Adios Europa!

Well folks, it's 3:20 in the morning and I have the computers of the ridiculously nice Auditorium Hotel in Madrid all to myself after my flight to Buenos Aires was delayed until tomorrow afternoon due to bad weather. So I'm going to try to crunch through my past 10 days in Spain without drooling or trailing off to much........


Right, so after Whitney prevented a guy from stealing her purse on Las Ramblas in Barcelona and caught her plane to NY, I headed back to Madrid where I was going to head out to South Africa the next day. Due to lack of planning, money, and a desire to give more time to Africa to do it properly I cancelled my flight and decided to start from scratch. My wonderful mother actually suggested I wait around to WATCH (yeah right) the running of the bulls the following week. So the following morning I hashed my grand finale in Europe: a relaxing day of booking hostels and trains in Madrid and chilling at the amazing Way hostel, 1 day in the historic city of Toledo, a weekend on the beach in San Sebastian, and then catch the first 2 days of the San Fermin Festival in Pamplona before flying out to Buenos Aires, Argentina on july 9th. So here we go...



Toledo

Toledo is a beautiful city about 30 minutes outside of Madrid by train. It is very similar to Granada in that it was shaped by Muslim, Moorish, and Christian culture. With in the small city walls there are Christian convents, churches built on from remains of mosques, mosques, monasteries, and an impressive fortress with the Arabic name Alcazar. It was also very hilly and hot, but I managed to make my way around most the city while visiting their large Cathedral, a monastery, the El Greco museum, and another large church. Toledo used to be the capital of Spain and was a very vibrant city. But when the capital moved to Madrid coupled with its central location away from the major waterways, the city became almost obselete. It is largely because of this that the city has been preserved in excellent condition! All in all it was a very enjoyable day.



San Sebastian

An absolutely beautiful beach town nestled in the hills of the Northern Basque country of Spain. It has two large beaches: La Concha and Zurriola, the surf beach. Both are beautiful but there are more waves at Zurriola. My time flew by with a friend I met from Melbourne and two Kiwi girls from my Hostel. It was a welcome reprieve to rest on the beach for an afternoon, and also go for a bike ride on the boardwalks all throughout the city. I also "surfed" for an hour and a half, and by surf I mean flop around on a tiny board on small to decent sized waves! I did stand up on 2 waves and ride several others on my belly so I'm going to stay positive and at least say I improved on how to catch waves!



...so I didn't quite make it...in Argentina now but I digress



Pamplona

So I booked a hostel called "El Centro", which is run by a couple South Africans that follow the world's largest festivals and set up a HostIVAL soley for that event. An very interesting concept...in theory. I showed up and was promptly put to work putting together beds! And it gets better, apparently there was one little piece of paperwork out of order- the one allowing people to sleep overnight in the building! And for the cherry on top, the chief of police lived next door and decided to make sure everything was in order the following morning...and boom Hostival is shut down, effectively becoming a very nice storage center. A simple stamp from the Ayuntamiento (city hall) would have remedied the situation but they are closed for the festival!



Anyway, we got one night's rest and decided to make the best of the situation. We were allowed to leave our stuff in the Hostel for another day and take much needed showers before we left. We then went and enjoyed the opening day festivities, partied most of the night, tried to get some sleep in a park with thousands of other like minded people, RAN with the BULLS, and then packed up and headed back to San Sebastian for another relaxing day on the beach!



The festival itself is INSANE! The city is literally covered in sangria, beer, and water. Everywhere you go people are dumping it on you. It's a 24 hour a day party and when people do try to get some rest they just lay down and sleep! I saw people sleeping on benches, in parks, random patches of grass, doorstops, and the bus stations (even though we got kicked out when we tried!).



The run is organized chaos. It originated from back in the day when herders would move bulls from the pasture to the bull ring. Locals would line the streets to watch and some would try to prove their bravery by running alongside them and touching them, and the rest is history. The run is approximately 800 meters and all that stands in your way is 10 550+ kg bulls and thousands of terrified tourists. They release the bulls in 2 shifts - 6 monstrous bulls first, and then 4 smaller steers that tend to be a little feistier second. There are 4 bells - the first one people take off, never see a bull, and get pelted when they enter the arena for being cowards. The second and third bells people slowly take off as the rumble of thundering hooves gets closer and then start running whenever their bravery runs out. The 4th bell is when the bulls are released. The majority of the carnage takes place right at the beginning with the crazy people at the back who wait for the 4th bell and Deadman's corner. Deadman's corner is a 90 degree right turn, the key is staying on the inside of it. The bulls can't turn quickly and with all the water and sangria on the ground often slip and go careening into the wall. I left just before the 3rd bell and made it to the inside of deadmans corner and smeared myself against the wall with about 5-10 seconds spare before all 6 bulls blew past me less than a foot away! But probably the biggest danger is other people, it's every man for himself and many people get pushed, elbowed, shoved, and often times trampled. After the first wave passes, you have to beat the second set of bulls into the ring to make it in, or else they close the doors and your run is over. Inside the ring is more pandemonium as the big bulls are herded straight out, but they release smaller ones with capped horns to wreak havoc on people. Needless to say it is a very exciting 5 minutes, but probably the worst part is waiting over an hour for the bulls to be released (you start lining up at 7 am). Everyone is standing there, staring at their watches while simultaneously defecating in their white pants and wondering "What the h*** am I doing here?!?" I did not make it to the ring and decided to stay in San Sebastian the next night after the hostel was shut down so next year maybe I'll make it to the ring!...

I then returned to the awesome Way hostel in Madrid, caught an awesome local Flamenco show and one last Madrid pub crawl before heading to Argentina (after a 1 day delay in cool hotel)!