Today, Brendan and I went to the small, nearby city, Ciudad Rodrigo (about an hour by bus from Salamanca), with some of my friends to see the festivities of the Carnaval del Toro (Bull's Carnaval). Minus the very cold temperature (a high of 29-32 degrees F all day), which was made worse by a lot of wind, we had a great time and loved the city! In my opinion, Ciudad Rodrigo is one of those truly authentic Spanish cities, that when you're there, every corner you turn and everything you see just breathes "real Spain". Although, of course there were many other tourists there, you could tell that this festival really means a lot to the citizens of Ciudad Rodrigo because they were every where and they were so into the events! Just take a look at my pictures below to get a better idea of what goes on during the Carnaval del Toro:
¡Bienvenidos a Ciudad Rodrigo! (Welcome to Rodrigo City!) It is surrounded by a moat! Even though it no longer has water, it's so cool!
To start off the day, they blockaded off some streets leading to the Plaza Mayor, where they would later hold "una corrida de toros" (a bull fight), and had a running of the bulls. We stayed safe and far away from the action below by getting this hill top view. We were sure glad we did because we saw some guy get pretty beat up by one of the bulls! Scroll down to see the video! (Sorry about a few swear words, but it was really scary!)
One of the scariest parts (in my opinion) about the running with the bulls is that on the streets they blockade off, they have to put these safety bars on the restaurants and bars and that is really your only access to safety if you need it... after the running of the bulls was over I tried fitting through some with my cowboy hat on and had a tough time... imagine when you're in a hurry!! Even though I think this is a dumb thing to do in the first place, if anybody is going to do it, I would recommend that they be VERY skinny!
The Plaza Mayor (where the bull fights took place later at 4pm)
Food, rides and attractions
Yummy baked goods and bread! :)
Walking through the carnival
Miranda, Elena, Cristina, Brendan and Me having a "Clara" (half beer/half Fanta limón), well Brendan was having a real beer, ha ha!
Pretty cool snail costumes! People really went all out on their costumes, and I figured out why! The prizes for winning a costume category ranged anywhere from 300-900 euros!!
There were tons of people dressed as Sponge Bob, ha ha! Also, a lot of typical flamenco/sevillanas/matador costumes.
So that's about it... we got to experience a running of the bulls from a distance, spent the day walking around the markets and carnival, admiring the costumes, eating lots of food, and having some drinks with the locals. A lot of fun- great city to visit during this time of the year!
RUNNING OF THE BULLS VIDEO:
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