Trampers in Sakartvelo (Georgia). Part 1: from mountain peaks to the Black Sea
I already said that I loved Georgia, and that as much as my heart leaped everytime I crossed the Armenia-Georgia border, it mourned each time I had to leave Tbilisi to come back to the country of khash and aveluk (sorry armenians, there is a lot of sarcasm in there!). Anyhow, to satisfy my apetite for always more of Georgia, I decided to spend a month in this beautiful country (and hoped to maybe get tired of it ;)). Many visits to the hospital (south caucasian water+air mustn't be good for me...), and waiting to get my driving license (don't ask me how I got it having never learnt how to drive backwards, I guess we could call it a miracle, or the miracle work or blond hair in a corrupt country...) delayed my departure a little, but on August 24th, Tabea and I were sitting in a huge truck on our way to the Georgian capital.
On the taxi to get from the outskirts of the city to the center, I start speaking with myprimitive georgian and doing georgian dances, amuzing both Tabea and the driver. But after a few minutes, I realised that the driver was actually armenian (I had forgotten that half of the taxi drivers in Tbilisi are armenian) and I started talking to him like a normal person. That's me.. hehe...
After a few days in Tbilisi, spent between oversleeping, going to embassies and wallpapering my friend's appartment, Tabea and I decided to go to the Georgian Mountains. We found our tramper group (for definition check tramper.com), adventurous, sporty, and open to anything that comes on the way. Tabea, Josh, Behzad, and I left Tbilisi with bags full of camping equipment and food for a week. We hitchhiked towards Kazbegi, and had some first adventures as Behzad and I didn't make it to our destination but got invited by the police to stay in an empty hotel for free ;) I know we are very bad tourists that don't stimulate local economic growth, but that's what happens after travelling for so long... you become an expert at living cheap and seizing opportunities. And its the best way to meet 'real' people and learn about their lives. The days in Kazbegi were nice, but quite low in surprises and adrenaline. Sleeping on the balcony of a guesthouse (free of course), meeting more israelis than georgian and celebrating the shabat...
Back in Tbilisi, Behzad decided to make his way to Yerevan, and Josh, Tabea and I were off for more impressive mountains: SVANETI! However, the next morning, we had our feet in the Black Sea as one of our drivers was a Turkish man from Batumi and invited us to stay at his house (you know... cheap, spontaneous, and cultural.. we were in!). It was great, nice turkish family and food (I almost became the man's second wife as his actual wife was on a holiday, but we managed to leave on time ;)), it was good to see and feel the sea after a year without a glimpse of anything bigger than lake Sevan.
The ride to Mestia, the largest town in Svaneti, was a long one... Through a half built mountain road, full of slow construction trucks and workers. In a dangerous part of the road, one of our drivers forced me to take of my seating belt, saying 'ok ok no police, no problem !!!'. I guess I was offending his driver's pride, and I was happy he was quite a good driver after all. It takes a lot of faith to travel!
To be continued... Check out part 2 ;)