Bullish on Pamplona

In 1976, I came to discover the Running of the Bulls; 42 years later I still return year after year. Sometimes travelers wander into cities by accident. But I know exactly why I came to Pamplona that first year back in 1976. I came to run the bulls. I drove for two...

Undiscovered Valencia, Spain: visiting the medieval core

Valencia is a trading city. Founded by the Greeks hundreds of years before Christ, it later served as Rome’s gateway to its Iberian provinces. In the Middle Ages it flourished, first as a Moorish capital (and briefly as El Cid’s citadel), then as a center...

Gastronomy tour through Madrid

From the Madrid Visitors & Convention Bureau Nine of the best restaurants in Madrid, Spain, combine sophisticated and varied cuisine with pleasant surroundings. Here, in this gastronomy walk through the city, are presented restaurants worth stopping into for a...

In Pamplona, the gathering party

Yesterday at noon in Pamplona, the mayor shot a rocket into the air from the balcony of the town hall and the fiesta de San Fermin burst into abandon. Thousand of locals and visitors started what is an eight-day, non-stop party in the streets of this northern Spanish...

Pamplona 2011: The first running of the bulls

The first running of the bulls, or the encierro, as they call it here in Pamplona is over. It is the first of eight mornings where the bulls that fight in the afternoon run from corrals at the edge of town through the old town streets to the bullring. This isn’t...