Seven Days Before the World Began Again

"Avoiding danger is no safer in the long run than outright exposure. Life is either a daring adventure or nothing at all.”

Seven Days Before the World Began Again

Solo Tales from the Berg

Some journeys begin the moment your boots hit the trail. Others start long before — in the quiet decision to walk away from noise and into yourself. This was one of those journeys.

Day One rose cool and pale, the Drakensberg still stretching its back from the night. The first climb was steady, familiar, like greeting an old friend whose moods you already understand. The world behind you shrank with every step; the world ahead opened like a long-hidden door.

By midday you were high enough to feel the silence change texture — thinner, sharper, cleaner. You stopped beside a stream, cupped your hands, drank cold water that tasted like stone and sky. And for the first time in months, the chatter in your head took a breath and sat still.

Day Two was the day of the cliffs — those massive walls that look like they could rise up and walk away if they wanted to. You crossed the ridgelines slowly, deliberately, knowing that these places demand respect, not speed. The clouds were low and fast, brushing over you like passing ghosts. You spoke to them anyway. No witnesses but the wind.

By Day Three, the wildness had properly settled into your bones. You dropped into a valley of long grass and river braids — water curling and unfolding like silver rope. You spent the morning tracing the river upstream, stepping through cold pools, watching the sun flare on every ripple. You could swear the mountains were watching you back, pleased that someone had arrived without asking them to be anything other than exactly what they were.

On Day Four, the world turned bright, brutal, magnificent. The trail climbed steeply through boulder fields where time had no meaning. Every stone carried the weight of millennia; every step carried the weight you were slowly learning to put down. That night you camped high — just you, the wind, and a sky so crowded with stars it felt like the universe had gathered close to hear your thoughts.

Day Five felt like stepping into a cathedral carved by weather. You walked through shadowed valleys, cliffs towering above you like ancient pillars. A single sunbeam broke through the mist and landed at your feet — a quiet blessing, or a warning, or maybe simply the mountain saying:
You’re exactly where you should be.

On Day Six you began the long traverse homeward. Your legs were tired, your shoulders sore, but your spirit? Lighter than it had been in years. You realized then that solitude isn’t the absence of people — it’s the presence of yourself. The version you forget when life gets loud.

Day Seven brought the final descent — grasslands giving way to paths, paths giving way to the faint suggestion of the world below. You looked back only once. The peaks stood silent, unchanged, yet somehow you knew they would never look the same again.

Out here, you didn’t escape life.
You found the part of it that still remembers how to breathe.

We as hikers, explorers, and adventurers have the absolute duty to respect and protect our Wildernesses.
Nobody else will do it for us. Take ownership!

The End.

Safe Hiking.