The GCW Tour, Spain & Morocco: San Fermin, Day 2, Part 1

5:00am comes very early under the best of circumstances, but to have to get up that early on vacation is just cruel. But if we wanted to experience the running of the bulls we had to be in town by about 6:30. So 5:00 it was.

Of course, the bus didn't really cooperate and we spent about 25 minutes waiting for it to appear, so by the time we got to the bull route it was already jammed with people -- mostly people who either don't read or believe themselves to be very special.

The route, you see, is lined with two sets of fences. As the guides make clear, no one is allowed in the space between the two fences except media and emergency personnel. It's primary purpose is to be an open area where runners can escape to if needed. Of course, at 6:30 in the morning that area between the fences is full of people convinced they'll watch the run from there. One can dream, I suppose. 

But at 6:30, the streets the bulls will run are full of people, too. At about 6:50, that starts to change. First, a line of cops enters the route where the bulls will enter and basically locks arms and pushes all the people on the street either up toward the arena our out past the first line of fences. Following those police are a cleaning crew that walks the route sweeping up all the cups, paper, bottles and other trash that could contribute to someone getting hurt. While that's happening, another group of cops climbs into the area between the fences and starts evicting people. The start out reasonably nice, but as the morning proceeds they get nastier and nastier to people trying to occupy that space. Shortly before the bulls started a guy crawled under the fence and was basically thrown back under by the two policemen who met him on the other side. 

Once the route is clear, it's walked by a couple of groups of mucky-mucks, a small marching band and whatnot, while the crowd gets excited. 

Next up comes the runners. "Running with the bulls" isn't so much running with the bulls as providing a human parade line for the bulls to run through on their way to the arena. The bulls are way too fast, and there are way too many people, for a human to keep pace with the bulls the entire route. Runners just need to survive the brief period when the bulls are in their vicinity -- and all the other panicked runners.

And us? We're in space that could reasonably hold, say, 300 people that's currently got 400+ in it. The fence in front of us is covered with people, from the drunks who've been sleeping under it, to the families and others who got here early enough to claim a spot, to the American girls who have used the fact that they left their bras at home -- and one keeps smoothing her shirt down so it's clear to everyone what she isn't wearing -- to make their way through the groups of men to the point that they've found a couple of guys sitting on the fence who are willing to "let" the girls cling to them to watch. 

We can sort of see the route, if we crouch down and look through the legs on the fence. 

And the the firecracker goes off letting us know the first bull is running. The crowd goes wild and the  runners in front of us take off. Where are they going? We're about 2/3 of the way down the route and it's going to take even the fastest bull more than half a second to get to us. After maybe ten seconds the second firecracker goes off letting us know all the bulls (and oxen) are running. A few more seconds and the crowd goes wild. What? Where? We look through the human legs and see about five cows quickly run past. Nothing. Nothing. Another cow or two. Nothing. Nothing. Is it over? A guy on one of the balconies points to where the bulls have come from and shouts to someone on the route, "There are two more!" Crouch, look through the legs, yup, two cows go running by. Is that it? I think that's it. Yeah, that must be it. Let's go...

...and the crowd erupts again. Wait! What? What's happening? I can't see anything. Oh well. I guess it's over now.

So we head to the Cafe Iruna for coffee and croissants. And as I'm pulling out my wallet to pay the bill a leg under the chair collapses and dumps me on the ground. I have sustained injury at the running of the bulls. 

While we're eating the niece is able to see the run replayed on TV. The final crowd eruption was caused when a bull reversed course and went back toward where we were watching. She also notes that there was at least one serious injury involving lots of blood. We actually hear three ambulances shortly after the run is completed.

Of course we heard more than half a dozen ambulances yesterday when the bulls didn't run so by our tally the current score is bulls 3, alcohol poisoning, heat stroke and general stupidity 8.

Tomorrow we have tickets to watch the run from a balcony over the route so hopefully we'll be better able to see what actually happens.