I Cannot Move Mountains — Only Admire Their Magnificence

Crushed between Mother Earth’s tectonic plates, they rise to inspire us

Section of Drakensberg mountains ( Image by Sandra Petersen from Pixabay)

I first learned about mountains in school through the story of how the Carthaginian general Hannibal crossed the Alps with the help of elephants and horses to attack the Romans in 218 BC.

However, my first sighting of a genuine mountain was in 1958, when the passenger liner transporting us from Southampton to start a new life in South Africa arrived in Cape Town harbour.

There stood Table Mountain, embracing the city with a cloudy tablecloth on top. I’d seen pictures in magazines before we left the UK, but seeing her in real life was awe-inspiring. We couldn’t linger as we had to catch the Blue Train to Johannesburg within hours of disembarkation, but I kept twisting my neck to catch as many glimpses of her as I could before we boarded the train.

Table Mountain (Image by Jean van der Meulen from Pixabay)

I’m delighted we didn’t have time to go on the aerial cableway or I would have discovered I’m afraid of heights!

That revelation only came the following year, when a friend from boarding school who lived in Lesotho — the…