Pamplona - how I ended up in Spain, Part 3

By the time we got back to the camp from the fireworks and debriefed, it was 1am before I made it to bed. My alarm was set for 5am the next morning and I had had a little bit of sangria the night before. After an eventful and sleepless few hours (note: my tentmate's mattress being sneakily stolen as I watched it sliding through the tent opening, not with my tentmates voice on the other side ;) ), I woke up about 4.30am and figured..this'll do. I'm not going to get any more sleep. Let's get this show on the road.

As I emerged from my tent, a figure dressed all in white stumbled past me to hurl at the tree base. This was off to a good start. I made my way to the shower (got in straight away, *fist pump*!) and realised that I was suffering from a mild-medium hangover. Back at my tent and a nurofriend later, I packed up my things and played the waiting game. Surrounded by a lot of seedy faces, we slowly made our way to the bus. I, for one, was wondering what the hell I was doing. I was dressed all in white, red sash around my waist, red neckerchief tied tied, arms crossed against the bitter cold. I was intending to run with the bulls that morning, and I was petrified.

I ran into Bec as I was boarding the bus. "Are you running?" I squeaked. Affirmative, and so we made the pact to meet before. Amy, too was prepared to run - but I couldn't find all the other brave girls who had sworn they were joining in too. At the conclusion of the nausea ting bus ride (reminder: I was battling a mild hangover), the girls and I grabbed some water and made our way to the town square. We pushed our way towards the centre - the crowd at this stage tight, but not claustrophobic. Somehow amongst the madness, we spotted the boys who were running and made our way over to them. Again, here stood a few unwell faces, tired eyes, nauseous souls. I shook. I was scared. I didn't know what to expect. We quizzed a boy who had run the day before. "Where do we go to start? How should we do it? What happened yesterday? Did you fall over? How many bulls do they release?"

The generally agreed tactic was to make our way past Dead Man's Corner (at Dead Man's Corner, bulls often lose their footing and slide out, crushing people against the side). After Dead Man's Corner it was. The next pointer was to wait until the first lot of about 6 bulls had past, run like hell to try to make it to the arena before the second lot of 2 bulls.

Suddenly the crowd surged and we got to know our neighbours a whole lot better. The crowd packed in. Obviously the police had begun shaving people from the edges and setting up the barriers. We stood pressed together, making small talk. Myself being so little, I was generally around armpit height, which is always fun. The instructional video continued to be broadcast on repeat: a cheerful cartoon with strangely calming music. The video made one think that the Running of the Bulls was a leisurely stroll in the park with a couple of non-threatening fluffy cows, not adrenaline filled madness with unpredictable, mad enormous bulls. Interestingly, one of the reasons that I was apprehensive about running with the bulls was that traditionally, women are not welcome. I had absolutely no problem from the Spanish men and was met with smiles, not spitting or bottles hurled at me as others had described. The instructional video also had changed with the times and each instruction alternated between a male cartoon (leisurely strolling in the park with a fluffy cow) to a female cartoon (leisurely strolling in the park with a fluffy cow).

The crowd surged even more than I thought humanely possible. If arms were up, they stayed up. If you were facing backwards - backwards is how you were going to remain. I lifted my head backwards in the vain hope of breathing some fresh air. Almost as suddenly, the crowd eased and I realised it was time. Absolutely no backing out now. Bec and Amy and I, along with the boys began to make our way down the track. In a few minutes, the cannon will sound, indicating the bulls have been let lose. We quickly made our way down, with a small startled sprint when someone beside us began to sprint. Lots of jumpy, nervous people around. The slightest twitch would set the people off on a scattered run.

We found a doorway vantage point down past Dead Man's Corner and nervously waited, chatting with another Aussie who we also found in the doorway. We heard the cannon, and then we waited with baited breath to see when others would start running - that means the bulls were there. People soon ran past us and pushed us closer to the wall. With a single layer of people between myself and the bulls, they powered past. I screamed as I watched two people fall and get tangled beneath the bulls hoofs in front of me. I hope they were ok. I began to run to try to keep up with the bulls but I fell behind. The pathway opened and the remaining two powered past. Sadly I wasn't quick enough to make it into the arena as the gates closed - a fact I feel conflicted towards - I'm not sure how I would have coped in the arena as once in, there's not a lot of escape. Maybe next year, now I know what I'm doing ;)

Bec and I had stayed together, and we tried to find another way into the arena. All tickets were sold by now and scalpers no longer to be seen so we started to make our way back to the meeting point to see if Amy got into the arena or not. On the way, we ran into her and made our way to a cafe that was already showing life replays of the run that just happened. Lots of ooohs and aaaahs and oh my god's later, we'd seen the replay from a few different perspectives (the whole course was rigged with cameras; above, on the ground, on the shops). We were starving by now and went to try to find some tapas, but ended up getting some chocolate and churros instead.

