An epic day today! I set out to do the Med Steps twice and I did it!
Because I was intending to do them twice, I thought I would park as close as possible and then get the bus up to the nature reserve. Not to be! I had to park a long way away, past the fort and then missed the bus so ended up walking all the way to the start point.
Nevertheless, I was determined to push myself - and I did! I felt great starting out and made good progress. I started flagging the second half because it was another really hot day, but I kept pushing and made the top in just 56 minutes! 11 minutes faster than my previous best. I was so happy to have made it in less than an hour and the achievement felt wonderful.
I walked down towards the start past St Michael's cave and went into the shop to buy some more water (I had already consumed 2 litres!), at which point, I suddenly started to feel sick and faint again! I had to sit down on a chair in the shade for a while and wondered if I was up to doing them a second time. But after a while, I felt OK again and set off. As soon as I was out of reach of the apes, I stopped, rested and had a banana.
When I got to the start, I figured it would be sensible to take my time this time round so I went at a comfortable pace. It took me a couple of minutes longer to reach the caves, where I stopped, ate a cereal bar and drank more water. Then I set off again. Amazingly, rather than feeling tired and wiped out, I suddenly started to feel stronger than ever. It helped that the sun had dropped behind the rock and I was now in shade all the time.
I kept a comfortable pace all the way up and - miracle of miracles, my time was once again 56 minutes! And that included the 7 minutes I stopped for a rest at the cave. Totally incredible - I was over the moon.
The entire hike from and back to the car was 17.5 kms and it took me 6.5 hours. That included shopping at Eroski on the way back! Total actual moving time was 4 hrs 50 mins. Elevation was somewhere between 700 m and 850 m depending on which mapping tool I used. I was cross with myself as I forgot to use Wikiloc. One of the Jebel Musa trails on Wikiloc is 12kms with elevation of 800 m - so I reckon I'm not going to disgrace myself too much when I tackle it!
Despite getting back late, I still just about made it to dancing and only felt tired right at the end of the class.
What a great day!