The most expensive part of not just San Fermin, but our entire trip to Spain were the accommodations in Pamplona. During San Fermin, there are up to 100,000 visitors in the city and only a few thousand rooms. Many residents leave town during the fiesta and rent their rooms (more info can be found on the boards on the official San Fermin web-site). People reserve their hotel rooms up to a year in advance. The local hotels prices sky rocket. People literally sleep and camp in the local parks to save money. The latter was not an option for us because of all our luggage, and since I heard that traffic and parking are pretty inconvenient in Pamplona during San Fermin, we opted to go the hotel route, and stay close to tha action. We booked several months early and were lucky to get a room. If you want to stay close by and have a decent room, try and book as early as you can (up to a year in advance).

We stayed at Husa Avenida, which I booked through my favorite travel search spider Kayak.com. I generally also rely pretty heavily on TripAdvisor reviews when I reserve a hotel room, but I didn't have much of a choice this time because of lack of rooms and needing a halfway-decent priced hotel in the city center. There weren't many recent reviews of this hotel on TripAdvisor, so I just went for it because the price was a little better than others in the city center, and because it was still available. Luckily, the accommodations were great. The staff was friendly, the room clean, the bed comfortable, the breakfast delicious, and the location PERFECT. A very quick and easy walk to anything you need during the fiesta, and just minutes away from the encierro route and Plaze de Toros. Not to mention our room had a really cool wrap around balcony that overlooked Avenida Zaragoza. One thing to remember is that San Fermin is a nonstop, 24/7 party, so throughout the entire night there is music, shouting, and fireworks all around you if you are staying in the city center. But hey, if you have a problem with that, then why'd you come to San Fermin in the first place? The free internet was also great so we could quickly let our family in the states know that we survived the encierro.

I would stay in this hotel again during my next trip to San Fermin. As for San Fermin, it was an incredible once in a lifetime experience, and I will be back someday.