Zimbabwe - The Lions on the Road: Cycling London to Cape Town - page 268

Chapter 19: Zimbabwe
Thenextmorning,Ipreparedmybikefordepartureby6:00a.m.Ihadbreakfastwith
the visiting priest and said goodbye to all the staff at the hospital. Within minutes I arrived
at the border. Passing through customs and immigration was incredibly quick and I found
myself on the long bridge that spanned the Zambezi River. On the Zimbabwean side there
was a short climb and then the terrain flattened out. The road took me along the western
boundaryoftheManaPoolsNationalParkandhadcompletedabout22kilometreswhenthe
most surreal moment of the tour occurred.
As you may recall from the introduction, it was here that the overloaded and dilap-
idated pick-up truck approached me on its way north to the Zambian border. The driver had
frantically waved his hands for me to stop to warn me that there were lions on the road at
the foot of the escarpment. My immediate thought was that he was joking, a sort of twisted
local humour. However, my gut feeling told me that he was giving me a warning.
So I did as he suggested and waited for a truck to hitch a ride. With no vehicles in
sight for quite a while, I was forced to consider my options. It was getting quite hot and us-
ing it to my advantage (animals don't hunt during the hottest part of the day) I eventually
decided to cautiously proceed.
After about ten kilometres of cycling I neared the foot of the escarpment when sud-
denly I hit my brakes and came to a frozen stop.
Not more than 200 meters in front of me was a lioness on the road walking toward
me. She had paused under a tree looking in my direction. Thankfully, I didn't see any other
animals, just her. I quickly tied down my Canadian flag that draped my rear panniers and
remained motionless as I straddled the bike and waited.
She made the first move. My heart was racing wildly as her front paw motioned in
my direction and then turned to her right and entered the tall grass behind a large tree.
I remained straddling my bike on the side of the road, unsure of my next move. I
eventually pushed off using that tree as a focal point. I crossed to the other side of the road
to get a better view but saw nothing. I knew I had to keep moving as quickly as possible for
the sun was lowering. Like a mantra, I recited Psalm 27 as fast as I could “The Lord is my
light and my salvation, whom shall I fear?” The adrenaline kicked in and I began to cycle
faster as my heart began to race. Asquietly as possible, Ipassed the tree, hoping forthe best
butimaginingtheworst.SinceIcouldn'tseebeyondthetree,Ididn'tknowhowfarshe…or
they were.
As the distance grew between me and the tree, I constantly looked over my shoulder
to make sure I was “safe”. It was difficult to do this as I started to climb the escarpment. I
had to consider many factors in balancing speed and safety: (a) my chain was in a tremend-