Carnival del Toro: Running of the Bulls in Rodrigo
Trip Start
Jan 24, 2009
1
10
19
Trip End
May 23, 2009
Ciudad Rodrigo, Castile-León, Spain and Canary Islands
Sunday, February 22, 2009
SO. We woke very early Saturday morning to get on buses (along with the ENTIRE city of Salamanca) and traveled the hour to Rodrigo. The town was absolutely packed. Of course, everyone immediately rushed to buy return tickets, since apparently for Carnival festivities you can't buy a round trip ticket (yes, we thought this was strange as well, but after arguing with the bus ticket man for fifteen minutes, we couldn't change it, sooo...). After securing a way back to Salamanca (NOT that we would have minded staying the night, since it's supposed to be an all night party in the streets, no one sleeps you just dance all night long {certainly my kind of thing}) we wandered to get some food and then stake out a spot for the Running of the Bulls. That's right...the running of the bulls. Not Spain's biggest, but certainly just as entertaining. Apparently in Rodrigo, they run all four days. The race culminates in leading the bulls and the runners into a huge arena, where then ANYONE is allowed to participate in about two hours worth of angry bull taunting. This, actually, turned out to be probably the best thing I've done so far in Spain. Correction: SEEN....since I was talked out of DOING it (probably rightly so, seeing as Rosario made mention that someone gets hurt every year, and last year at Rodrigo someone died).
SO we staked a spot out on the massive wooden bleachers that they erected in their Plaza Mayor (which, by the way, did NOT look sturdy at all!!) and waited an hour or so while the city gathered (all in costume of course, I forgot to mention that Carnival is the Spanish equivalent of Halloween) to see the end of the Running. The running ends in a sand arena that has high wooden walls around it (probably 12 or so feet) and the bleachers above...this is, obviously, to keep the bulls from stampeeding the crowd. And to give the idiots that would be taunting the bulls an exit. Did I mention that it was noon and the entire city was drunk at this point? Our dear friend Claire, SMALLEST girl in America, put down five beers before noon without us noticing, to the surprise of the group. SO prompty at 1pm the belltower began to ring and everyone went wild (of course, we're there like, WHAT IS HAPPENING?! WE CAN'T SEE ANYTHING!!!) but luckily I was sitting next to an old Spanish man that pointed my attention in the right direction. We were confused because every exit to the arena we could see had been blocked off. BUT one even with us that we really couldn't see was kept open to let the runners and bulls in. This was insane to see...because no one knew what was happening, and then everyone who was waiting in the middle of the arena began to back up towards the high walls, and then suddenly a HUGE crowd of runners just burst through the opening, followed VERY closely by seven huge and angry bulls!!!!!
Massive amounts of cheering for the runners later, the second part of the "event" began...which was: "Let's let all of the drunken idiots in Ciudad Rodrigo gather in the sand pit and Taunt the angry bulls until they chase them up the walls!"
This actually was great to watch.....of course it was all men in the arena, which was what initially sparked my interest in going down and joining, just to have a woman in the ring. BUT my friends would not allow this, ESPECIALLY since our good friend Andrew (this is Andrew that was convinced he wanted to participate in the Run, but we wouldn't let him), after watching for a half and hour, stood up and declared he was climbing down from the bleachers and into the arena. And then promptly climbed over the hundreds of people in front of us, was confronted by several Spanish men that attempted to talk him out of it, and then leapt the fence and was in the ring! We, of course, a group of 15 or so girls, were freaking out. But Andrew was calm as you please, he had a great time and even (to the terror of all of us watching him) managed to touch the bull! And of course afterwards ran away for his life!!
But it was great to watch! And afterwards we spent the rest of the day roaming the city, through the carnival rides that were set up, eating massive amounts of carnival food and being in love with Spain.
Also: no one was hurt in the Running on Saturday...I have yet to hear the news of the wounded, or "heridos" from today.
