Last Saturday morning, my alarm went off  at 7 so that I could get up the hill to the start of the Med Steps 5 Challenge. After a couple of days with rain showers I was relieved to see that the forecast of cloudy but dry skies was correct. 

It wasn’t long before the crowds of walkers and their supporters began to arrive. Just after 9am, the safety briefing began in readiness for the start of the event. 

And at approximately 9:30, we were off and underway on lap one! It wasn’t too bad as we were carried along with the momentum of the crowd, although by the summit, the crowd had thinned out a bit.

There were a lot of tourists on the Upper Rock and the apes had come out to greet them, and us!

48 minutes for the first lap, not too bad.

The wildflowers are at their peak in the nature reserve at the moment, these poppies were my favourite.

2 laps done…

And here’s the proof!

Onwards and upwards…

Three laps in two and a half hours…

Time for a breather and a great view south towards the lighthouse.

Starting to slow up a bit… Almost a whole hour for lap number 4.

On the final lap and I was starting to flag, I couldn’t even focus the picture! Thank you Soreen for giving me the energy to finish (you can take the girl out of Manchester…).

The floor in parts of the walk was carpeted in a confetti of olive blossom. I was looking down a lot at this point, just trying to get one foot in front of the other…

I did it! I even managed 15 minutes faster than last year (I have no idea how I managed that with less training, unless the extra weight brought me down quicker 😉).

Look, five stamps, one for each lap of the challenge. Phew, I’m glad that’s over, anyone fancy joining me next year?

Time to collapse…

If you would like to hear some of the atmosphere of the day, why not give my latest podcast a listen here?