Every year for the past 500 years, in Pamplona Spain in July, thousands and thousands of people get together to celebrate together at the San Fermines festival. This festival is known mainly for one thing- the running of the bulls every morning. Each day at 8:00, hundreds of people adorn their white clothing with red “pañuelos" and belt scarves to run along side bulls.
It is really cool to be there with everyone wearing the same thing. Normally, being an American tourist, I tend to stick out. But it was awesome to blend in. It was a sea of white with touches of red. I can’t really describe how it was to be there other than saying the energy was phenomenal. Everyone was just excited to there.
The day before this officially starts, there is an opening ceremony, called The Chupinazo, where what seems like a million people gather in the square of Pamplona to do something. I don’t really know what happened besides them lowering a big flag. The section I was at (bodies on bodies on bodies in a million degree heat), people would pop champagne and spray it over everyone. And vino, lots of wine. Also something yellow, which we think was Fanta Limon. After the ceremony, from the balconies surrounding the square people were dumping buckets of water down to the crowds below. It was so hot people were begging “agua! agua!" Basically, everyone was soaked with wine and other sticky liquids. We all smelled. And it was awesome.
During the heat of the heat of the day, we went back to our hostel and showered. Our hair was hard, so it was for the best. We did our Spanish duty and took a siesta until it got a little cooler out.
For dinner we found a street fair type thing with a bunch of food. We ended up splitting a couple tapas and then walking around a bit. While i was searching in a souvenir shop, an awesome guy named Gonzalo from Chile started talking to my friends outside. He kind of just started hanging out with us for the rest of the evening. His friends ditched him, and I would have totally tagged on to a group if I was in the same situation. We came across some live music, and Gonzalo took my friend Mary by the hand and started dancing with her- Spanish style. It was there that we found an awesome caramel cream filled churro for only 2 euro.
By following the crowd (like cattle, ironically) we ended up in a park watching an amazing fireworks show. If they do that every night, our 4th of July festivities are embarrassing.
The next morning was the first encierro. We got to the fences at 6:00am when it doesn’t start until 8:00am. However, there were still 4 rows of people in front of us. We lucked out because the spot of fence we were on, the people couldn’t sit on since it was an ambulance exit. Otherwise we would not have been able to see literally anything. When the race started, we could hold up our cameras and snap pictures of what we could. Joey let our friend Taylor sit on his shoulders, so she got one of the best views. I would suggest renting a balcony, for anyone who is planning on going.
The energy of the crowd when the “petardo" (firework) went off signaling the release of the bulls was incredible. People were screaming and cheering, and of course, running away from the bulls. Honestly, if I were to run, I would be more scared about being trampled by people than getting hurt by the bulls. The people are crazy, and they won’t exactly stop from running over you.
Overall it was a crazy awesome weekend. A couple things I didn’t expect- after the Chupinazo- we were almost being herded. Everyone wanted to be out of the square, and it was a mess trying to get out. People would shove, but there was no where to be shoved to. Haha. Also the amount of trash in the streets was crazy. Everywhere you looked there were piles of trash. I was not expecting that. The ground was sticky with all the wine thrown around too.
This was definitely the experience of a lifetime. I had so much fun this weekend- being surrounded by people who wanted to take part in a huge aspect of Spanish culture was awesome. I can now successfully check the Running of the Bulls off my bucket list.