Race Across South Africa, part nine

Beat warned me that my Freedom Challenge report is delving too far into the negative aspects of my experience. I didn't mean for it to come across that way — to sound as though I spent the entire trip stressed and frightened. There were many relaxing and enjoyable moments that tend to fade in the wash of memory, while the sharp edges of the more intense experiences stick out. Those sharp edges are why I pursue endurance racing. I seek to not only learn more about what lies beneath my perception of the world and myself, but also to gain more control over these perceptions. I'm a fearful person. Maybe more so than others, and maybe not, but fear has always lurked around the edges of joy. I'm not brave, and I'm not strong ... but I'd like to be. So what do I do about it? I face my fears. I push my limits. This process is always hard and sometimes painful, and many, many mistakes are made ... but ultimately, I emerge with a richer perception of the world, which is useful in smothering fear.

 I knew, going into the Freedom Challenge, that I had a deep fear of being lost. I came here to face that fear. I did what I thought would help me in preparation — reading orienteering books, studying the race maps, practicing with trail maps at home. But in practice, facing this fear was much harder than I expected it to be. I was in a foreign, unfamiliar land. Trails weren't laid out in familiar ways; roads were devoid of signs. The phantom night would haunt me. Panics would seep through my determination, shutting out rational thought. This internal difficulty is what I am trying to convey in these writings. Conveying the emotion of an experience is different than conveying its objective reality. In reality, Liehann and I were having a nearly flawless race. Yes, there were some mechanicals, some minor injuries, a wrong turn here and there. But the weather was almost perfect — except for a few days of harsh wind — and we made good time on the move. We worked well as a team. Although luck played a part, there were no major navigational mistakes. Most of our gear was working well for us. There was no rational reason for me to be so upset; when I was, it was because of fear.

Now I'm going to post about three days when I succeeded in banishing my fear, at least most of the time. These were "easy nav" days, it's true. They were also long, physically demanding, occasionally tedious, energy draining days — all things that are much easier for me than facing fear. In many ways, they were the most relaxing days of the journey. They were also some of the most beautiful. I took a lot of photos that were — as photos often are — incredibly disappointing. They didn't begin to convey the stunning colors, the sweeping expanses, the sweet air and strange sounds of the landscape.

We left Cambria at 5 a.m., and I was buzzing with excitement. Some of that energy sparked from relief that we'd survived the Osseberg, and some was anticipation for the day we had planned — 106 miles with 13,000 feet of climbing across the Baviaanskloof Nature Reserve.

I've never been to a place quite like the Baviaanskloof. The closest parallel I can think of is Zion National Park in Utah. There were intriguing new geologic phenomenons around every turn, kudu wading through the streams across the road, baboons peering out from the bushes, a warm breeze (that developed into a more fierce wind later in the day) and climb after wonderfully long climb. My energy felt almost boundless, and riding my bicycle was a gift. "Every day is a gift," I reminded myself. This was becoming my personal mantra for the Freedom Challenge — "Every day is a gift." After 81 kilometers, we stopped for lunch in Damsedrif — and I couldn't wait to get back out there.

The riding was still difficult, and this day extended well into the hours after dark. We climbed another game fence and rolled along tall brush with all manner of unseen animals rustling branches. I was nervous about buffalo. Rabbits darted across the road, and then I saw a small cat with dark, pointy ears. We weren't all that close to town yet. "Is that a regular cat, or a wild cat?" I asked Liehann. He guessed it was an African Wildcat.

We spent the night in Willowmore at a historic hotel. Thirty minutes after we arrived, it started to rain — our timing was impeccable.  We enjoyed a gourmet dinner of lamb curry in an ornate dining room. It was a far, far cry from the Osseberg. Marnitz was sleeping there still, and the race leader, Graham Bird, had arrived as well. Graham was going through the following day's maps, of which there were a lot. It was another 162 kilometers to Prince Albert. I couldn't wait.

This day would take us back into the high desert of the Karoo, wide-open spaces of rolling terrain that look flat on maps and from afar, but on the ground are anything but.

