Pamplona was insane.
That could almost be my entire post on the issue but I'll go into more detail.
The trip left from London and our first stop was at Arromanches beach in Normandy, France. This is one of the beaches where the allied Forces landed during the D-day landings of World War 2.
After the troops landed and captured the beaches from the Germans they set about building an artificial harbour so that they could import supplies of food, ammunition, vehicles, weapons etc.
They sunk huge blocks of concrete in the water to create some protection for the new harbour and then they built four floating piers where the incoming ships could offload the supplies. They then drove the supplies along the piers onto the beaches.
This photo is of the remains of one of the piers. They were originally designed to last for six months but there are still a number of ruins of the outer wall (which you can just see in the background) and the piers along the beach.
Arromanches beach is also where the opening scenes of Saving Private Ryan were filmed.
We also visited the American War Memorial and Cemetery nearby. This is for all the American soldiers who died on the Normandy beaches. There are 9387 graves and it is a humbling experience to walk amongst them all. The cemetary is beautiful, the lawns are perfect and every grave is in line with the ones next to it.
The next day we drove down to the French town of Cognac, famous for its, you guessed it, cognac. We were supposed to go on a tour of the Hennessey Cognac distillery but our driver got lost and by the time we arrived in town the distillery was closed.
Instead we all pooled the money we had for the tour and spent it on ingredients to make some punch. And when I say some punch I mean about 100 L of the stuff. Good times!
After Cognac we stopped at Biarritz beach for a swim. It is supposed to be the surf capital of Europe or something like that. It was nice, but it really wasn't that good - I'd take Coogee over it anyday of the week. Although it did have these cool little tents along the sand.
After our swim we drove to San Sebastian in Spain. We all went into town and split up into little groups for dinner. My group tried to have tapas at a Spanish bar but we must have been served by least tolerant waiter in Spain so it didn't end up being that good.
After dinner our entire trip met up to go out in town. This was the night that Germany were playing the Italians in the soccer semi final. The Spanish word for Germany is 'Alemania' which I thought was pretty appropriate! This was the night where I had my first (of many) sangrias. I'm still not entirely sure what sangria is made out of but from what I can gather it's basically a mixed drink (e.g. vodka and orange or bourbon and coke) where you mix some sort of spirit with red wine. You can also throw in some chunks of fruit if you really want to be upmarket.
The next day, after a bit of a sleep in - thank god, we drove to Pamplona itself. On the first afternoon there we went into town and on a walking tour of the path on which the running of the bulls actually takes place. The path is about 850 metres long and goes straight through the main streets of the town. It is pretty straight except for dead mans corner where the bulls are pretty much guarenteed to be running too fast to turn in time and so they almost alwasy crash into the wall. If you get caught between the wall and the 500 odd kg bull you're pretty much a dead man, hence the name.
The next day was the opening ceremony off the festival. Everyone, tourists and locals alike dresses in the traditional clothes of a white shirt and pants with a red sash round the waist and a red scarf tied around their wrist. At mid day a priest comes onto the balcony of the town hall and everyone takes the scarves off their wrists, holds them in the air and chants "San Fermin, San Fermin..." before tying the scarves around their necks. San Fermin is the guy who the festival is in honour of.
The next few hours are basically one massive food fight. You just walk around with either sangria, champagne, flour, sugar, shaving cream or any combination of them spraying it all over everyone else. I don't know how traditional this
aspect of it is but the locals get into it just as much as the tourists and it is a heap of fun.
I spent all the money I'd brought into town on shaving cream. I had to borrow money to buy lunch and even then I spent most of that on a few more bottles of shaving cream.
After that everyone is pretty tired and most people spent the rest of the afternoon lazing around in the main square chatting, drinking sangria or sleeping off the effects of too much sangria.
I didn't drink anything once I got back to camp because the next day was when I was going to run with the bulls and I wanted to be absolutely alert as possible. Given that I don't have the best reflexes in the world to begin with I didn't want them dulled even further.
