Before this journey, our experience with the disputed regions in the Caucasus - Abkhazia, South Ossetia, and Nagorno-Karabakh - amounted to a few news articles and flashpoint body-count news tickers drifting across the bottom of our television screens.

Something bad had happened, people had died, but we never truly appreciated or understood the details. Continue Reading »

When you get there, you’ll meet the Afghan at the telephone pole.

These instructions given to us in Mestia by the Svaneti Mountaineering Tourism Center left us baffled. Is our mountain guide a member of the Mujahideen who’d lost his way and made his home in the mountains of Georgia? After all, in Svaneti just about anything seems possible. Continue Reading »

 

 Svaneti Tunes [1:09m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

As the first tourists to take advantage of the Svaneti Mountaineering Tourism Center (SMTC), we planned our arrival in the town of Mestia to coincide with the organization’s inaugural party. Because of our exceptionally long ride from Zugdidi to Mestia, we barely arrived in time for the opening speeches, including one which singled us out and unexpectedly turned the local crowd’s attention to us. Continue Reading »

Some cities seem to exist in two dimensions, best taken in with a camera from afar. Not Tbilisi. Its turbulent history is a veritable bullet list of invasions, destructions, occupations, and reconstructions. As a result, it tends to reveal itself in layers, both architecturally and culturally. Labyrinthine and tactile, Tbilisi invites visitors to dig into it like urban archaeologists intent on determining its composition and its narrative. Continue Reading »

Between embassy queues for visas, we’ve been taking advantage of Tashkent’s surprising supply of wifi and internet cafes.

As a result, we finally have some photos to show from Armenia and Azerbaijan, thereby completing our visual tour of the Caucasus. Continue Reading »

I tell you, the Svanetians are crazy. Their brains are deficient in oxygen.

- A Tbilisi resident describing how the high altitudes of Svaneti have affected its people.

Svaneti, the high Caucasus mountain region in the northwestern corner of Georgia, has a long reputation of fierce independence characterized by the 12th century defensive towers that still dot many of its villages. More recently, Svaneti has been feared as outlaw territory where bandits and escaping terrorists from nearby Abkhazia, Chechnya and Ingushetia took refuge as locals holed up in their homes with guns at the ready. Continue Reading »

Every inch of our map of Georgia seemed to covered with little icons marking churches, monasteries, ancient settlements, caves, mountains, towns, villages, and vineyards. Though we spent a month in Georgia, we only experienced a fraction of what’s on offer. Continue Reading »

“The driving here is something special; only India is worse.” - Anonymous, on the rules of the road in Georgia

The more we travel, the more stories we collect about Georgian driving habits. For example, one of the Mongol Rally teams traveling without a map of Tblisi, decided to hire a taxi to show them the way through the city. After a harrowing bob and weave through town, “rather like a video game,” the rally driver asked the taxi driver for a hotel recommendation. The taxi driver, thinking they were looking for prostitutes, replied “How much time do you need? One hour? Will that be enough?” Continue Reading »

While putting the finishing touches on our website, we spent a considerable amount of time at internet cafés in Tbilisi, Georgia. At one café, we noticed a semi-private room set up with couches, comfortable chairs and computers outfitted with webcams for video Skype calls. The typical configuration: children and grandmother crowded around the computer and Mommy or Daddy on the video screen. So, what’s going on here? Continue Reading »

In Georgia, the food is quite appropriately an expression of the culture. Warm, gooey comfort food like khajapuri (cheese-stuffed bread) finds balance with matsoni (sour yogurt). Herbs like tarragon, flat parsley, dill and coriander combine with walnuts and garlic for rich fillings and sauces. Continue Reading »