To my horror, as I mud-pedalled closer to St James, I saw that it was not all in the near distance.

Another of Lesotho’s deep valleys lay between. A steep, dirt road wound down to a gushing river and up the other side.

“There must be a short cut for people on foot, on horseback and on bicycles,” I thought. I stubbornly walked off the road making a bee-line for my destination in the distance. Then I came to the top of a cliff. The road was not far below me.

“There must be a pathway down some route over the cliff,” I thought. There wasn’t!

A voice called out from a nearby hilltop. A man pointed towards the road. No, there were no shortcuts here. Pilgrimages are supposed to be difficult things, so the hard way seemed my only option.

I free-wheeled well down the steep road in spite of the mud. Then I rested at the river to get ready for the steep climb to St James, remembering that all I had eaten was an energy bar, the last of my rations.

I looked at the rock face beside the river. In it I could see the shape of the face of the toy monsters my son plays with. Maybe I was seeing things!

Time to move on.

Up, up, up. I simply pushed. The mud was too thick to try my low-gear, gentle pedalling style.

A four-by-four passed me and a kind driver offered me a lift. “Thanks but no thanks,” I replied. “I’m on a mission to get to that mission up the hill.”

He was probably heading on to the massive Katse Dam, built deep in the mountains to supply South Africa with water from Lesotho’s rains and melted winter snow.

Image: Duncan Guy, CC-BY-SA

WHAT DO YOU THINK? Have you ever run out of money, far from home?