The next day we got ridiculously early (5:15 am - you don't go on holidays to get up at times like that) to catch a bus into town and claim our spot on the path. We'd been told yesterday where the best places to start from were so a couple of us got there and stood and waited for an hour or so until the fun began.
Before the running starts the police clear out heaps of the crowd so that there is more room remaining for the people who actually run. They also kick out anyone who looks pissed or any females, as it's traditional that they don't run. After all, running is all about proving your manhood.
After that you can move into the newly cleared space and you just wait for it to start. At 8:00 am a rocket is fired to indicate that the first lot of bulls have been released from the starting pen. That's when everyone starts to jog along, not very quickly at first but getting quicker.
I heard the bulls before I saw them. You can easily hear their hooves on the pavements of the streets. Once this happens everyone starts sprinting and most people move over to the sides of the streets to let the bulls pass. Some crazy fuckers try and run directly in front of the bulls and jump out of the way at the very last minute. This is nuts because the grounds wet and slippery - the next day I saw a couple of people get trampled over doing this.
As the bulls ran past me they were within 1 or 2 metres of me and my heart was absolutely racing. Once they were past and the danger gone (at least for the moment) I relaxed a bit and felt the adrenilin flowing through my body which was an awesome feeling.
It was about this time that the second rocket was fired and the second lot of bulls released. I managed to run into the arena at the end of the course long before this lot got anywhere near me so I saw them running through the arena into the holding pen at the other end.
After both lots of bulls have finished the run the gates to the arena are closed and everyone cheers the people who have done the run. Then after a few minutes some of the bulls are let back into the arena to run around with the crowd. This was the point where I thought that I'd done enough so I legged it over the fence and took up a seat in the front row along with a heap of others who'd had the same idea.
For about half an hour the bulls are released into the crowd one or two at a time and run around trying to get people with their horns. The people are supposed to try and move out of the bulls way by distracting their attention and confusing them. They're not supposed to touch the bulls under any circumstances. Unfortunately a lot of tourists do touch the bulls. One idiot even tried to tackle them (he got taken away by the Spanish police at the end and given a bit of a beating apparantly). The locals in the crowd boo when people touch them and the locals who are left in the ring get pissed off and explain to the tourists that they're not supposed to touch them.
That afternoon we had a sangria party back at the campsite before heading in to town later in the evening to watch a bullfight. I saw one but it really wasn't fun at all. In fact it was pretty sad. The bull ended up with about seven knives, each about 40 cm long, in his back. He kept trying to get the matadors right until the very end, by which stage there were four or five of them in the ring. I was really surprised at how suddenly the bull just fell over and died and everyone in the crowd started cheering. I didn't like it so I left after the first one.
In the evening there was a fireworks display. It was really good, there were a few firework companies and they each try to out do the others so the displays are excellent and the whole show goes on for quite a while.
The next day we had another early start. The festival lasts for about a week and each day apart from the opening ceremony they have bull runs in the mornings and fights in the afternoons. On the second day we had bought tickets to watch the run from a balcony about three floors up directly overlooking the street. This was an awesome view of the event.
You can see in the photo how most people have moved to the sides but there are a few crazy ones in the middle waiting for the bulls.
The white bulls are relatively safe, they run the course each year for up to 10 years. Their job is to guide the brown bulls which are ones who are going to be killed in the fights that afternoon. Problems arise when the brown bulls fall over and get separated from the white ones. Instead of running in a straight line they will then try to chase anyone who gets in their field of vision.
After the two lots of bulls had run past our balcony we went inside and watched replays on the tv.
After that we went back to camp, packed up and then had a 24 hour bus ride to get back to london.
All in all, Pamplona (and the rest of the trip) was fantastic. I met some really cool people and now have a few more places to stay when I come back to London later on. The atmosphere of the festival is amazing. There is just such a positive buzz in the air. The whole time apart from the bull fight was really cool and even that was good to see even though I didn't like it. I'd definitely recommend going there to anyone who has the chance.
See you later, Pete