This day, we would greet our old friend, the West Wind. It rushed across the open expanses without mercy, pummeling us in the face with cold air and abrasive sand. By afternoon the wind was easily blowing a steady 25 mph with gusts to 35 mph, and we were lucky if we could hold an 5 mph pace against it. The problem wasn't just the wind, but the road surfaces — swept with soft sand, we'd swerve and stall as we churned forward. Liehann asked if I wanted him to pull, but I was having a difficult time holding my line as it was. "It's not the wind as much as the sand," I said. "I don't think pacing will help much."

The constant roar of the wind started to get to me. I put in my earphones and listened to my favorite mix from the Iditarod, which seemed fitting and made me happy. Liehann would ask if I was okay. "This isn't that bad," I said. "This is just tedious. I'm good at tedious." We churned and churned. The wind sapped the energy right out of our legs. Swerving in the sand threw me off my pedals more than once, and my shins were bleeding. Once I nearly pitched over the handlebars at five kilometers per hour.

Night fell. For the first time in the entire Freedom Challenge, I welcomed it, because I believed darkness had the power to quiet the West Wind. Rolling in a sea of blackness, we caught a glimpse of an island of lights. Prince Albert was still 25 kilometers away, and only about 200 meters lower than our current elevation. Liehann didn't think we could possibly see town from that far away, but I didn't think it could be anything else. We rode toward those lights for what seemed like hours; visually, it looked like a descent, but we always had to pedal. As long as we were riding we never stopped pedaling, all day. We reached the fancy hotel in Price Albert at nearly the exact same time we'd reached Willowmore — 9:15 p.m.

Marnitz was there, sitting on a couch and drinking red wine. His hair was substantially shorter than it had been last we saw him — a little girl at a farm house offered to cut it. He asked how long it took us to ride into town. Liehann thought about it — not counting the lunch stop, 14 hours. "How long did it take you and Graham?

"Fourteen hours."

Later, Di would tell us that Graham said that day across the wind-blasted Karoo was one of his hardest on a bike. Whether or not he actually said this, I'm not sure. I didn't think it was too hard. Just tedious. I'm good at tedious.

Prince Albert was another nice stop, and our reward the next day was another long climb to Swartberg Pass.

The road was narrow, muddy, and empty. If this place were located in California, it would be a National Park as crowded as Yosemite. But instead it's here — isolated, quiet in the winter, sublime.

You're probably detecting a pattern here. I did love the dirt road touring, especially when it was both scenic and physically demanding. 

Here, again, is where I have more pictures than story.

We turned off Swartberg Pass onto the road into Gamkaskloof. Gamkaskloof is a deep, isolated valley protected by cliffs and an impassable gorge. The only way in is a rugged, 37-kilometer dirt road that residents petitioned for in 1962, and that led to the depopulation of the valley. This road is the only way out as well. Well, technically, there is one more way out.

This was a fun ride. Lots of steep rollers lined by these imposing mountains. The weather looked threatening, but we only got a few short rain showers.

Legend has it that Gamkaskloof was discovered when farmers lost their cattle and followed their tracks into the valley. There was no easy way to get their cattle out, so they decided to settle there.

Today Gamkaskloof is a nature preserve and still occupied by a lucky few. Sure, they have a long way to drive to the grocery store — but what a location.

Gamkaskloof is also referred to as "Die Hel" — "The Hell." No one really knows why, although legend has it that an animal inspector went into the valley in the 1940s, before the road was built, using a route known as "Die Leer" — "The Ladder." He described the experience as "Hell." This would be our way out.

Really, what I have here again is more pictures than story.

There are only so many ways you can say "this section was beautiful and fun."

But I couldn't easily pick which photos to cull.

Liehann looking into "The Hell." Yeah, I know. Quite hellish.

