Foreigners flock back to Spain for the running of the bulls

As soon as Peter Millington heard that Spain’s San Fermin Fiesta would be back this year after a two-year absence due to the pandemic, he began making travel arrangements.

The 38-year-old British financial adviser has been a regular at Spain’s most famous running of the bulls since he first attended the annual event in Pamplona as a student and was keen to return.

Millington said he booked his flight from London and made hotel reservations in February, just days after the mayor of Pamplona announced San Fermin was likely to take place this year.

“There’s nothing like it, it’s absolutely unique,” he told AFP on Wednesday in the northern Spanish city as the nine-day fiesta officially opened.

“I had to be here,” he added, gesturing toward the sea of ​​revelers happily drinking around him, most dressed in the traditional all-white outfit and red scarf.

Immortalized in Ernest Hemingway’s 1926 novel The Sun Also Rises, the festival has long attracted large numbers of expats, including many like Millington, who return year after year.

And with global travel recovering since most coronavirus pandemic restrictions were lifted, foreign visitors have been back in Pamplona this year.

Among the regulars returning this year was Hemingway’s writer-grandson, John Hemingway, who was from Montreal, where he currently resides.

“It’s good to be here,” said the 61-year-old, who was making his tenth appearance at San Fermin.

“This is a breath of fresh air after all this madness of lockdowns and social distancing.”

Dating back to medieval times, the festival features concerts, religious processions, nightly fireworks and 24-hour drinking sessions.

It is best known, however, for the daily dare against a thundering pack of half-ton bulls with sharp horns.

Every day at 8am, hundreds of daredevils with six fighting bulls compete on a 850 meter route from a pen to the Pamplona bullring.

In the afternoon the bulls face matadors and almost certain death in bullfights.

About 40 percent of all runners come from abroad, with Australia, the United States and Great Britain providing the most foreigners, according to Pamplona City Hall.

The vast majority of participants are men, with hardly a female face visible among the runners – although there were many in the cheering crowd.

At the last run in 2019, Pamplona City Hall said only six percent of the runners were women. This year’s number will not be available until the end of the festival.

Roger Sandhu, a 30-year-old businessman from the United States, had just taken part in the first bull run on Thursday.

“As soon as we turned the corner, the cops were right there,” he said.

“It was a damn good experience.”

But for Jack Denault, a 50-year-old Canadian now based in France, the festival’s biggest draw is the “camaraderie” that reigns among festival-goers.

“The bond you make with the people you party with lasts forever,” said Denault, who rents the same apartment every time he comes to the fiesta.

“There are so many of us that come back year after year and it’s such a great reunion.”

Denault said he’s participated in over 80 bull runs at San Fermin, but he said they’re just a “small part” of the festival.

He’s been coming to every San Fermin festival since 2008 and has got a bull’s hoof tattoo on his arm for every year he’s attended.

“I will come as long as my body will allow,” says the retired hotel manager.

The festival last took place in 2019. Because of the pandemic, it was canceled in 2020 and 2021.

Timothy Pinks, a 60-year-old London driver who has been visiting San Fermin regularly since the 1980s, said he is thrilled that the event is back this year.

“It’s paradise on earth. Nine days of Christmas for us adults,” he said while having a drink with a large group of friends in a central square in Pamplona.