Miles in Madrid by Hola

Today we went to a different part of the Guadarrama mountain range to do a walk that I had found on the internet. We drove to a town called La Cabrera and planned to climb ‘El Pico de Miel’ (Honey Peak).

We decided to start with a coffee and cake at the lovely café in the town and being a sunny day we sat outside. I couldn’t believe my eyes when I looked up and saw the graffiti facing me. MTS obviously sprang straight to my mind and I had to snap a picture for my profile! 

We then did a fantastic walk scrambling up the rocks to the peak. It’s a really popular spot with climbers and there were many of them scattered across the rocky faces of the mountain. We met a climber at the top who told us about a quicker way down using permanent ropes but we thought we’d just return on our outward route! The weather was very warm and sunny and there were lots of vultures and eagles soaring about. Some would fly in low and we told our younger son that they always seek out the youngest and weakest members that become detached from the herd. It kept his pace up a bit.

It was a hard walk with lots of rock scrambling

but the views from the top were spectacular.

The week hasn’t been too bad for running. 7km on Monday and Wednesday at the track with a few ‘faster’ laps thrown in when I felt like it and on Thursday I got out for a beautiful 8km in the park. I also went to self defence/Taekwondo on Monday and Wednesday and then on Friday, because the schools broke up the day before, the instructors did a special session to include the kids which was lots of fun.

Other news is that I will be in London for the London marathon! (To spectate, not run…)  My brother in law and his wife are coming over from Australia for a long trip in Europe and the first thing on his agenda is to run the marathon so we are going over to meet up with them and to watch him run. Another brother in law (there are six of them!) is living in London at the moment and he is a marathon runner too so it will be a good get together. I hope I will be able to spot some of you in the crowds, that would be very exciting.

We are now in the Easter holidays and so I won’t get much running done but we are going to a town near Córdoba for a few days at the end of the week so I might get a chance down there. We haven’t been to Córdoba before and the Mezquita has been on my list of things to see in Spain since we first got here so I’m looking forward to it.

Best wishes and good luck to the marathon trainers as they approach 'taper stage'!