Santander spain

You can see bus schedules on Google Maps. Just type in Bilbao and Santander and click the bus icon. It looks like about a 90-minute ride each way but you have to fit the schedule. Me, I could easily spend a day in Bilbao itself, with two fine art museums, interesting river-valey topography, walking tours from the city tourism authority, and lots of early industrial heritage. Good food too, if not as star-blessed as San Sebastian.

John, that's an unusual choice of destination. May I ask why? (You need not answer.)

I ask because if you're looking for an impressive beach, you can find it in the somewhat easier-of-access San Sebastian, along with a very lively tapas/dining district (yes, touristy). For anything else, I think you'll do better in Bilbao. Santander is an attractive city but a relatively new one due to a catastrophic fire in 1941.

Rome2Rio.com is usually a good first step in determining the best way to get from A to B. It can can generally be relied upon to indicate whether there is rail service and/or bus service. Don't trust the details as to duration of trip and cost, however.

Unfortunately, in the case of the specific trip you propose to take, Rome2Rio falls short because it for some reason does not have information about the FEVE trains in northern Spain. But those are extremely slow trains, many traveling through scenic country, that seem to be used mostly by commuters. So, yes, there is FEVE service between Bilbao and Santander, but it's slow (3 hours) and infrequent enough (just three times a day on the weekday I checked) that I doubt it will be helpful for a day trip. Here's a schematic diagram of the route.

Fortunately for you, Bilbao and Santander are major cities, and the ALSA bus company runs frequent buses between them. You can check the schedule on the web page I've linked to. Be careful about the day of the week. The schedule is irregular but the buses run almost every hour, sometimes more often. The trip takes 1:15 to 1:30, and you'll pay extra for the faster buses.

However, your ship doesn't arrive in Bilbao proper; the cruise terminal is about 12 miles from Bilbao near Getxo. (I assume the info I found on the Internet is correct.) First you must get into Bilbao. There's Metro service from Getxo (nearest station probably Neguri) and reportedly also shuttle buses as well as taxis.