On Saturday we went down to the Plaza de Toro and had the guide tour. It was very neat to see how it the bull rings operate. Our guide said that the bull on the pink wall was the second bull that ever fought here in El Puerto, 134 years ago! Pretty crazy the tradition of bull fights have lasted that long. We got to see the actual bull fighters cape, they use pink and yellow here. It was actually quite heavy. Then we headed down to the bull cages. They said that each event has 6 bulls that fight and they have two in reserve in case they don't fight well or they get hurt. They always get the 8 bulls from the same ranch for each fight so that the bulls are used to each other and won't fight each other. Our tour guide said it cost about 20,000 euro just for the bulls. We let the kids watch what we wanted them to see on YouTube and it was very interesting to see such a powerful animal and the crazy people who dance around them!
They have a flag system to tell who wins or how well the bull and or fighter does. Three white flags mean the fighter wins, the bull is dead and the fighter gets both ears and his tail as trophies. The red flag means the bull is not a good fighter and needs to be replaced. The blue flag means the bull wins, but is still dead. The green flag means the bull is injured and needs to be replaced. The orange flag means the bull is amazing and needs to be sent back to the ranch to make more bull babies :).
It was quite interesting to see just how this tradition lives on!
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