GEORGIA – HITCHING, HIKING AND HOME BREW

And wine. Wine! But it was not alliterative, so did not make the title.

We went to Georgia in the middle of 2021. It was a bit of a final treat for ourselves because, notwithstanding having been on the road/off work for circa 14 months at this point, it all seemed a bit much to expect we would head straight back to the working world from our cycle trip and subsequent 4 months spent in NZ with family. As such, the moment we figured out we could get into Georgia with our sparkly new NZ vaccines, we booked a ticket to make sure we had a couple of weeks there before I reentered the workforce.

Some fun facts about Georgia.

1. Georgia was the birthplace of Stalin. Something of which the Georgians generally seemed relatively proud until relatively recently. Apparently the next generation did not think mass purges and gulags were a super cool thing for which a compatriot to be known (or, people are only now willing to speak out). In any event, we went to the Stalin museum in Gori and it was actually really interesting. That said, it is certainly not woke, so is unlikely to last in its current form too much longer. Basically, the museum has been maintained exactly as it was on its last refurbishment – in all its propaganda pushing glory (said refurbishment occurred prior to the fall of the Soviet Union). As such, it was really more a historical monument in a sense than a museum providing curated information. It was interesting to walk around though and look at the history presented through the Soviet viewpoint of the early 1980s.

2. Driving. Georgians enjoying performing death defying feats on the regular apparently. Participating in the Georgian public transport experience includes an exciting combination of playing a high speed game of chicken with the bovine population of the country coupled with an attempt to practice drifting and pass every other vehicle on the road as quickly as mechanically possible without skidding out – preferably on a hairpin bend. Sure to get one’s heart rate up and make one forget about the stifling temperatures of the packed mini-vans.  This made for an exciting introduction to Georgia as we careened our way up the winding roads to Svaneti on arrival. Lucky for us, we also got to enjoy this adventure subsequently when heading up to Stepantsminda.

3. Wine Tasting (*hiccup* guzzling). The wine in Georgia is sensational – and, no surprises, we indulged (more on this below). Oddly, one thing that we really struggled with was that they don’t exactly have a concept of wine “tasting”. You can go and do lots of “tastings”, but they will invariably pour you a full glass of whatever wine they decide to give you, so at 3 wines I was totally maxed out and needed some food. Which, to be fair, was often also provided. Add to this the fact that you were typically sitting in someone’s living room while doing the tasting and they were opening a bottle from their private cellar – sipping and spitting out the balance was not exactly polite. This obviously meant that a certain amount of stamina and wine drinking capacity was required to truly get to know a bit about Georgian wine in the course of the 4 days we had accorded to this activity. I think we performed rather admirably.

4. Home Brew. Not only do Georgians make wine, but they also indulge in some pretty epic home brew distilling activity. This basically includes the alcohol reserved from the wine making process distilled and then coupled with whatever fun random fruit/leaves/etc they have on hand. Often a mix is added to as it sits and steeps.  Everything from marijuana, peaches (our favourite), tarragon, cherries, plumbs, and more are fair game. We did not go blind and the additions were mostly pretty tasty (if potent), so overall a good time.

4. Scenery. As one expects on choosing to travel to Georgia, the scenery really is truly epic. The Caucaus mountains are spectacular and actually pretty accessible. Even if you are not a major hiker, you can get to towns surrounded by stunning peaks by road. If you hike, there are heaps of accessible day and multi-day hikes (many of which allow you to stay in villages and therefore avoid the preparation and luggage necessary to a camping excursion). If you are into mountaineering, there is a heap too (or so we understand, we are not that intense). 

5. Carpets. Of course. Probably we need to stop doing this, but we once again chose to travel to a country known for its history of carpet production. We were actually interested in acquiring something here as we do not have anything from this region, and we have something of a collection at this point. However, on arrival, everything seemed insanely pricy and we determined that we would not bother. We obviously jinxed it, because we managed to purchase not one, but two carpets, before leaving the country. In our defense, they are amazing and possibly among our favourites. Not really sure that makes it better – but they made me happy anyway.

6. Cheese bread. Georgian cuisine is fantastic. In our opinions.  There are an amazing variety of herbs, lots of vegetables, fantastic salad and stews. That said, it also benefits from the amazing invention that is khachapuri in all its wondrous forms. Basically khachapuri can be summed up as various ways in which to stuff cheese into bread – obviously a winning concept.  The Georgians do truly take this to the next level in terms of availability (everywhere), variety (almost limitless), and quality (absolutely banging). A favourite with just about everyone is the Adjarian khachapuri from the Black Sea coast (but you can get it everywhere), which is essentially a bread boat, filled with cheese and topped with a lightly cooked egg yolk. On receiving this delicacy at your table you pop the yolk and stir the egg through the cheese. Following this bit of fanfare, you are ready to rip a piece of bread off the edge, dunk it into the cheese mix and take that one step closer to a heart attack. Followed by the next step. And the next. As you quickly manage to work your way through the cheese boat.