We had a quick lunch in the tiny village and set out to find The Ladder. A steep climb brought us to the corner of this isolated valley. In front of us was a wall, and it looked insurmountable. I mean, it really did look like a cliff. "That looks super technical," I said nervously. "I don't know about this." Fear started to creep back in. Liehann assured me all would be fine. We picked out the poplar trees listed in our cues. "As you go behind the trees you will experience a moment of magic. In the metre-wide gap between the poplar trees and the face of the mountain there is a a foot path. You are now on The Ladder."

And indeed, behind the poplar trees, we caught our first glimpse of the zig-zagging path up the face of the cliff. It wasn't quite a moment of magic — but it was reassuring. The Ladder is in fact a well-built trail, although very steep, with stair-like boulders lined by thick brush. My arms still weren't well-recovered, and my muscles balked at even meager efforts. I tried to hoist the bike on my back, but I couldn't quite position it correctly. My method of walking with the saddle hooked over my shoulder didn't work on a trail this steep. I resorted to lifting the bike up and placing it down on a ledge, crawling up myself, repeat. It was extremely slow. My arm muscles started to fail again. I dropped the bike once, and teetered enough to feel unnerved. I made more efforts to hoist the bike on my back. "It really shouldn't be that hard," I thought to myself. "What's the deal?" 

I looked up to see Liehann far ahead. Eventually he came back down to help me. "I'm sorry I'm so slow," I apologized. "I really don't know what's wrong with me." I thanked him repeatedly as he carried my anchor part way up the mountain after hauling his own.

"It's for my benefit as well," Liehann said. 

I agreed. "Yeah, it would probably take me all night to scale this wall alone. And you'd have to wait for me." 

As it was, the sun was setting by the time both bikes reached the top. We still had ten more kilometers on a faint track overgrown with tall brush — and just steep and rocky enough that we could only intermittently ride. At the end of that track, there were still 40 more kilometers of often steep, rolling roads into our destination, for another 130-kilometer day that included this two-hour hike.

Long days. And I admit I was feeling deflated by my inability to conquer The Ladder on my own. Still, the beauty of this place eclipsed the hard efforts, making every hour worth it. 

Race Across South Africa, part eight

I was tired of being frightened of things that didn't exist, of things that hadn't even happened. My fear of being lost in the dark was not based in reality, and I knew that. "What's the worst that will really happen?" I reminded myself. As Liehann snoozed in Hadley, I studied the map by headlamp beneath my covers, tracing the dotted line as it contoured down a ridge, crossed the wide blue shading of a river, sliced across a spur, and then continued down the valley. The dotted line hugged the river around Osseberg mountain, which was lower than points on the ridge up canyon — possibly not visible from certain vantage points? I tried to imagine what this landscape would look like — the tight contour lines of cliffs, the steep side canyons ... should I count them? Could I count them? What looked like a trail on the map would look like nothing at all from the ground. I knew if I carried my bike, the odometer would be useless in tracking distance. I was tired of being frightened, so I just put the map away. 

We set out in the morning to cut through a wall of mountains we spent the previous day approaching, the Bavianskloof. It was incredible bike touring terrain — 400 meter drop followed by an "equally ridiculous" 400 meter ascent along the rippled sedimentary layers of redrock cliffs. The previous day, Anine showed me a tourism map that revealed a route to Cambria going the long way around on this scenic and fun road, but of course that is not the Freedom Challenge Way. I told Liehann I was getting to a point where I was questioning my life choices regarding doing things I really did not want to do because I'm in a race. Of course I do it because of the enduring rewards of overcoming my fears and weaknesses — but the fears and weaknesses of the Freedom Challenge were not relinquishing their grip, and I was becoming tired. 

 The long closed and technically prohibited Osseberg jeep track was about forty percent into the process of being entirely reclaimed by nature. Short sections were rideable, but much of it was not — at least not without taking a serious beating from high brush, thorns, deep erosion ruts, and hidden rocks. Liehann and I were always in agreement about playing it safe and hiked, hiked, hiked. The day began to heat up. I inadvertently chose a terrible bush to squat behind and ended up with seemingly hundreds of damn near microscopic (and yet oh so prickly) thorns inside my tights.

