The Big Walk

The Running of the Bulls – Day 40

Beyond the walls a massive funfair has been set up. We wonder round the stomach-churning rides before opting for the big wheel – which still proves terrifying for Helen. We run round after a peña band for a while before heading to another park. There’s a giant stage and music but we’re hungry enough to instead devour what looks like a very dodgy paella from a street stall. The fiesta rolls on but the buzz is beginning to desert us as exhaustion begins to take hold – we’re utterly knackered. We try to sleep on a park bench, before deciding that the ‘soft’ concrete in a children’s play area will be more comfortable. I can’t sleep a wink, I’m too scared of being robbed, not to mention the discomfort. We head onto another perch on some steps in the centre but the never ending bar activity and a guy on the next step vomiting up his entire fiesta consumption are no improvement.

Finally we take up a prime position from which we’ll be able to watch the bull run – in three hours time. After only another half an hour our vantage point is crammed full of spectators, together with the balconies on all the buildings, whilst in the street just below the brave or foolish are gathering. They arrive loud and raucous but as time passes begin to look more nervous, sobering up rapidly as danger time draws near. The tension builds until with five minutes left the crowd turn to face towards the bulls, and begin chanting and waving their newspapers, their nerve at last returning with the solidarity in numbers. An explosion is heard as a rocket flies into the air – the bulls have been released. Everyone turns to run, or to cram into the sides of the road, but the six bulls are here in an instant, menacing and black, with huge horns. They are running together as a pack and several people take glancing blows from their sides but they are past in just a second, followed by a group of steers with bells ringing out. In no time at all the adrenaline has gone; replaced by profound relief, as the runners dust themselves down looking dazed. Only later do we learn that further along the today’s run six people are hospitalised, three being gored and seriously injured. Since record-keeping began in 1924, thirteen people have been killed.

We go to collect our bags ready to move on, as the rubbish-strewn streets are swept and another day of the fiesta begins. We leave the centre past a tall statue of St. Francis: even the Saint is now adorned with the red scarf tied round his neck. Once in the anonymous suburbs we stop for a civilised breakfast to kick-start our return to reality. There’s a hostel beyond the edge of the city but it’s too early to be open, and some energy is coming back into our limbs with the warming sun – in spite of twenty seven hours without sleep (and counting). A twenty kilometre walk passes in a trance; I remember only the heat and regretting eating the dodgy paella from the stall last night.

We stumble into the pilgrim hostel at Larrasoaña, only to be taken on an agonising tour of the facilities by the warden. He goes through everything with ridiculous thoroughness. “These are the taps, this one’s hot, this one’s cold…. That’s a toilet, which flushes like this.” Only when another pilgrim arrives do we escape, and crash out on the mattresses on the floor for a couple of hours.

When we wake, our host completes the tour by showing us his gallery, filled with photos and watercolour paintings by pilgrims, and every sort of camino memorabilia. He’s a true eccentric; so obsessed by the pilgrimage that he’s completed it seven times and even changed his name to Santiago. In several hostels on the route we’ve seen signed photos of a bearded man dressed in full medieval pilgrim costume, draped in scallop shells – there’s another of them here. As I glance at it I realise – it’s the warden with a pilgrimage-grown beard.

When we wonder outside we find that Larrasoaña is a picturesque village, but it’s best feature is a bar serving the meal I’d dreamed of – a huge, refreshing salad followed by steak and chips, after which we again leave the land of the living for the soundest dormitory sleep ever.

Long Live San Fermin! – Day 39

We lie in as long as we can, until Maribel wakes everyone to come and watch the first encierro on her television. There’s an absolute throng of people all along the half mile of narrow city streets; it seems impossible that the bulls will even be able to get through. When the bulls are released and plough through the crowd it’s an incredible spectacle. Nearly everyone dives for the doorways and presumed safety towards the sides of the street, but there’s not enough room, particularly when the bulls skid round the tight corners, and at least one person looks to have been badly trampled. One brave Spaniard runs right in front of the horns for a hundred yards or more, before he is pulled away at the last moment by another runner. Maribel approves of this and is cheering and shouting out – afterwards, she says it was a good run. We hope to see tomorrow’s encierro for real – but I now know I dare not take part!

A short walk through parkland and past the pentagonal citadel walls that enclose central Pamplona, and we’re there. We call at one of hundreds of stalls to buy the red scarf and white t-shirt – no longer will we be the odd ones out – and plunge through the crowds. We hope to party until tomorrow morning, sleeping on the streets if need be, so there’s nothing for it but to join a huge queue for a left luggage office. In front of us, three young Californian backpackers keep me awake with their conversation, two hours of incessant, imaginative bull-shitting on their travel experiences. It makes me glad that we have our trek to provide a sense of purpose rather than being on the standard world backpackers tour. I can see we’d be too old for it and too interested in seeing the places themselves rather than in impressing our mates or trying to get laid.