Back at the camp, it was all lazy times, naps and packing as we were to be leaving that day. What a crazy ride. I couldn't bring myself to drink any more sangria. We packed and sat around, some nursing hangovers, reminiscing on crazy last few days of our lives and dreading the upcoming 20 hour coach ride. Rumour was spreading that there were exactly half as many people coming home with us, allowing everybody to have a full 2 seats to themselves.

The coach ride was painful as to be expected and nothing out of the ordinary happened. We arrived back to the coast of Calais where I was let back in the UK without a second glance (unlike my first eventful experience getting into the country) and we made our way back to the Walkie, where the adventure had begun.


Spain, you had me. I feel had. You're a crazy, crazy place. I'll be seeing you soon.

xx

Pamplona - how I ended up in Spain, Part 2

Wake up alarms began sounding at 4.30am, 4.35am, 4.40am the next morning, signalling the start of a very long day beginning with the first Running of the Bulls. Many in our tour were going to run today (despite suggestions not to) and were amping themselves up. Some didn't even make it out of bed today after a big hard night of partying the night before. Some of the boys had returned home with interesting hair adornments and styles - a true sign of a good night out.

Stumbling around at 5 in the morning in Spain is cold and dark. We were tired and ranging on the hungover scale. We made it to the bus, shivering, and many of us managed a little snooze on the 45 minute coach ride in. I was adamant that I wanted to get into the stadium to see, and Kim, Robbie and myself pushed our way to the queue for tickets. Only 6 euros and we were in. By this stage, it was about 6.30am as we emerged into the stadium, securing good seats to watch what was going to unfurl. For the next hour and a half until the bull run began, we were entertained by a marching band, footage from the year before, songs sung in Spanish and a bio on each of the bulls who were to be run today. They all had a name and ranged, roughly, from 500-600kg's each. That's kinda not small. That's kinda enormous. Time continued to pass and soon enough, it was 8am and the cannon was to go off - the bulls along with it.

Strung along the bull running path were many cameras, and so we saw the carnage from different angles. Largely, the bulls ran in a pack together and didn't try to veer, although at times they lost their footing or people just got in the way. After only about 2 minutes, the first people started to pop through the stadium entrance - bulls in tow. More and more people entered, as bull after bull burst into the ring and raced across to the other side. For those who aren't aware, these are the bulls that are to be sacrificed in the bull fight tonight. The arena filled with white, the runners began cheering and congratulating themselves. This was short lived, as, unbenownst to most of them (silly tourists), another 2 bulls had been released after the rest. These burst into the ring and the white scattered out of their way.

All bulls across to the other side now, the arena gates were closed, and those inside were to face the next stage of the bull run. Again, many tourists seemed unaware of what was to happen and were rather shocked when a smaller steer was let into the ring, sending people running in all directions. Many people lined the sides, rows and rows deep - by now it was too difficult to try to get out of the arena over the barrier so once they were in, they were in.

This part of the bull run was dividing. It was exciting - but the tourists simply showed no respect - you do not touch the bull. They thought the Spanish crowd was cheering? No, the crowd was hurling abuse. You do not incite the bull. You do not slap, hit, pull the tail or the horns and, to be honest, I was rooting for the bull. I hope no one got seriously hurt, but if they did, it was their own fault. No insurance will cover the Running of the Bulls - you do it at your own risk. One gentleman (and I use the term loosely) got a horn between the legs, which would have been exceptionally painful, however he went back for seconds and got a bit of a thrown down, arms up, cheering his own macho-ness. One tourist jumped on the back of the bull, to which the local Spaniards began beating the ever living shit out of him - you don't touch the bull.

Every few minutes, the steer was rounded up by a big..pasture bull? Mamma? I can't work out what it was - surely it wasn't a female with those enormous horns, but I can't find any information anywhere. It was placid and docile and was led into the stadium. The small steer would generally stop trying to gore people and turn to follow the big one. Hilariously, most people didn't see the big one coming and it would just plow into people (slowly, not violently) - catching people in its horns and dragging them along. It was priceless to see their faces -and I'm pretty sure a few may have soiled themselves judging by their look - this bull wasn't going to hurt them, it was just a bit of a steamroller.

This part of the bull run lasted for about 45 minutes - every few minutes the steer was replaced by another. People would crouch down in front of the entrance so that the steer was forced to jump over them - that was rather exciting, as they aren't interested in trampling you, they'd rather jump over you.