 Grumpy, I was. We arrived at an abandoned camp site and I sat down to eat a sandwich that Anine had packed for me — salami and cheese, and it was amazing. "I miss Hadley," I thought. "I should go live there." The track disappeared and the route across the river was far from obvious. The map directed us to "continue on to easier river crossing." The campsite sat about fifteen meters above the river on a vertical bluff. I wasn't sure exactly where we were on the map, but I thought we needed to continue up river before finding a lower crossing and looping back around. Liehann argued that the crossing must be somewhere below the campsite. I insisted we needed to go up river. Liehann conceded this time, even though he was certain of his assessment — and also right.

We hacked through thorns along a faint animal track. Tiny prickly pear-like cactus lodged in my shoes and lower leg. I scanned the other side of the river for the supposed old wagon trail that was supposed to climb over the spur, but saw nothing. Features that I thought would seem obvious from the map were anything but on the ground. Every peak looked like the one we needed to go around, every side canyon like the possible main river valley. It wasn't just that I lacked adequate orientation skills — although, alas, this was partially to blame. I did have a map and compass and the rational capability to use deduction to assess my position. But my creeping fear created an irrational but debilitating disorientation. The canyon might as well have started spinning.

I continued dragging Liehann through the brush. The sandy river bluff only became steeper, the main river channel wider. We started arguing. "Fine, we'll go back to the campsite," I huffed. We picked our way back until we saw a steep gully beneath the trees. "That's possibly a way down." It involved lowering our bikes off a six-foot dropoff and picking our way down smaller boulders, but we did at least arrive at river level. Would there be any track to pick up on the other side? How would we find it? If not, could we hack our way down this valley? Just schwacking through no more than 300 meters of brush had taken a half hour and left us thorn-pricked and exhausted. There was no way that 15 kilometers of this was possible, let alone plausible. And even if it was, how would we keep track of the exact location where we needed to leave the river and hack our way toward civilization? Liehann remained optimistic, but I could only see the world spinning.

"I'm thinking about just going back to Hadley," I announced to Liehann. He thought I was joking. I was not.

It was there, standing bewildered on a gravel bed in the middle of the Groot Rivier, that we heard a loud, "Oi!"

We turned around to see a solo cyclist with a bike on his back. We hadn't seen another rider in the Freedom Challenge since we left Richard in Elandsberg five days earlier, and suddenly, here one was, at the exact moment I was feeling most bewildered and lost. A knight in dirty bicycle kit — Marnitz Nienaber.

Marnitz is a hardened Freedom Challenge veteran, having completed the route across South Africa five times before this year. He started the race on June 15 — five days after us. He looked surprisingly fresh, although his legs were painted with fresh blood — hinting that he probably rode most the way down the Osseberg track through the punishing brush.

"We wondered when you'd catch us," Liehann called to him, referring to the fast guys who were racing this course for time, not just a finisher's blanket.

"Do you know where the track goes, from here?" I called out a little more timidly. I was surely happy to see Marnitz, but at the same time, strangely embarrassed.

"I will show you," Marnitz called back. "Wait there."

 Marnitz hoisted his bike and crossed the first channel, then took the lead through thick reeds at the edge of the river, arriving precisely at the head of a faint double track. I thought that would be the extent of Marnitz's guidance, and now he would race on ahead. But it was a major help. At least we found the track, for now.

"Follow me, I will show you where to go," he said. We mounted our bikes and raced after him up the steep track, with no more regard for the thorn bushes or cactus spikes. If I got an unsealable puncture I was just going to ride the flat. I did not want to lose Marnitz.

At the crest of the climb we looked down the river valley. "That is where you need to go, around there," Marnitz said, pointing at a peak that I presumed was the Osseberg.

I thought that was it, but we still raced after him down to the river bank, where he ducked through the branches of a fallen tree and stopped at a wall of reeds. I could just barely see over the river, but there was nothing there — just more walls of reeds, and more toppled trees. "Look for the breaks in the reeds? See them? It is here," Martinez said.

