[To see the pictures of the events, click on the picture above]
Everything starts with preparation, just like the athletes prepare for their final event, everything is in the details: the thoughts, the visualization, the equipment, rest. This is no different. The evening of Friday the 8th required the purchase of quality equipment:
· 3€ WHITE t-shirt at Zara
· 20€ WHITE pants at Springfield
Then getting a full tank of gas, maps of Pamplona, Tom-Tom, sunglasses, cameras (x2), cash, and good running shoes. Everything was ready. Off to sleep.
Saturday the 9th
Get up at 4:50am, get the WHITE gear on, gather all equipment and dive to pick up Noa, a female colleague of mine, at 5:30am. We set course for San Fermin fiesta in Pamplona. Here, timing is everything: my original plan was to leave Friday night on a bus and see the festivities in full swing, but my original partner got stuck in Cadiz and could not make it back. So the morning departure of 5:30am would still get us to Pamplona for the 8am el Encierro: the Bull Run.
We arrived in Pamplona at about 7:15am with enough time to find parking (which was not very difficult) and headed towards the Calle de Estafeta, where the Bull Run takes place. You could see the evidence of the Fiesta far from the city centre: white and red dressed partiers sleeping in parks, under the trees and in their cars. Many were still walking the streets, reminding you of the zombie movies: vacant looks, enough energy left to stay on their feet but not enough to lift their heads…
We got to the entrance of the downtown core, which is very historic and features many heritage buildings. At the entrance we completed our camouflage in order to blend in to the crown and avoid, as much as possible, looking like tourists: we got our red scarves to tie around our necks and long and wide red cloth ”belts” to tie around our waist. The disguise was complete. The only thing giving us away was:
· My pale, in comparison to the Spanish, skin
· Our alert and sober eyes
· The absence of red wine stains on our clothes
· The absence of 2 liter jugs of beer or wine in each of our hands
· Our purposeful and too fast of a pace through garbage and broken glass filled streets
· My camera, likely the biggest giveaway
Surprisingly, we go to the Calle de Estafeta very fast, but about 451.713 others beat us there first. What a bummer!
Luckily, Noa, with her perfect command of Spanish and her Galician accent (which this Saturday was a very welcome, as we met lots of people from Galicia) was able to chat up with some rare sober locals, which knew of a place to watch the Bull Run from. We briskly followed.
In the meantime, braving our way through the crowds of San Fermin party-goer look-alikes, with broken glass crunching under our feet and with smell of wine, alcohol and cigarettes abundant, we got to the place where we were on an elevated street, which allowed for some views of the soon-to-be Bull Run. The people right at the barricades got here at 4am to get a spot (many probably never left from last night), some others had views from the balconies of the nearby buildings, at a meagre cost of 85-115€ per hour (but that includes juice and breakfast).
The crowds were singing the final song announcing the beginning of the Run. The cannon goes off and the Bulls are released. We were situated right above the place where the Runners meet their fate. We could see the bulls and hear the screams of the Runners and the encouraging roar of the crowd. Amazing: the run is so fast and it is over in a few minutes. The Bulls run for about 3 minutes to the Plaza del Toros, where in the evening at 6:30pm there is a Bull Fight. You can see a video of the event to give you an idea: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MTHHgxFOD_g&feature=player_embedded#at=23
After the Run was over, we walked the Calle de Estafeta all the way to the Plaza del Toros and ended up being able to get into the Bullring for a few pictures. Then we walked back through the town, had some coffee and shared our impressions.
It was about 9:30am at that point. The day was young…
Our next thought was: instead of going back to Zaragoza, we were about 1 hour away from San Sebastian, to which Noa has never been. We decided to go and see the city and I could show her around J since we have already been there and seen many of the things this beautiful city has to offer.
En route to San Sebastian we got pulled over at a roadblock along with a large number of other vehicles, all San Fermin party-goers. I suppose the all-white outfits and red scarves are an easy way to spot a potential offender. I had to blow into the little machine they presented, but after scoring an astounding 0.00 the Guardia Civil politely waved us on and off we went.
We got to San Sebastian and the weather was only 18 and raining. After Pamplona with 25 degrees and sunshine, that felt a bit of a let-down. However, we were going to maximize the day and see the town anyway. In addition, based on my last experience here, the weather can change in a few hours.
We parked just up the hill from our vacation apartment, walked down to La Concha beach and had a tapa (this nice lady asked for some translation help from us: I then asked her and found out she was from Victoria BC and lived in Cadboro Bay. How about that?!?). Then we walked down to the Neo-gothic church and all the way to the other side of town to the Surfer’s beach. Our San Fermin outfits were slightly noticeable and we could see the smiles on people’s faces as we walked. We walked all the way to the beach and spend half an hour sitting on the sand and watching several groups of wannabe surfers getting a lesson and heading to the water. The waves were quite good and the sun was starting to peek out.
I said to Noa: “you know, we could be surfing too”, to which she said: “ah, that is crazy, maybe another time”.
In the next 20 minutes we had our surfing lesson all booked for 3pm. In the meantime, we went and got some lunch, got our car and came back to the PUKAS surf school to join 2 Swedish girls and a guy from Los Angeles.
We got into our wetsuits and headed off to the beach. With our cool looking instructor, we, with our surfboards in hand, went to the water’s edge to get our surfing instructions. The style they teach here is slightly different from the one taught in Hawaii, and I think it is a bit easier. At this point, the sun was out in full force and we hit the waves. I got up nicely and had 3 good rides; Noa was also able to get 3 waves. As always, learning can be a bit challenging, but the experience was absolutely worth it. Our 1.5 hour lesson was a perfect amount of time to get enough bruises and drink enough salt water to get the appreciation that this is indeed a difficult sport for beginners. But we enjoyed the experience and will have to come back.
The last thing we did in San Sebastian is seeing the Wind Comb statute at the one end of the harbour (one of the things I did not get to see last time we were here) and it was time to drive back to Zaragoza, which was 2.5 hours away.
We got back just after 9pm, slightly tired, but with big grins on our faces. Talk about hitting 2 birds with one stone!