To the route. Given that we (only) had two weeks in Georgia, we decided to focus our attentions and be a touch more organized than is typical for us. As such, we prioritized. We had been in NZ for 4 months enjoying family time and eating and drinking our way around the country. We would take the time in Georgia and head to the mountains to hike. This would comprise 2/3 of our time in the country. Appropriately detoxed and invigorated from the mountain scenery (and hauling our unfit butts up and down various mountainsides) we would spend the last 1/3 of our time in the country focusing on trying as much wine as we could handle (as yet oblivious to the true courage of conviction this would require). No doubt some solid decision making on our part.

With this in mind, after spending a day recovering from flying in Tbilisi and starting our detox with some cheese bread, dumplings and red wine, we hopped on a train across the country to make our way to Zugdidi and onwards to Mestia, the starting point for most hiking in Svaneti.

Mestia itself is a cute town with not all that much going on. We spent a night, chucked on our packs and headed out the next morning. We spent four days hiking to Ushguli with overnight stops at Zhabeshi, Adishi and Iprari. The mountains where spectacular, the glaciers were glacial and the weather was stinking hot. There were ancient watchtowers dotting the landscape and overseeing our entrance and exit from the various idyllic towns en route. There were quite a few other hikers to talk to (but happily not so many as to ruin the experience).  There was banging food every night offered by the welcoming homestays we frequented.  And, perhaps my favourite part, the mountains and meadows were abundantly draped in one the most spectacular arrays of wild flowers I have yet had the pleasure to experience (that said, it did seem to make the hike a bit of a nightmare for those suffering from hayfeaver).  Suffice to say, I thought Svaneti was very worthwhile.

Following our hike, we worked our way back to Gori, visited the aforementioned Stalin museum and then moved onwards to Kazbegi – or as I had previously known it, the place with the church on the hill included in all postcard pictures of, and all guide books relating to, Georgia. It did not disappoint. After our driver spent three hours trying his best to do an impersonation of Schumacher up the winding mountainsides – we arrived. Happily, friends we had made in Svaneti happened to be in town, so we managed to head out immediately to check out the not so stellar restaurant scene and enjoy a couple of glasses wine to prep for the a hike to the glacier the next day. We, of course, did the classic hike to get the photo of the famous church. We then headed on to the glacier. A very worthwhile full day walk followed by a much better restaurant for dinner.

On to our final hike of the trip – we decided that we wanted to head from Juta (also in the Kazbegi area) to Roshka across a mountain pass. That said, we actually decided that while it would be okay to hike it, ideally we would get some horses and get a ride over the peaks. For me, this was clearly because I was very lazy by this point (nothing less than general uselessness would get me on a horse after previous less than stellar experiences in this regard). For Tom, this was because hanging out with horses for a day clearly beats hiking for a day. Pretty sure it also beats hanging out with me for the day. Anyway. As it turned out, our budget did not stretch to the eyewatering cost of equine transport, so we determined to get walking. This walk was a very long day walk over a very large mountain – but very much worth it. Absolutely spectacular the whole way notwithstanding a bit of cloud on the top. We made it through to Roshka completing our last hike of the trip and finding our way to some wine at the homestay at the bottom of the mountain just as the weather packed it in! Success.

Onwards to wine country – we hit first Telavi and then Sighnaghi – with a bit of hitching around and in between the two towns. Our time spent in these towns was very much focused on wine tasting, but we did hit a few of the key churches, which were nice. 

The Georgian’s have been making wine for a long long time and have an absolutely insane number of grape varietals (saperavi is probably the most prolific red and rkatsiteli the most prolific white (although you do also see a fair amount of mtsvane and kisi around)). On top of this, the traditional approach to wine making was to have a massive terracotta urn (quevri) buried in your back yard and to stuff everything (skins, stalks, etc) from the grape harvest in and then sit back and let it do its thing. As such, they have some incredibly banging, incredibly tanic wines (to get the idea, all their “white” wines are traditionally amber due to the skins and the reds were incredibly thick). Divisive for some Western European palates – but we were onboard. Basically everyone has a couple of quevris in their back yard and the families that are more into it have a marani (cellar) and you can go round, sit about and have a taste with them. We found a few places that were absolutely amazing and met some great people. In addition, we went to some more established wineries, which as a typical thing were not really better.

However, we did hit Pheasants Tears, which has been on our list for the last 6 years or so after trying a bottle in London, and we absolutely loved the place and the wine – no shock there. Separate from the wine, Sighnaghi is also a totally adorable town on a hill that is worth visiting in any event.

After our boozy outing in Khaketi, we returned to Tbilisi for the aforementioned carpet buying, hit a final wine shop, to do some of the tourist activities (check out some churches, take a gondola up the hill) and have a steam bath. This last was amazing – old Russian bath houses in the center of town will let you have a private room for a bargain price along with an attendant to come and give you a good scrub down and pummeling. I very much enjoyed this not least because it was very comical watching a very jolly man happily massage Tom with a force and enthusiasm to be reckoned with. We also managed to meet up with our friends once again to enjoy an ill-fated evening of delicious Georgian food and questionable decisions (not least consuming alcohol from the very smelly drinking horns Tom had insisted on purchasing from a local market and I have since vetoed using as permanent décor in our apartment, much to his enduring disappointment (picture evidence above)).

In summary, Georgia was most definitely an excellent outing and managed pack a whole lot of punch into a relatively small area.

July 2021