"No," I thought. I didn't see anything remotely resembling a break in the thick vegetation that stretched about two feet over my head. But I hoisted my bicycle and thrashed through the green confusion, waded across the knee-deep water that was so murky it was difficult discern which way it was flowing, and bashed through more reeds to the other side — where we arrived at a faint jeep track.

I was beside myself. How did he find that? What did he see? "Do you even need a map anymore?" Liehann asked him.

"Not so much," Marnitz replied.

 I kept waiting for Marnitz to ditch us, but he would wait at crossings, and hiked behind us up the steep brushy slopes where the abandoned track cut across river bends. He would pick what to me appeared to be a random spot to cross the river, bulldoze through the reeds, and still find the exact spot where the track met the other side. The barely-there track was surrounded by thick thorn bushes and tangles of fallen trees, revealing what would be a painful, if not impossible, bushwhack, for anyone who couldn't locate the track. "Thank you for helping us," I said several times. "Really, thank you."

Later, I learned that last year, Marnitz encountered another group in the Osseberg, including a woman named Avril. He thought Avril was traveling with the two guys, but actually she was alone — she had ridden alone for most of the race. Marnitz went on ahead, and the guys also made their way forward without Avril. She found her way to the sixth river crossing, and then sent a text message to the race office that they didn't receive until the following day: “Now I’m scared. Alone in Baviaans valley and don’t know which way to go, please can you help..?”

Avril ended up spending the night near that crossing. She built a fire and waited patiently. Later the following day, she heard the sound of voices — and tearfully met up with a group of riders who started several days after she did. Despite their fast pace, she resolved to stay with them through the remainder of the race, and finished with her group of "rescuers." Avril is no doubt a tenacious woman, but I got the sense that Marnitz felt a little bad about leaving her behind in 2013. Her ordeal became our good fortune. Liehann believes that we would have eventually found the way on our own, but I'm not so optimistic. We're both grateful for Marnitz's help on that day.

Though catered to us, the pace was fierce. We didn't eat, we ran out of water, hours went by ... it didn't matter. As we worked our way down the valley, the track became progressively worse, until it was almost entirely overgrown everywhere, and we had to find our way around enormous tree tangles brought down by floods. Give this valley few more years of growth and flooding, and it's hard to imagine how this route would even be passable by seasoned veterans, let alone clueless rookies. Marnitz seems to share this belief. He snapped a photo of one of the downed trees.

"I want to show David his highway to Hell," Marnitz said. He put his camera away and turned to me. "What do you think of the Osseberg?"

"Well," I stammered, looking up at the sculpted cliffs. "It is a beautiful canyon."

"There is nothing beautiful about this place," Marnitz said.

Picking our way out of the canyon, we learned how strong solo racers like Marnitz climb game fences — he hooked his bike on the bar across the top, climbed over, straddled the bar, swung his whole bike around, and dropped it on the other side. I tried to imagine what it must feel like to be that confident and strong. We arrived at Cambria before dark, but only just — 54 kilometers in ten and a half hours. Although we had seen him on the road just a mile back, Marnitz did not arrive until a half hour later. His rear derailleur was busted, and the chain broke. He went to a farmer to ask for makeshift parts he could use to fix the damage. "If he doesn't have it, then it was not to be," Marnitz said.

I felt a sinking guilt — that perhaps the extra effort and bashing to help Liehann and me might just cost Marnitz his race. Although his plan had been to shower and go, Marnitz stayed to fix his bike and had dinner with us. He told us about his sleeping system — in order to make the race more challenging this year, Marnitz was spending most every night sleeping outside. I told him about my experiences in the Iditarod.

"That sounds like a real adventure race," Marnitz said, which I admit sparked a bit of pride. I respected the hell out of this guy.

Marnitz was able to fix his broken bike and was off in the night, like a phantom. Liehann went to bed, and about a half hour later, the peloton arrived — Steve, Di, Richard, and two others named Con and Coen. The were all buzzing from their successful portage through the Groot Rivier gorge after starting in Bucklands early that morning.

