Places of Loneliness - Part 2

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Entry

  Tbilisi, Georgia
Friday, September 3, 2004

Part 2 of 2

We stood looking across the river at Chechnya.

The road from Shatili had come north and now turned a sharp bend into a southwards valley.

Somewhere in front of us a new road began, leading 60km to Grozny, one of the most troubled places in modern human history.

Below us stood small black buildings. They were the tombs of plague victims who bricked themselves up inside in order to save the rest of the population of the area.

It seemed that after hundreds of years the same desolation of the physical world and same hardiness of human spirit still survived here.

It was day 7 of our big trek across the mountains and our first back on the road after resting at Shatili for a day.

The weather was still blessing us with sharp, cutting sunshine and our packs were reassuringly heavy after a stock up of kerosine, bread and cheese.

The valley slowly climbed towards the ancient city of Mutso. It was Shatili's counterpart, guarding this part of Khevsureti from raiders from the north. Unlike Shatili it was completely abandoned now and stood proudly ruined on a mountain top, high above the valley floor.

After stashing our packs in some long grass we climbed up to the bones of the city. The towers were still impressive but nothing remained of the civilisation that had built them.

From the heights of the hilltop we looked south-east at the heavy line of mountains crowned by Mount Tebulos (4492m) and stretching south, cutting off Khevsureti from the next province, Tusheti. Somewhere in those mountains was the Atsunta pass (3431m) which we had to somehow cross to reach our goal of the village of Omalo.

We retrieved our bags from the grass after climbing down from the ruins and continued south. We were sweating and sweating and struggling to stay rehydrated. Despite this we were making good time and decided to climb to the OSCE POP (Prominent Observation Point) underneath the Atsunta pass instead of camping on the valley floor.

After drinking fresh mountain water until we were about to burst and filling up our supply of bottles, we began the 1100m slog up the side of the steep valley.

As we climbed Mount Tebulos became visible, its snow covered peak shrouded in a skullcap of white cloud.

On topping the final rise, we found the Polish OSCE monitor, Czeslaw, sunbathing with a book and a huge pair of binoculars. In between pages he would check the pass that run north directly in front of us to see if anyone had crossed the Chechen border.

We chatted as we cooled down before setting up camp on the shelf below the POP. We'd walked 18km for the day.

"This is the coolest camp ever," I said looking out over Tebulos. The sun was going down behind us and was painting the giant peak in shades of gold and scarlet.

"Yep, the coolest camp ever," said Mike, echoing my sentiment.

It was a little chillier camping at a higher altitude but we woke as the sun rose directly above Tebulos, showering the whole mountain in heavenly light.

We were pumped. We'd checked out our route to the pass with the OSCE guys' military maps. The weather was clear. Our food supplies were good and we'd refilled all of our water bottles. Everything was in our favour to cross the pass that day.

With a final thanks to the OSCE guys, we departed. We needed to climb to the top of the nearest ridge, then follow it along for 5kms until we spotted a path through the pass and into Tusheti.

As we got to the top of the ridge we could see the pass next to a jagged mouth of peaks topping a black glacial bowl. We saw the ridge follow round into some scree. We decided not to risk following the ridge in case it was loose and we descended 50m off the ridge and shadowed it across shale runoffs and over sharp vertical ravines cutting the valley side.

"Snake, I see a snake!!!!" Mike shouted, mimicking a song he'd heard on the internet.

I stopped dead behind him. I didn't want my approach to spook the snake into attacking him.

"Where is it?"

"Right in front of me."

"How big?"

"About half a meter. Its in a striking position."

Czeslaw had warned us about the Caucasian vipers around this area. We'd spotted one or two little ones escaping into the long grass but had so far managed to avoid any more personal encounters.

"I'm going to try and move it with my stick," said Mike. We were on a 10cm wide cattle track at the top of a steep hill. We couldn't really go around it.

"Get ready..."

I waited.

"Woah!" he shouted as the snake attacked his stick. He jumped aside as it ploughed past, straight towards me. I dived aside and let it disappear into the rocks.

"He was a nasty little bugger," I said as Mike examined the end of his staff appreciatively.

Laughing at our encounter, we topped the final rise onto a nice shallow bowl of thick mountain grass and sat down on the ridge, looking out over the next valley.

We had a celebatory snack and I took a few mandatory "view from the pass" photos. We looked down and spotted the river that turned up the valley and led to the first town in Tusheti, Girevi (approx 2000m).

