Running with the Bulls

        Now I realize it’s been a couple week since I did the run but it’s not something you easily forget.  So John, Anastasia and I take a nap to prepare us for the crazy 14 hours to come………. Now that we’re well rested we catch the last bus to Pamplona, which was a free-for-all mosh pit.  Upon arriving we were awe struck

at the masses of people everywhere.  People sleeping in parks, bus stops, anywhere flat.  Streets were completely packed and chaotic.  We grabbed a quick snack and a beer then made our way to the square where the real party was.  We thought what we already saw was awesome, this was the center of the mayhem and killed it 10 fold.

         
         By far the biggest party I’ve been to… yet.  Live music until 3 am, broken glass everywhere, everyone stained pink hopping from bar to bar with no regard for capacity, age, drunkenness, etc.  Anything goes… and absolutely everything went.  Why buy booze at the bar when the shops stayed open all night and sold litre boxes of sangria for 2 euro and you could simply walk in to the bar with it, “I think I just found an equation where every possible result is me being drunk.”… I went with option 3, result = drunk Scottie Baker.  Around 4:30 we decided to leave the party, which was still going just as strong, and find a place to nap.  The place we found… an underground bus garage.  It didn’t have a single but in it, however, it was packed with about 200 people with the same idea.  Some people you could tell were veterans at this, they had their sleeping bags, pillows, one guy even made a cardboard tent.

         
         After an hour and a half power nap (using my wineskin as a pillow) we were ready to run.  I met up with some other Busabout kids and we found our spot on the course just past Dead Man’s Corner.  After waiting there for a couple hours everyone was kicked out 20 minutes before the run started.  So Mark and I make a mad dash through the town, losing everyone else on the way, and manage to make it back in just before Dead Man’s Corner.  Now the butterflies start to float.  Random noises and bangs cause some people to panic and start running early.  Then, BOOM!!!  The first canon goes and most people start running.  Mark and I move with the crowd but don’t run because we actually want to see the bulls coming.  The second canon goes and we don’t fully see the bulls but we do see the chaos round the corner and then we were off.  It took no more than 30 seconds for us to lose each other and within 45 seconds the bulls were passing me, “Holy fuck they caught up fast”  Now that they were within arms reach I wanted to get the hell out of the way.  I try to veer to the side, nope, it’s about 8 people deep crammed into 3 feet of space, “Well if I can’t squeeze in beside them, I’m going on top.”  So I jump up and grab some dude and pull myself up onto about 4 sets of shoulders.  They didn’t seem too pleased about it but too bad, time to keep running.  Once the danger passed everyone flooded the street again and followed the bulls.

       
       As I near the entrance of the arena I hear more screams from behind me.  Somehow in all the reading I did and all the people I spoke with I never managed to catch a tiny piece of info that would have warned me they send out a second group.  Now I’m caught in round 2 and playing the most intense game of Frogger ever.  Now that I dodged round 2 I had to get into the arena.  Unfortunately I didn’t make it into the arena since a police officer clothes-lined me to the ground as the gates were closing, “But this allowed 2 other guys to slide in, your welcome random dudes.”

       So… now to get home.  I start wandering around Pamplona solo hoping to find some people.  Surprisingly I ran into 2 people from Madrid including Kyle who evaded ASG with my.  But luckily it didn’t take long to find John and Anastasia.  We jumped back on a bus and that concluded our crazy 14 hours in Pamplona