I joined in the joyful recounting of the day, but I admit that anger lurked in there as well. We had been incredibly lucky with Marnitz's timing and willingness to help, but what if we hadn't? You wouldn't have to venture very far off the track to not hear others go by; no one else goes down there anymore; they might never find our bodies. This was, again, echoes of that irrational fear calling out from the confines of grateful retrospect. But after two weeks of Freedom Challenge I was beginning to wonder what I had *really* gotten myself into. That valley was ridiculous, it really was. Which I guess is the point — to learn the way, to graciously embrace the help of others, to accept that maybe you couldn't have done this on your own the first time around, but now you're older and wiser.

But still ... what had I gotten myself into? 

Race Across South Africa, part seven

Saturday, June 21. Winter solstice — the darkest day of the year. Grootdam was one of my more restful stops on the Freedom Trail — multi-course meal, a high-pressure hot shower, and rare success in sleeping through most of the night without any nightmares about losing the track. We even slept in — the proprietor told us the farm gate didn't open until 6 a.m., so we opted for a 6 a.m. start rather than climbing a gate first thing in the morning. Still, when I woke up in the morning, my right ankle was stiff and mildly swollen, with purple bruising appearing near the edges. Definitely sprained, but at least it was just sprained. 

Morning brought a steep climb out of a sandy valley, followed by a cross-country traverse along a desert ridge. This traverse, which seemed to start and end nowhere, was inexplicably marked by white painted stones — which, given the more likely possibilities here, make for a much-appreciated trail.

The white rocks guided us to a rim before plummeting into a gorge down a steep, boulder-clogged gully. Just as quickly, the sandy desolation of the Karoo transitioned to this strange, almost lush climate with thick brush, palms, and cactus, along with a harmonious chorus of bird calls and barking baboons. Liehann and I both independently likened the ambience to that Jules Verne story, "Journey to the Center of the Earth," about a group who descend lava tubes into a prehistoric world populated by dinosaurs.

It almost felt as if a velociraptor might leap out of the bush, and Liehann was thrilled with the adventurous atmosphere of the place. But we were both struggling physically — me with my sore ankle, and Liehann with his swollen shin. The best way to get down the boulders was to hook the bike's saddle on my shoulder, but this seemed to place more painful pressure on the sprained ankle no matter which shoulder I hooked the bike on. Progress was extremely slow — well under a kilometer an hour — and about midway down the canyon I hit another bonky wall. I was just extremely hot (probably more of a result of poor thermoregulation than an actual high temperature) and out of sorts. We sat down for a break and I ate a bag of crackers and three salt tablets, which seemed to help.

Even still, despite the good night of sleep and continued snacking, my energy levels did not improve. We needed to take a detour into the town of Pearston so Liehann could pick up a bleed kit that his parents had mailed to him — in another frustrating mechanical, his rear brake stopped working. As we rode through town, I started pointing out convenience stores so we could stop for a cold drink and ice cream. That's when I learned Liehann was actually in a big hurry — our next support station, Gegun, was only supposed to be a lunch stop. I was having a rough morning and up until that point thought Gegun was our day's destination.

I mounted a protest. Our hike down Struishoek portage was much slower than it should have been, and after the detour into town, it was already 1:30 in the afternoon. At best it would be 3:30 by the time we covered the 30 kilometers into Gegun, and after that we only had about two hours of good daylight left. The next 52-kilometer leg included four kilometers of portaging and 30 kilometers of intermediate technical riding, through an area where navigation looked like it might get tricky. "We're going to ride most of that after dark," I argued. "If we're going to do that we might as well just start planning now for spending the night out. We should at least pick up some extra supplies here in town."

Liehann thought I was being too alarmist on the matter, but he also seemed concerned about even a remote possibility of spending the night outdoors. Although I didn't feel fully prepared for a night out, camping was not my main concern. I had a good bivy sack and warm layers, as well as firestarters, and I've spent a few cold nights sleeping outside with less than adequate gear, so I felt I had the past experience to mentally deal with a night out in the frigid South African bush. My main concern was feeling horribly lost for an entire night, a mental blow that I wasn't sure I could handle. I no longer cared about our twenty-day race plan — only about managing my fear-of-being-lost issues. "I don't mind doing the work," I said. "I'll ride all day and all night when we get to the longer road sections. I could go through the rest of this race perfectly happy if we don't have to do any more night navigation."