Whilst we are waiting the official procession, with its ornately decorated bust of San Fermin carried aloft, passes through a corner of the square. It halts whilst a lone female vocalist addresses it in haunting song. This procession has been carried out on the 7^th July for at least seven hundred years. Once we’re rid of the bags, we battle through the streets to the cathedral in time to see the procession again for the ceremony outside the cathedral called the atrio, buying a bottle of cava en route. As I open it the flying cork nearly takes my eye out and we begin drinking as the parade approaches. Eight enormous giant figures, four metre high wooden structures with faces of made of painted paper mache, dressed in elegant clothing hiding their carriers below, lead the way. There are four pairs of Kings and Queens, representing Europe, America, Asia and Africa (poor Australia has never been added). Also with old paper mache faces are the five cabezudos or councillors, and the six kilikis, villains of history such as Napolean who carry sponge balls on wooden sticks with which they attack any children (or adults) who cross their path. All line up in two rows, and when the cathedral bells ring out the bands begin to play and the giants dance. There are also the zaldikos, half man, half horse, who also run around attacking children. Some kids are screaming with laughter as they are bashed over their heads, others burst into tears and have to be hugged by their attackers afterwards. One proud lad had his own mask and sponge stick and was chasing after all his mates.

As the parade moves away we venture round the streets, and our afternoon is filled with street-performers, jugglers, folk groups, and occasional kiliki or zaldiko attacks. The atmosphere is absolutely electric. Seemingly everywhere are the peñas, local brass bands with deafening drummers who charge around the streets, each with their own bands of followers adding to the anarchy. We have to settle down for a while, drinking our second bottle of bubbly as we listen to a great pop band on stage. In the next street, there’s traditional Basque dancing – it sounds like Medieval court music and the dances involve holding your arms motionless in the air whilst your legs go wild. It’s pretty impossible to do it from watching but hundreds of locals are on the move. The tempo is building all the time, and at ten o’clock the ‘fire bull’ is let loose. A man wearing a wooden frame in the shape of a bull runs through the streets at full pelt. The frame is covered in whirring, sparking Catherine wheels whilst rockets fire off the head in all directions. He runs past us and is lost in the crowd in seconds.

By now we’ve opened our third bottle of bubbly (this may sound excessive but it really was the cheapest drink!) and headed to the citadel walls for the fireworks display. I always love fireworks but this display was the most spectacular I’ve seen, completely spellbinding as half the sky was lit in blinding explosions of colour. Some combinations are even arranged to draw giant, multicoloured smiling faces in the air, whilst hundreds of rockets shot up, exploded and fell in wonderful colours and when half way down reversed and flew up once more. I’ve seen nothing like it. It’s midnight, and it feels like things are only just beginning…..

To the Fiesta – Day 38

We were kept awake much of last night by guitar-playing pilgrims, but were cheered outside town when we saw a signpost declaring ‘Santiago – 825km’. It sounds a impressively long way, but I’m glad there’s no pointer for Istanbul. After several more whitewashed villages, we climb up to the Alto de Perdon, a long ridge topped by a line of graceful wind turbines. At the top of the pass is a cut-out steel sculpture of a motley group of pilgrims, and a great view of Pamplona ahead, backed by further, higher hills. Down the other side, fields of sunflowers bring us to Cizur Menor, a suburb of Pamplona, before the hostel opens at noon. Everyone around the streets is dressed all in white except for a red neckerchief tied round their waist- it’s like a uniform for San Fermin. Thankfully there’s no queue of cow-bell sporting pilgrims here, so we head into a bar for a coffee while we wait. On the television (where again everyone is wearing the white outfits – I’m impressed), the seven days of continuous live coverage of the great Fiesta is about to begin. The scene in the centre of Pamplona looks amazing – almost a million identically-dressed people are crammed into the central square and surrounding streets, all jumping up and down, passing some unfortunate souls around above their heads – a sea of white and red. Even in the bar there’s an air of excitement building, so we have a beer and wait for the launch of the rocket that will signal the start of the fiesta. A deafening boom from the television, then the bar staff fire open bottles of sparkling wine and hand everyone in the bar a glass on the house.

We’re hoping to get a good night’s sleep before heading in for the fiesta tomorrow, so we eventually get away and check in to a lovely private hostel with hardwood bunks, beautiful gardens and a friendly owner, Maribel. She’s clearly excited about the start of the fiesta, though she has regrets at the international character of the encierro or running of the bulls these days.

“There are two many foreigners and backpackers come now. They try to reach out and touch the bulls. They don’t understand that the bulls are sacred to us”. This seems a bit rich, given that the bulls from each day’s encierro are killed in the bull fights that evening.

