TWO WHEELS TO A HIDDEN GEM | KAIROS GLOBAL | OCTOBER 2026

Author: Pavana Roy

Audio

Intro: Pavana Roy writes about riding to a secluded grotto on her birthday and an unexpected gift.

For the past few years, I’ve loved keeping my birthday memorable in my own quiet way… an unexplored spot, somewhere I’ve never been, a long-slow day to breathe fresh air, notice the world around me, and quietly thank God for one more year and the gift of this life.

This year, it was a little easier. I’ve been placed in a completely new land, the Netherlands, and there’s so much around me to explore. However, I was looking for a spot for a getaway day by riding and walking trails. My first option was to look for new (to me) Catholic churches, and I ended up at Lourdesgrot, hidden in the woods, in a town called Driebergen-Rijsenburg. It felt as though I found a forgotten but familiar path.

Heading to the woods

My birthday falls on St Mark the Apostle’s feast. It was a blessing to start the day with Holy Mass alongside the Catholic community here, and it made the beginning so perfect. After spending some time with the wonderful people around, I prepared to head out.

The grotto was about 17 km from my place. The Dutch live on two wheels with bikes outnumbering almost every other mode of transport here, and I’ve happily slipped into that rhythm. In a country as flat as the Netherlands, cycling is a blessing. People here ride all year because the land lets them. No mountains, no excuses, just long roads that let you forget your legs and listen to your thoughts instead.

The weather was perfect – the kind of light that makes even the polders look romantic! I took my time; stopped to watch a herd of cows graze, paused at a canal where a family of ducks paddled past in single file. In between, I picked up birthday calls from family and friends with my phone clipped to the bicycle, talking and pedalling under a sky that felt unusually generous.

After a while, I passed tulip gardens in bloom, canals reflecting the sky, and small patches of woods that grew thicker the closer I got to Driebergen. And then the path narrowed, the trees closed in, and I knew I was almost there. 

The grotto that nearly disappeared

You don’t arrive at the Lourdes Grotto of Driebergen with all the bustle of a tourist site. A small path leads through the trees of the old Rijsenburg Seminary grounds. The grotto isn’t visible from outside the enclosed gardens; you have to know it’s there, or let the signboards inform you! Then, almost like the trees decide to let you in, a clearing opens.

Mamma Mary stands inside a grotto built of dark, misfired bricks, raised on a small platform. She is surrounded by an English landscape garden with springs and watercourses dug in 1790, older than almost anyone reading this can imagine.

A small plaque outside tells the story plainly. In 1858, a French miller’s daughter named Bernadette said Mary had appeared to her in a grotto near the village of Lourdes. The story spread, and people worldwide began quietly building their own small copies, each with a statue of Mary in the posture Bernadette described. This one, in the Dutch woods, was built around 1900.

I learned later that over a hundred Lourdes grottoes were built across the Netherlands, many still standing, mostly in the Catholic south. Small Mother Marys tucked into woods and gardens and quiet corners across the country, and I hope I’ll get to find more of them.

But here’s what made me put my hand on the bricks for a moment: This grotto was built around 1900. In 1968, when the Rijsenburg Major Seminary closed, Mary’s statue disappeared. For nearly fifty years, this place was empty, overgrown with ivy and half-forgotten. Then in 2016, a man from Driebergen named Hans Havers gathered volunteers, restored the grotto with matching stones, and placed a new statue of Mary. She has only been back for about ten years!

Bring your own tea light

For some reason, while packing my backpack, I remembered to pack candles, which I felt was a quiet prompting from the Holy Spirit because there were only a handful of candles left near the grotto for passers-by. The grotto is freely accessible, no entry fee, no donation box pressuring you, no caretaker hovering. Just a small note that says: Lighting a tea light is appreciated. Please bring your own. I love this detail. It tells you something about the place: that it trusts you to come with an intention. That the small effort of remembering a candle in your bag is itself part of the prayer.

Only a handful of people were around – a couple walking with their dog, some stooping to light a candle in the grotto, a few friends sitting on a bench enjoying the weekday quiet, others passing through on the trails. No crowd. Just enough company to feel held, not enough to feel watched.

I lit my candles, sat down, and stayed. I prayed the Rosary slowly that afternoon, keeping all those in need of prayers. For me personally, the Rosary is less a request list and more a way of slowing down enough for Mamma Mary to walk beside me. Each Hail Mary is a small step. Each mystery – joyful, sorrowful, glorious, luminous is a moment in her Son’s life she lets us sit inside.

Birds called above me, different kinds, different calls and the trees danced gently with a slow breeze. The whole place felt like a small Eden carved out of the Dutch countryside. I stayed for a few hours, walking the paths, journaling, sitting in silence, with a time of personal prayer and just listening.

The ride back: a thank-you on wheels

The 17 km back home felt different. Going out, I had been moving toward something. Coming back, I was moving with something, a quietness that the grotto had handed me, almost like a precious parcel I was carrying carefully in my backpack.

I haven’t been to Lourdes in France. But that afternoon, riding home on a perfect April day, with a candle lit somewhere behind me in the woods and my rosary still warm around my neck, I felt as if I had been to Lourdes anyway. Maybe that’s the secret of holy places. They are smaller than we expect, and bigger than we think!

A particular kind of tiredness results from a long journey to a quiet place. It is not the fatigue of a hard week or a late night. It is the tiredness of someone who has been somewhere, somewhere real, somewhere peaceful, somewhere holy, and come home a little lighter than they left.

I hope to go back again to explore more. Maybe in autumn, when the woods change colour. Or maybe sooner, if the week gets loud!

A legal researcher currently based in the Netherlands, Pavana Roy focuses on international law and is passionate about human rights and the pro-life cause. Her journey with Jesus took deeper root during her time with the Jesus Youth Bangalore Campus Ministry, which continues to shape her life of prayer and reflection. Outside academia, she’s usually on a trail somewhere, chasing pilgrim paths, music, and quiet corners where nature does the talking, writing down what stays with her.