Liehann pointed out that we'd have to make a new plan if we stopped early. Although the Freedom Challenge is a nonstop race, most participants treat it as something of a stage race with stops at specific full support stations. Intermediate stops didn't usually accommodate overnight stays. Changing the schedule might mean reshuffling plans for more people than just us, but my concerns about sleeping out eventually swayed the argument in my favor. Liehann called the race director and worked out a schedule that would put us at intermediate stops for the next three days before a really tough portage into the Baavianskloof.

The day after winter solstice, I woke up feeling markedly better. The long stop at Gegun had done me some good — we installed a new chain on my bike, bled Liehann's brakes, ate two dinners and breakfast, and recovered both of our injuries enough that most of the swelling had gone down. The four-kilometer portage was actually quite easy, following a steep track. At one point Liehann was a few minutes behind, and I stopped at an intersection to scrutinize the map. There were bike tracks going off in both directions, and the cues seemed to direct us to the right. But after mulling it for several minutes, I was convinced we needed to go straight.

When Liehann arrived, he was convinced we should go right. He and I occasionally had debates about directions, and I usually conceded. But this time I was certain my way was correct. "I knew you were going to argue with me," I pouted, then pointed to my map. "See, here, this side trail goes straight up these contour lines, while the correct trail wraps around the hill. Here is where I think Bugs and Allen came back down; see their tracks curve like they turned right on this road, not left from behind."

Liehann was still skeptical, so I requested we just ride down the hill and look for another intersection. I careened down the steep slope until I came to a Y junction, which was marked by a rare "bokkie" — a Freedom Challenge trail marker, of which there were a few dozen on the entire 2,400-kilometer course, always at random intervals and never in the most confusing spots. But this one mattered. "It's here! It's here!" I called out. A minute went by, and still no Liehann. Finally, I started yelling louder. "Bokkie!" I screamed. "There's a bokkie down here!"

Finally he rolled down the hill. I was offended. "You weren't going to come down," I teased him. "You didn't believe me."

After a steep descent we climbed again to a game gate, and then launched into one of the most incredible segments of the entire trip — 15 kilometers of gradual but sublime descending on a rugged jeep track through the Voelrivier gorge. As the layered cliffs steepened, I stopped to take a photograph of interesting water markings on the wall. It was just then that I noticed what I thought had been part of the rock formation, starting to move.

Giraffes! I crept forward as a herd of eight to ten gathered and crossed the track up a hill to our right.

I watched them gallop up the slope, necks bobbing gracefully as their long legs swept over the grass in a beautiful angular motion. It occurred to me that my only reference for giraffes were the animals I'd seen in small enclosures at the zoo — standing still. I had never seen one run. It was enchanting.

The herd gathered again higher up on the hill. I could have watched them all day, galloping through the grass and grazing on trees in this deep and isolated gorge. But our modified race plan meant we had a long day ahead, so we continued pedaling along the dry riverbed. "If we left Gegun last night we would have ridden this section in the dark," I said to Liehann after apologizing for my alarmism. The portage hadn't been tricky, so I felt guilty about stopping short the night before — but at the same time, what was our purpose on the Freedom Trail? To finish, or to embrace every new day as a gift? As the days went on, I admit, I cared less about the finish — my reason for not wanting to quit was not wanting to miss a single kilometer of this incredible journey. "In the dark, we would have missed this."

We were descending deeper into a low-elevation region of the Karoo where a high concentration of game animals reside. More game meant more posted signs warning about buffalo, hippo, and rhino, more sightings of kudu and wildebeest, and a lot more game fences. Sometimes we found creative ways to get around them — at this gate, we were able to squeeze ourselves and our bikes through a narrow opening above the lock. Others forced us to go over the top, and later that day, a tall gate with spikes prompted us to take the wheels off both bikes to more easily lift them over. These fences also sparked more stress than was warranted. But the problem was never knowing how many were ahead, or how long they would take to surmount.

