Outrunning the bull in a course Camarguaise

In the morning we explored Isle-sur-la-Sorgue’s enormous market, stocking up on strawberries and tapenade and a white lace top that dazzles like the hot Provencal sun.

Tapenade and other delights for enjoying on your Provencal patio

Tapenade for packing into your suitcase so at home you can try to pretend you’re still in Provence

We spent a lazy midday painting and writing on our shady patio and making hamburgers Provencal for lunch (cook the burger with onions and mushrooms in olive oil and pile on fresh vegetables and fromage and tapenade until you can hardly hold the petit pain closed). At last it was time for the big event. We had seen signs around town our town of Pernes-les-Fontaines for a course Camarguaise, a French bullfight, with bulls direct from the Camargue, so now that all the artistes and hangers-on were expert in the raising and training of such taureaux, we were excited to see a live show.

We found the arena on the edge of town near the sports complex. The oval of packed dirt was surrounded by a waist-high wall with a low step on the inside, then a walkway around it, then a solid wall topped with bars, then the bleachers, then tall trees which provided shade to most of the seating. At one end of the arena was a raised platform for the judges and an announcer (who had something to say for the entire event), at the other end was a wide door to the covered bull pens and on one side was a waiting ambulance. We had plenty of choice as to where we wanted to sit, so we guessed today’s bulls were not famous yet.

At the appointed hour the raseteurs appeared, the bullfighters, lean and young and dressed in white. There were eight of them, plus two older men, tourneurs, who must have been raseteurs once and couldn’t tear themselves away from the thrill.

A tourneur crouching down in the center

The job of the tourneurs was to get the bull’s attention while the young raseteurs positioned themselves to make runs from the side or behind, ideally grabbing the ribbons attached to the bull’s horns just before the bull’s head and horns turned fully on them, at which point they ran for the encircling wall, hit the step, sprang from the top of the wall (or right over it) and caught themselves on the bars in front of the bleachers. (And who had the job of trying the ribbons to the bulls’ horns we never did learn.) Then it was back into the ring for more.

It was quite a spectacle, like a wild game of keep away and capture the flag at the same time. The bull pawed the dirt and snorted; the older men irritated the bull; the young ones danced around, grabbing and running and leaping.

The hook used to snag the ribbons

One bull even leapt over the wall after his tormentor (sadly, no picture); the raseteur quickly jumped up from the walkway while the errant bull was led back to the ring. At certain times in the game the familiar toreador song from Bizet’s opera Carmen was blared over the loudspeaker. Each of six matches with different bulls lasted fifteen minutes (unless all the ribbons were taken before that), then the gate opened and the bull was allowed back into his pen. One bull refused to return, so an elder statesman bull with a bell came out and coaxed him back. Two hours passed quickly, fun in the dusty little arena under the trees in a small town in the south of France.