What? No Bull?

“You missed it!” she said.

“What?” I said.

“You missed the turn,” she said.

“Did I?” I said.

“You did.” She said.

“So...” I said.

“We’ll have to go around a gain,” she said.

“I didn’t see the road number.” I said.

“There was no road number,” she said.

“Then how do you know we missed the road?” I said.

“Because the sign said “Pamplona”” she said.

“And...” I said.

“That’s where we’re going.” she said.

“I didn’t know,” I said.

“I’m sure it is,” she said, and I was glad to hear it in the midst of the dialogue beginning to sound like a Robert B. Parker novel.  It had been a long drive from, although Spanish tollways are excellent highways. I was tired. We found Hotel Pamplona with relative ease, parked the car in hotel parking, and planned our visit. 

Pamplona is one of the cities on El Camino de Santiago, the Way of Saint James, and has existed for over a thousand years. Legend has it that the body of Saint James was carried from Jerusalem to the coast of northern Spain and buried at Santiago de Compostela.  The route is marked by an image of a blue seashell. But this was not why we were here. We came hoping to join in the Fiesta de San Fermin. The festival is held twice a year with the more famous one in July. This would be the mini-festival.  The July festival attracts more that a million people. But, then, that is when the bulls run through the streets with people, an event reserved for those lacking in some mental facilities.  Our friend Brian ran with the bulls. The event is also chronicled is Ernest Hemmingway’s The Sun Also Rises. But, alas, we would see no bulls run. However, we would join the festival the following day. 

Pamplona, like many old cities, is build on a river and has a wall surrounding it it.  The Hotel Pamplona was not within that wall, so we walked from the hotel, crossed the river, and walked up to the walled old city. It was only about ten o’clock in the morning when we entered the medieval city. I reminded Claudette  about the early hour and that I did not think that festivals began that early.  And then a young man with a trumpet walked past us on the narrow street. As we walked along more people  were going in the same direction. Now we were sure we had found the festival. We knew that the festival parade would follow the same route that the bulls ran in July but had not a clue what that route was. We continued to walk, and our pace quickened.  We heard horns and drums and people, many people.  We could tell that we were joining a parade.  But what kind? Did we really care?

The crowd had many families with youngsters on adult shoulders and some mommies pushing strollers with little tykes. The street is only about twelve feet wide including some of the tables of the sidewalk cafes. We continued to move faster trying to get to the head of the parade.  Then we saw them: thirteen foot tall giants.  Obviously there was a man underneath providing motivation for the giant king. Further up the street I saw kings and queens all dancing and swaying with the music.  We had stumbled onto the parade of “the giants and big heads”, a tradition for over one hundred and fifty years. Each royal pair represents either Europe, Asia, Africa, or America. We had to hurry on and get in front of the parade which had grown to nearly one thousand people by now. We ducked into a cafe for a restroom break and a quick cafe con leche.  We watched as the happy revelers went by and noticed that street vendors were out selling balloons kid stuff. Also, another band unattached to a giant and led by people carrying a banner had joined the parade.  We got back in the melee, enjoying the throngs of happy people and I was constantly checking to see that I had no strange hands in my pockets.  The parade goes downhill since it ends at the bullring. In july the bulls run from the bull holding pens to the bullring. But no bull today!  A few blocks from the bull ring is a large, life size sculpture of the running of the bulls. Ernest Hemmingway, as well as the sculptor, are depicted in the work of art. Shortly after viewing the statue we had an amusing encounter with a Spanish automated toilet.  Once again the lack of native language was our undoing.  But why would you need instructions to use a toilet?  Some of us do.  This was a self-cleaning unit. If you did not get out of the small structure within a certain number of minutes of flushing the door would lock, the light would go out and the floor would be sprayed with a cleaning liquid. Fortunately, this cleaning liquid does not stain ones clothes.  Later we found a plaza where many of the parade participants were singing while accompanied by guitars. We took the funicular back down to the riverbank near the bridge and walked back to our hotel. It had been a most enjoyable day. We walked around the area about our hotel but did not find a place we thought we would like to eat at and decided to eat at the hotel. It turned out to be good food and a good value. We turned in early.(In Spain that means before midnight.) It had been a great day of automated toilets and giants!