At the conclusion, we made our way out of the arena and jumped on the coach back into the campsite. Forgoing a much needed nap, I opted to start drinking sangria instead and some of us headed to the bar, awaiting the Topdeck Sangria BBQ. By the time the BBQ rolled around, many of us were rather lightly toasted and the stories from the boys who ran were making the rounds. Where they were, how they got into the arena, how they gallantly jumped out of the way.

The evening consisted of..you guessed it..more sangria..and I'm pretty sure a tequila shot in there somewhere too..before heading back into Pamplona to see the fireworks. We squished our way into the grassy arena to get prime position - I love fireworks, have I mentioned that before? I'm such a little pyro. The fireworks were lovely (and seemingly endless, every time we thought it was the finale, another round would come) before a final two little spluttering fireworks signalled the end. We returned to our campsite and I prepared for what was going to be a terrifying day ahead.

To be continued.

In the stadium before it all starts - filling with spectators

The bulls running through! It's not good for people to reach the
arena before the bulls, hence not many people in there.

Heaps of runners in the arena before...

...they let loose a little bull

Steer about to hit someone, with the big pasture bull behind

Evening fireworks :)

Pamplona - how I ended up in Spain, Part 1

I'm going to skip forward a couple of days and then return to what happened in the interim.

As some of you by now already know (even though I was trying to keep it on the lowdown until I signed the dotted line), I did in fact get offered the job at Imperial College - the one I had been obsessing about and interviewed for the day after I arrived as a broken human being. I got it. Like, seriously. Something has to go wrong, this is going much too smoothly. Maybe it's good karma after the stress of almost not being let into the country?

The position starts July 15 and so my next question was - what can I do in the meantime? Let's do something crazy! Pamplona was the word on everybody's lips and so I got the very very last spot with the Topdeck Pronto 6 day tour (with much thanks to BritBound and MC for squeezing me in).

This was on Monday, 30 June. The tour was leaving Friday, 4 July. Nothing really sunk in until I was on the bus. I'm going to Spain? Wha? Running of the Bulls? I'll do the thought process later.

Thursday night, some of the BritBounders who were travelling met together at a Spanish restaurant to get to know one another and have a couple of familiar faces. Here I met Emera and Ashley, Guy, Megan and Leigh, and Kimberley. We bid each other farewell until the morrow and went home to finish packing.

Friday morning, wheely suitcase and backpack loaded, I made my way to the Walkie. On the way, I received a message from MC asking if I was there yet (which sent me into a panic as I thought I was running late). Turned out another BritBounder went to the wrong location, but all was well in the end. At the Walkie, I excitedly sat with those I had met the night before, Guy and Kimberley (who kindly lent me a European power adaptor) and we tried to guess what the next few days were going to be like.  We boarded the coach, I sat with Kim - and we began the first leg to Dover, about a 2 hour drive from the Walkie. (There was slight drama here with the ferry, and where we were meant to board, and missing people, but I won't go into those details).

The next 20 hours passed...rather slowly. Not in a blur, not swiftly with excitement, but rather painfully and slowly. First stop: Dover, where we saw the White Cliffs. We boarded the ferry (P&O - a bit of information for you, Mum!) and embarked towards France. I was a little bit crazy as I was about to land on French soil. 2 ill-advised ciders later (and also a broken seal..) and we jumped off the ferry and into our Topdeck coach in France. In France! Kim enjoyed my excitement as I pointed out particularly French things - look! French cows! Over there! French trees. Oh! A french building! I tried not to overdo this to the point of her stabbing me in the face with frustration; I think I succeeded.

We stopped every 4 hours for a stretch, toilet stop and some food. I had some of the most hideous chicken nuggets I have ever had the misfortune of experiencing in a service station in France. The customer service was roughly the same. I popped some half sleeping tablets and while not knocked out completely, this did afford me a couple of hours here and there and the luxury of dozing. The coach ride gave us the chance to start getting to know the other people on the tour (about 60 of us on our particular tour, although there were over 400 Topdeckers staying in the camp site on other variations of the tour). As we had been sitting together, our tent numbers also became close together - so these became the people I was to socialise with for the next 6 days.

Arriving at the campsite, we made our way to our tents and dumped our stuff. The talk around me was to go to the bar and then for a swim. I almost cried - I only wanted to sleep. I sat on the airmattress for a while and then slowly forced myself to put my bathers on - encouraging a second wind of enthusiasm and I was alright again. At the bar, I introduced myself to Kat, Dave, Dan and Sherrie and we had a breakfast sangria or 2 (or 3? I can't remember). It was 10.10am, and this was to set the tone for the next few days in Spain. We wandered down to the lake on the campsite (with more sangria - 1L for 2 euros) and went for a dip - today was 32C and we all got a bit sunburnt. Spanish sunburn! Which will hopefully turn into a Spanish tan and not peel, Spanishly.

