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Published: July 10th 2007
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Before we get to Brad´s dangerous encounter with the bulls...we feel the need to briefly mention Bilbao. What a gorgeous city. We just wish that we had more than a few hours late at night to experience all that it has to offer. If we make it back to Spain we will add it to our list of must visit cities.
Ok now on with the blog... so maybe Brad did not have a dangerous encounter with the bulls, but it sounded good.
We reached Pamplona on the morning of the ninth. We found our hotel north of the city, and were able to check in early. Bag-free, we headed into the city and found the plaça de toros. The plaça serves two primary purposes. First, it is the place where the bulls run during the morning runs. All the mayhem you have heard of from Pamplona ends in the plaça de toros. Second, every night the plaça is host to 6 bullfights, and the bullfights were our reason for heading that way. After a long wait, the ticket office opened, and when we reached the front of the line, we found that we were 5 cents short.
However, enough jabbering in English convinced the guy that we weren´t going away until he gave us the tickets for a 1% discount. Loaded with our tickets for that night, we headed out to explore the city. Unfortunately, this was day 4 of San Fermin, so the city was pretty well destroyed. Trash everywhere, beer and various other aromas filling the street, and people sleeping any and everywhere. Not a great time to visit if you are interested in Pamplona´s natural beauty. We finally made our way to the bull fight at 6:30 that night, and the event didn´t disappoint. While we didn´t understand the ritual and traditions of bullfighting, it was clear who was good and who wasn´t, and the atmosphere was a lot of fun (see pictures). We even saw Salvador Cortes, and we think he might be famous. Feel free to google that one for us. That night we decided to avoid the chaos and headed back home.
The morning of the 10th started early, as we awoke at 6:00AM and headed for the encirro (running). We lucked into a great place to watch, and at around 8:05 we saw the RUNNING OF THE BULLS live.
It was a great 3.2 seconds (see picture). It was actually fun to watch everyone in his or her white and reds getting ready for a pure adrenaline rush. While we didn´t witness any accidents live, the replay we caught in the big square a few minutes later showed quite a bit of carnage. Our decision not to run was very justified.
On the way back to the hotel we stumbled across the Parade of the Big Heads. We don´t know the story, don´t understand the tradition, but felt that everyone could enjoy a Big Head Parade. One highlight of the parade was that certain members of the BHG (Big Head Group) were armed with sticks and the equivalent of big nerf balls. They would walk around absolutely laying into people, sending kids flying and leaving parents befuddled. Pure hilarity. I´ll take two.
After a late morning relaxing at the hotel, we headed for the train station and set off for Barcelona. Unfortunately we arrived pretty late, so nothing to report just yet. Keep an eye out for our continuing adventures and more pictures of funny hats.
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