We navigated our way along the dry edge of a dam and crossed into Addo Elephant National Park. We saw no elephants in this corner of the park, but we did cross into another sort of Lost World.

The jeep track along a dry river bed had been abandoned many years ago, and was almost completely reclaimed by these thorn bushes. Called the Karoo thorn or Aracia karoo, its conspicuous spines are sharp enough to impale skin, as happened to my poor calves on two occasions. They also find their way into bicycle tires, sticking out like toothpicks bubbling with sealant. You can't pull them out, as the holes they create are on the margins of being too large to re-seal — you simply have to keep riding and hope the excess thorn eventually breaks off, leaving behind a suitable plug. Despite extremely cautious riding and carrying our bikes through the worst patches, Liehann and I must have picked up a dozen or more of these thorns. I'm still afraid to open my bike's tires and see what lurks inside, but the tubeless system worked wonderfully. I never had a single flat; the most I had to do was top off air pressure.

Our new schedule necessitated another 130-kilometer day with lots of tough riding, and we arrived late in Kleinpoort. We met a nice couple who worked as bird researchers and birding guides who were staying as guests at the house that hosted Freedom Challenge racers. They hadn't expected our arrival, so we felt guilty for bursting in on them after 9 p.m. We made our dinner from a box of emergency provisions provided by the race — ramen noodles and crackers. The man gave me some of his leftovers — plain boiled cauliflower, carrots, broccoli, and corn on the cob, apologizing that there wasn't more. I was so thrilled to eat a big batch of vegetables that I declared it my favorite dinner in days.

The following day, I think Liehann still had ambitions to make up our lost half day. We made quick work of the thirty kilometers into Bucklands, and even after enjoying a leisurely breakfast of lamb shepherd's pie that was supposed to be our dinner the previous night (they actually had been expecting us), and despite a harsh headwind and plenty of climbing, we made also made quick work of the next 42 kilometers to the intermediate stop in Hadley.

As we got closer to Hadley, I checked my watch. 1 p.m. I slowed my pedaling, trying to stall as I watched Liehann race ahead. Although we agreed to the plan to stop here, I thought he probably wouldn't be thrilled about stopping this early in the day when we were a half day behind schedule. He might think there was enough daylight to take on this next portage. I strongly disagreed. Although I'd been admittedly too timid about the section after Gegun, this one was truly alarming — twenty kilometers of steep ascents and descents followed by fifteen (or more, it was usually more) kilometers of river valley bushwhacking that sounded even trickier than the Vuvu Valley, and likely a lot slower. These directions told us to look for indentations in the reeds instead of a trail — indentations made by who? The two guys who were in front of us? There were supposedly 11 river crossings "that look wide but are usually never more than waist deep and there are no crocodiles." They way they made an effort to point out there were no crocodiles made me wonder if there actually were. Either way, I was in near panics about the prospect of taking on the Groot Rivier gorge in the afternoon.

I came up with a plan to convince Liehann to stay in Hadley. We'd get a super early start — 4 a.m. if necessary, to get through the first twenty kilometers before sunrise. Then, if the river bushwhack went well, we could ride late into the day to click off 130 total kilometers into Damsedrif. And if it didn't go well, we'd at least have an entire day to hack away at the 50 kilometers into Cambria.

The family at Hadley also hadn't expected us — despite filing our plan two days earlier, no one had been forewarned. But Anine and Bennie welcomed us with open arms anyway, and we enjoyed a long afternoon rest getting to know them better. I had tea with Anine, called Beat, took a hot shower, actually shaved my legs, and almost felt like a regular person again. I watched the sun set over the beautiful sandstone cliffs behind the house, and realized I needed to relish this sanctuary of warmth and kindness. Tomorrow, we would descend into Mordor.