After a dip and too much sangria, some of us jumped on the bus and had a tour of Pamplona, as well as tips and tricks for staying alive and un-gored if any of us were to do the bull run. It was a hot day and combination sangria, lack of sleep, lack of food and dehydration ended up with me having a borderline migraine and the first to lose the bet on who would chunder first on the trip. That's right. I'm gonna own that.

Fell into bed and slept like a log.

Sunday morning arrived and I felt wonderful but was surrounded by some seedy heads. Sunday was the opening ceremony for the San Fermin festival and so we all donned our white pants, white t-shirt (most of us chose to wear the Topdeck one in case we lost each other in the crowd) and red waist sash. We were not to put our red neckerchief on until the cannon had sounded at midday. We arrived into town just after 10am and, as a group roughly 14 strong, we made our way exactly where we were recommended not to go - into the town square. Along the way, we purchased our first bottle of sangria for the day (1.5L for 3 euros) which was then carefully poured into our sangria sacks for optimal drinking and sangria squirting. In the town square, things were already beginning to get crazy. Drunk Spaniards with their home made sangria in giant 5L or more bottles. Buckets full of sangria and large cups, ready to be thrown at all and everyone. Anyone who ended up on someone else's shoulders was instantly doused with sangria. Anyone who was even in the square simply ended up covered in sangria. We were squirting it at each other and throwing it, and getting caught in cross-fires from other groups. It was crazy and mental and insane. Someone decided it would be a good idea to begin throwing empty (or mostly empty) bottles of sangria into someone's balcony (the town square was lined with tall housing blocks). This resulted in hundreds and hundreds of bottles flying through the air - until the balcony was filled. They then started on the adjoining balcony. I could see the residents inside - they were laughing. They weren't mad. This was all part of the crazy.

A couple of giant inflatable balls joined the fray. More sangria throwing. More people. Squishy squishy. Until it was almost midday and the crowd had become the single biggest mosh-pit I've ever experienced in my life. I was separated from the group and surrounded by about five 6'+ enormous Spaniards who were holding up their red neckerchiefs and chanting San Fermin! San Fermin! I was a fraction panicky as I desperately did not want to fall over. I held onto the back-fat of the Spaniard in front of me as the crowd grew closer and closer and more and more frenzied. Jumping, pushing, screaming, as it drew closer to midday. San Fermin! San Fermin! People emerged onto the balcony of the main building and the crowd settled slightly - awaiting the cannon to be fired and the start of the festival. And...boom! San Fermin! Everyone pumped their red neckerchiefs in the air and tied it around their necks. Jumping, dancing, screaming, sangria, white, red, pink.

After the boom, the crowd dispersed slightly and I spotted Robbie in the crowd. I pushed my way over to him and found the rest of the group. We continued to drink sangria and pour sangria and slowly made our way out of the fray which had begun to thin (but only slightly, just enough to move). The whole experience was completely crazy.

We tried to go to the main square but ended up in a smaller, more family friendly square. We stopped here for a while to catch our breath and exclaim how incredible that all just was and admire our sangria stains. A band marched past us, followed by one of the coolest drumming bands I have ever heard.  Sidetracked, we stopped and danced for a while as the drummers, enormous smiles on their faces, drummed in unison incredibly catchy beats. I wish I knew what they were playing so I could find that music again. It brought such happiness! The drummers continued on and we made our way to the main square.

It was like herding cats - there was 14 of us, an enormous crowd to battle through, and people stopping along the way. The streets were soaked with sangria and cider and piss and basically miscellaneous liquids as the cleaners used high pressure hoses to just wash it all away...

In the main square, we needed 3 things; 1) more sangria, 2) bathrooms and 3) food (not necessarily in that order). We had some tapas and other food, waiting in line for the toilet for about half an hour and then some of us caught the coach back to the campsite because we were bushed.

What a mental day. After a while back at the camp, I mustered the energy for a shower - one of the sweetest showers I have ever had in my life, albeit lukewarm-to-cold and having to press for water every 15 seconds. Ahh, the stink of clean. We continued partying and eating and drinking and went to bed rather early - it was going to be a difficult 5am start the next day so we could secure good places for the first Running of the Bulls.

To be continued.

Lake at the campsite

1.5L sangria for breakfast, opening ceremony of San Fermin

Before: shiny white and clean

After! 

The houses lining the town square 

Sea of white (and slightly pinkish)