“Even some women run now,” she continues. “It’s not meant for women. It’s for young men to prove themselves. What do women have to prove?”

She sends us off for free swimming nearby, at a huge, five pool outdoor complex, and we have the Olympic-sized main pool almost to ourselves. On the streets, all are wearing the red and white outfits – since the rocket launch, the red neckerchiefs have been moved from waist and tied around the neck, and when we pop into another bar the tv coverage of mayhem is continuing – we too are getting very excited about tomorrow. I had been worried that it would be hard for a foreign couple to get into the spirit of the fiesta, but the atmosphere is so electric that already we’re buzzing.

Bridge of the Queen – Day 37

Outside Estella we crossed the Salt River. In the Santiago pilgrim museum we saw an original copy of the Codex Clatinus, the original book written to help pilgrims and reputedly the world’s first guidebook. The author of the Codex warned pilgrims not to allow their horses to drink from this river; his own horse had done, and had died instantly. He then related how two Basques were standing on the bank sharpening their knives ready to flay the skin from dying pilgrims’ horses – but why this didn’t make him suspicious and stop his horse from drinking is a mystery. He certainly had it in for the Basques – elsewhere in his guide he’d claimed that they regularly exposed themselves to strangers, and noted in passing that many of their cows had been fitted with chastity belts to protect them from their human neighbours.

We stop to eat a huge bread cake at a bakery in Cirauqui. This villages name means ‘nest of thieves’ but it seems safe today. It’s a tightly packed jumble of whitewashed cottages atop a steep hill, the route being hard to follow through a maze of tiny winding alleys, arched gateways and secluded squares. Beyond this the countryside begins to level off until we reach a huge, cobbled stone bridge, the Puente La Reina or ‘Queen’s bridge’. The Queen in question was Urraca, whose chalice we saw in a Leon museum – she ordered construction to help pilgrims cross the river in the eleventh century. It has six graceful arches and a slight kink in the middle – presumably where constructions began from each bank had met. Through an archway on the far side is the town that shares the bridge’s name, which sprung up to serve the pilgrims using it. It has three parallel streets, long and narrow and lined with quite magnificent brick mansions, the projecting wooden eaves of which, exquisitely carved, seem to extend half way across the road. Everything is maintained immaculately; there’s obviously a lot more wealth around in Navarra than in the crumbling villages we saw in Castille. One of the few modern touches is a high wall, enclosed by wire fencing, together with a set of lines painted on the concrete – a pelota court. It looks like squash but with only one wall. Our guidebook informs us that other popular Basque sports include boulder-lifting, the practitioners of which enjoy the status of ‘rock’ stars, and, apparently, grass-cutting. I presume they would be welcome anywhere when on tour.

Fountain of Life – Day 36

 We decide to have a really short day today, to ensure we don’t arrive at Pamplona before the start of the fiesta. Happily, our Dutch hosts serve a big, leisurely buffet breakfast. Afterwards they hand out tiny sewing kits to each pilgrim – is there no end to their kindness? Our penance is having to accept a copy of the gospel according to St. John as a parting gift.

Opposite a monastery at Irache, attached to a winery, we discover a remarkable public fountain. It has two taps for the refreshment of passing walkers. One reads agua, the other, I read with disbelief, is vino tinto. Like children let loose in a sweet factory we fill our mugs and begin drinking – even though it’s nine in the morning. Spanish pilgrims going past aren’t even bothering to stop, and it seems we’re displaying the typically rash British attitude to alcohol. I try to imagine the scene if a free wine fountain was set up in a village at home – there’d be a huge crowd, much worse for wear, thronging the area. I’ve noticed the same thing in bars –the Spaniards (and the pilgrims from France) often leave without drinking half their bottle of wine or a good part of their beer, being there for the company more than the drink. Possibly it’s just that alcohol is so cheap here – limitless wine is available free with food in most bars, but how often do you see anyone in a British pub leave half their pint? Even if your mates are leaving immediately, most of us try to down whatever we’ve got left.

We stagger on into Estella, a sizeable town, and join a queue of about a hundred pilgrims waiting for the hostel to open its doors at noon. When the doors do open, there’s a mad crush to get in and bag the bunks – with not much Christian spirit on display. Our bunks seem fine until we notice that the guy next to us is, for some reason, walking the camino wearing two large cowbells round his neck. He even wears them to sleep.

Estella has many beautiful old houses and unusual churches – but also it’s fair share of busy roads and drab concrete blocks. For us the main attraction is the outdoor swimming pool, where we recover from our morning’s indiscretions. I would be relaxed, but I’m trying to summon up courage to do something I’ve been dreading – go to a barbers for a haircut. To be honest, I hate having my hair cut even at home, and being asked hundreds of incomprehensible questions in Spanish about razors, blades, shavers and scissors doesn’t improve the experience. Still, that’ll be fine for another eight weeks.