protests. Benson said he’s never seen children while monitoring ICE charter flights, so he suspected the agency was flying them commercially. He identified the time and day the father and son were flown out of Minneapolis, filed a public records request for the security video — and there they were.

The Associated Press obtained the same video through a similar request to the MSP Airport Police Department. It shows the father carrying the boy’s Spider-Man backpack as a woman shows an airline agent their boarding passes. A man and the other woman follow them onto the jet bridge.

Delta declined to comment on the video. But the airline said most government travel is booked through third-party agencies, with no advance notice about who is flying or why. The Department of Homeland Security did not immediately return messages seeking comment.

What is ICE Air?

ICE Air Operations transfers and deports people mostly using flights chartered through airline broker CSI Aviation, which has subcontracted with small airlines such as GlobalX, Eastern Air Express, Bighorn Airways, Key Lime Air and Avelo Airlines.

ICE Air continues to rapidly expand both domestic transfer and deportation flights, according to Human Rights First, which documented 1,630 immigration enforcement flights in February alone. Of that total, 183 were deportation flights and 1,170 were domestic transfer flights.

ICE also uses U.S. Coast Guard planes. Flight Monitor said it has tracked hundreds of flights since June in which Coast Guard planes were used to transport immigrants domestically.

“It seems that ICE sometimes uses commercial flights to destinations where they don’t carry out kind of larger scale ICE Air deportation flights,” said Savi Arvey, director of research and analysis for refugee and immigrant rights at Human Rights First.

The monitors use flight-tracking websites to follow the charter planes, but these tools can’t track individual passengers on commercial flights, making them “less in the public eye,” Arvey said. “It adds another level of opaqueness.”

Bellisle and Vancleave write for the Associated Press. Bellisle reported from Seattle. AP writers Rio Yamat in Las Vegas and Rebecca Santana in Washington contributed to this report.