Yesterday, I called up the tourist office in Saintes-Maries-de-la-Mer to inquire about the bull fight. I was immediately corrected: "We do not fight bulls. The bulls do not die." OK, so today we went to the bull races.
Saintes-Maries-de-la-Mer is a small town on the Mediterranean coast, that is the site of a major gypsy pilgrimage in May. But the bull race was 9 days ahead of their Saint day, so we thought it wouldn't be too crowded, and we wanted to see the bulls again.
The bull event started at 4 PM, and we aimed to arrive there around noon, have a leisurely lunch, then meander over to the arena and buy tickets for the event. However, we ended up in a huge traffic gridlock when the gendarms closed the main road for 30 or 45 minutes while the bulls were being driven down the street to the arena. Somehow, we ended up at a stop sign about 40 feet from the truck with the bulls and watched the handlers encourage the bulls to leave the truck and run down the street, accompanied by a couple of men on horses.
We had to park about a mile from the arena, but felt lucky to find a lot that wasn't full of modern caravans (RVs) full of gypsies.
Although most gypsies now have modern RVs, we passed one traditional gypsy horse-drawn wagon on our way to town.
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| Behind the gypsy wagon |
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| Ahead of the gypsy wagon |
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| Women in traditional 19th century costumes, and one chevalier |
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| The runners, there were 16 of them |
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| Bull number 1 |
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| Bull number 2 |
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| Bull number 3. It wouldn't leave the arena when it's time slot was over, so 2 other animals with bells were sent in to encourage the bull to leave. |
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| The runners try to remove rosetttes and strings that have been tied to the bulls horns |
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| They need to get close to the bull |
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| But they often have to jump the fence to safety |
No bulls jumped the fence this year. But it was still an interesting experience.
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