Kasbegi - one of Georgia’s well known mountain peaks
One of our trips out of Tbilisi took us to one of Georgia’s best known spots, the Gergeti Trinity Church (still being used for worship) which sits above the village of Stepantsminda in the shadow of the towering Kasbegi mountain peak. (5033m).
The journey there took us along the Georgian Military Road which leads to the border with Russia and is used extensively by Heavy Goods vehicles crossing between the two Countries. At Gergeti we were only a few kilometres from the border itself. Something was going badly wrong with the border and we saw many thousands of lorries and their patient drivers parked at the roadside between settlements waiting to cross. This line of lorries extended for many kilometers and was actively policed. This was to keep things orderly but also to stop the lorries from entering and parking in the small villages and hamlets along the route and blocking up and ruining normal life.
Our first stop en route was in a layby at the far end of a man-made reservoir, where sat a small cluster of beautiful fortified churches. The larger of the two dating to 1689 (Ananauri). The tower above the Church is a 12th Century watchtower part of a set built to defend the valley. It seems that originally it had been planned to flood the valley beyond this point and the Churches would have been lost. Local protests were heeded and the Church and its amazing view down the valley have survived! As it is, the village of Ananauri itself was lost under the reservoir.
Ananuri Fortified church at head of reservoir
Part of Ananuri complex
Sprinter strutting its stuff
Hoping to capture tourists with trinkets
Favorite Georgian tipple
The Military road climbs through a very high Cross Pass at 2395m. It is incredible that normally thousands of HGVs make it up there daily. Fairly near the top of the pass there existed an untidy mess of apartments, chalets, hotels and rooms in what we learnt was a major Georgian ski resort with a single main road passing right through the middle. The road is closed for 7 months of the year (November - May) and the roads, messy escarpements and abandoned building materials are then covered in snow. At this time of year it just looks a disorganised mess.
Driving ever higher, eventually the views back down the valley from the top of the pass, with the ski village hidden far down below, were amazing and many stopped to photograph the scene. We continued on down towards Stepandsminda, the village nestled below Kasbegi and other mountain peaks as we still had to reach our destination, the Gelati Trinity Church and the day was getting late.
We had a couple of Wild Camping suggestions from iOverlander and this included parking up close to the Church right up in the mountains where temperatures plunged at night. We knew that 4x4 taxis took tourists up there regularly but they were not our size and weight. We were uncertain whether our Sprinter would make to the Church as the road was steep and narrow. We were prepared, if necessary, to walk 5kms up the steep track the following day.
We should not have worried at all because it was exactly the kind of steep and narrow road that the Sprinter excelled at. The only heart in mouth moment was a small section where part of the narrow road had recently collapsed down the escarpment, and cones were in place to ensure vehicles did not drive on the loose edges. There was evidence of fairly recent heavy winds and rains as there were also trees fallen across the road which had yet to be properly cleared. We are quite heavy and wide and you do have to have a bit of a leap of faith as we squeezed through. When we arrived at the plateau, the space opened up into meadows. Parking areas had been created which totally masked the steep climb up involved to get there!
The Church looked stunning against the greenery of the meadows and the soaring snow capped peaks behind. We entered through the belltower, where a priest was tolling a bell to summon the faithful to prayer. There were the most amazing views in every direction. The view of the Church and belltower with mountains behind had deservedly become a symbol of Georgia. It appeared on the front of our Bradt guide to the country and was tattooed on the arm of our guide in Tbilisi.
We found ourselves nestled under the gaze of the Church as light was fading and we resolved to attempt a longish walk up above the snow line the following day. I could not believe that I was going to sleep and waking up in the morning with uninterrupted views of such a sight!
In fact the weather in the few days before had been pretty foul (wet and cold/snowy) and the temperature had been forecast to drop to minus 6 degrees during the night. As we had planned to stay overnight and walk up to the neighbouring Gergeti Glacier it made sense to choose a warmer sunny day. We decided to wait a day or two so that we could take advantage of better weather and less chilly nights. This worked perfectly. People we were in touch with said it had been snowing and cold the day before and we got clear skies and full sunshine!
The next morning we resolved to walk up towards the glacier and see how far we could get. It was not a great distance but the beginning of the trail was particularly steep and although the snow line was receeding, it was not clear how far we could safely go. We had poles and boots, warm gear and food etc. There were also quite a few younger couples in trainers! As this was the first test for my new hip and Jim had just had his 75th birthday, it felt a bit intrepid for us. We expected it to take us 6 hours. (4 up and 2 down). The image below is an extract from the route we had downloaded.
Route of our Gergeti Glacier walk. Snow stopped play.
We had downloaded the footpath into maps me, courtesy of the Hoggs. This gave us extra assurance that we had not wandered off and also ensured we knew how far we had gone along the route.
Most of it was pretty uphill most of the time but there was a patch which opened up into a high meadow. Late Spring flowers were trying to poke through and patches of snow were melting away from the footpath. The meadow was being grazed by a large flock of noisy sheep and goats. The shepherd and his dogs were looking on as we disturbed the herd, but were largely snoozing in the sun.
We ploughed on up and had to increasingly tramp through melting snowy patches crossing the path. The Gergeti Church became smaller and smaller and the Sprinter in the car park eventually became a small black dot.
Looking down on Gergeti Monastery. Black Sprinter visible in car park
Well I do have to report that whilst we made it to the top of the pass, from there on it was too snowy for us to continue. The path was no longer visible and progress would have been too slow and dangerous. Our descent was almost as slow as our ascent, but we felt elated by all we had seen and delighted that we had made it that far up in spite of a bit of altitude challenge. (We were about 3,000 metres when we turned around and had tramped up nearly 1,000 metres!
Another peak near Kasbek
