38.9 Km with 1.3 Km total climb at Vandellos

After an awesome trail we are resting our legs in the mediterranean sun overlooking the bay, and making plans for lunch. I think the local fish restaurant will win, perhaps a nice paella or plate full of Merluza.

The trail back from Vandellos turned into a bit of an impromptu selection of routes, keeping an eye on the GPS that we were at least sort of heading in the right direction. The views of the mountain range and the sea were stunning.

The road back to Hospitalet was interesting, as we were challenged by some very strong sidewind with gusts up to force 7. That combined with the speed at which we were descending required us to navigate carefully.

Over lunch we'll think about what trail to do tomorrow, but with Vandellos done I am sure we will be looking for a bit of a challenge.

One thing is for sure, we are getting fit and will be well prepared for the Camino to Santiago starting 6 June.

Hasta la próxima!


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On the Vandellos trail

So we set out this morning on the Vandellos trail. Pretty steep climbs and I am sure I saw Frans weep and suppress some tears from the corner of my eye from time to time ;)

We are on our cafe con leche break right now, and are sort of half way on todays trail. We just passed a small pueblo in ruins, simply deserted, will post some photo's of the ruins in the middle of the mountains. We were kind of speculating that this may be one of those places that got wiped out in the civil war. We just asked about it in the café and the answers were a tad sketchy.

We will head out now, have to find the camino that will take us around the mountain and back to the mediterranean side of the trail. Will post some pics and Gps data in coming posts.

Hasta la proxima




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We are getting ready for the Vandellos trail

One of the advantages of living in a catholic country like Spain is the many public holidays they give you, even to an atheist like myself. Tomorrow, 16 may, is a public holiday in Madrid. Not sure what it's about, but a long weekend is always welcome and we decided to head out to the beach house in Tarragona province. Frans joined us and we have two serious MTB trails planned.

The first one will be a pretty steep and tricky one around Vandellos, one I have been on before. There has been quite a bit of rain here lately so should be a muddy ride. The cumulative climb is around 1200 meters, so am sure we'll get a bit of a work-out out of it.

Attached picture is Frans who is claims to be looking forward to tomorrows trail, but I'm not convinced ;)

More on our ventures with some pics tomorrow.


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10 May Trail from Colmenar to Navacerrada and back

We ended up doing a stretch of the Camino today, albeit a different part we initially set out to do. It was a good workout nonetheless and took us through some beautiful terrain. Plus we got to get a first touch of the Camino, a mix of narrow dirt tracks, gravel to some tar roads. By far most of what we did was off road however.

For a map of the route click on below button. It's data taken from my GPS.



We ended up doing 38 KM. One of our objectives of today was to see if we will set our target on Segovia for the first day of our Camino trip. I believe we will, eventhough from Madrid this will be slightly more than 100 Km and with some steep climbs.


Next weekend will be a bank holiday weekend in Madrid, so we will be doing some trails in Catalonia near Tarragona. There are two trails in particular that we will do there, more on that later in the week.

5 June, our departure date for the Camino, is approaching quickly. A bit more training to do....

Getting ready to eat a chunck out of the Camino

Today we will do a 40 km training run near Navacerrada and am mentally preparing myself for what I know will be a very interesting climb. We'll see.

The excuse of this posting however is to test the email to blog interface. Blogger allows you to post by way of simple emails (with or without attachments). So am using my blackberry to see if this will work out.

That way we can do regular posts on the blog, without having to either schlepp a laptop along or find an internet cafe.

Will post more this evening on how the Navacerrada run went. We're mainly doing it to help us decide if Madrid - Segovia will be the first leg of the trip.


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Training run this Sunday

OK, so we decided that we will ride the Camino from Madrid to Santiago. We will leave on 5 June and take about six days to get to Santiago.

As we are not sure what really to expect on the first leg, Madrid to Segovia..well, we know there are some mountains in between..., we will give part of that track a go this coming Sunday to make a more educated guess. It is not that the 100 Km distance from Madrid to Segovia scares us, but it is rather hilly.. just after Navacerrada

We have already started going over the route and Frans was kind enough to pass by the Madrid Friends of the Camino station to buy some guides and maps. Below photo shows one of the guides that we are studying and we noticed that the Madrid (semi official portion) of the Camino will start at the Santiago church in the centre of Madrid. We have decided to start there, would be kind of nice to do the whole tour. From there we leave Madrid via Plaza de Castilla and El Pardo. Past Fuencaral we will start to hit the dirt tracks we suspect. The first leg to Segovia goes past Tres Cantos, Colmenar Viejo, Manzanares el Rey, Navacerrada and Cercedilla. We'll see if the first leg to Segovia is reasonable, more on that this Sunday.

El Atazar

OK, so on 2 May we hit the beautiful countryside around El Atazar. Spectacular views that took us through the nort-eastern tip of Madrid (Comunidad) and into parts of Castilla la Mancha. We took a bit of a short cut on account of not interpreting the GPS entirely correctly. This trail is not for those who would like to stay away from long and steep climbs, it was quite challenging at times and both Frans and I were a tad out of breath after 28 kilometers of this terrain.

Click on below button for a detailed overview of the route and to download the GPS data if you wish to head out on this trail.



What has become clear is that we (at least I) will need to get a little bit more in shape still for our camino to Santiago. The 6 day 750 KM ride will be pretty tough I am sure.

For more photo´s of our route at El Atazar goto my facebook album

Next weekend we want to do another run (30 to 40 Km´s) near Madrid. If you have any suggestions please just post them to this blog.