I was quite underwhelmed by the pass. Tony Anderson, whose book gave us the idea of the trek, gave a harrowing account of the pass: deadly stretches of steep rock, ice and shale.

I looked around at the nice grass covered ridge beside us.

"He must of gone through the wrong point. Accidently ended up in those peaks or something," I said to Mike. "That wasn't that hard at all!"

We began the descent. We had a skip in our step and powered down the hill towards the river.

After 20 minutes of down, down, down, I sat down, leant back on my pack, shouted out: "bollocks to this walking malarchy!" and began sliding at breakneck pace down the grass slope. Mike whooped in delight as he followed my channel through the grass.

I kept my stick handy to fend off any startled snakes and we stopped every now and tried to pry out the terrible wedgies we were given by the slide.

We dropped quickly and were thankful to find a good cattle path to continue.

"I guess we follow this to the river and head up one of those two side valleys," I said.

"Sounds good."

We checked the map and took a bearing on our compasses. I realised that we hadn't done so at the top of the pass.

The bearing didn't match the map. We looked over it carefully. The topography was completely correct: there was the pass, there the river and there the turn in the river towards Girevi.

"It must be magnetic drift or something," I said.

"Yeah, everything is right but the bearing is weird."

"Lets keep going. We'll get down to the river and work it out from there."

We kept going and started to get more and more alarmed as the valley turned west, then north-west. It felt like we were doing a circle.

"I think we've gone wrong," said Mike.

"But that was the pass. There was no where else it could be," I said. I was suddenly realising how fundamental a mistake it was not taking a bearing from the pass. It was one of the first things you get taught in Boy Scouts.

"Well we need to get to the river anyway. I've got about half a liter of water left and its damn hot up here," I continued.

Mike agreed and we kept to the cattle path around the valley edge.

Our growing confusion drove us forward without considering our position.

The path suddenly stopped at the edge of a dried mud gully which looked promising.

"I think we can get down here."

I stepped onto the direct slope and was tumbling down the hill. The sky was below me, dust tearing my skin, rocks hitting, shouting, stop stop stop!!!!!

I clung to a thatch of grass. The heart was bursting in my ears. I was covered in a curtain of yellow smoke. My arm was bleeding, scratches carved along the skin. My stick was clutched like a weapon in my sweat stained hands. I must have unconciously used it to slow my fall enough to grab the grass.

I spat out a mouthful of dust.

"Mike!"

I looked over and above me. Another cloud of smoke rose from the gully.

"Mike!"

"Yeah!"

"Are you ok?"

"Yeah. I've lost my stick," he said.

I touched my head. My new hat!

"I've lost my hat."

"I can see my stick. Can you get over to it?" said Mike.

I tested the dirt beside me. It was too slick to climb.

"I can't get up there. The ground is too loose."

"I'll try and get it."

"OK. I can see my hat below me."

"I'm taking off my backpack," said Mike. I could just see him above me, shrouded behind some grass in different rivulet of the gully. He secured it to a small shrub and started climbing.

"Shit! My pack!"

The anguished cry lifted my sight from my hat. A stream of dust spiralled into the hazy air as Mike's pack slipped down the hill. It was too far away for me to get to.

"Can you see it!!" The panic was rising in Mike's voice.

"Yeah, yeah, its sliding. Stop, you bastard, stop!" I willed it to stop but began to turn faster and faster. It approached a drop off and slowed down.

"Its stopping! Its stopping!" I shouted.

"It is?"

"Oh no. Its gone over the cliff. I can't believe it!"

"Can you see it!?"

"Its tumbling, its... oh damn... its opened up... things are flying out... your mug is gone... it pirouetted into the grass." Why I chose the word "pirouette" at a time like that I do not know.

"My mug!" There was two items Mike had with him that mattered more than anything to him: his metal mug and his metal water bottle. He'd carried them on dozens of trips around the world and they had taken on totem significance for him.

I slumped to the ground. Even though I couldn't see him, I know Mike was similarly defeated. The enormity of what had happened was dawning on me. All of the pasta and rice was in his bag, as was the stove.

It was game over.

"Its stopped," I said.

"Can you see it?"

"No. Its gone. Two, maybe three hundred meters."

Mike let out almost an animal cry of anguish.

"We have to get down," he said.

"Fuck the stick. Fuck the hat. Just get down and take stock."

"Agreed."

And that was how I lost my second hat of the trip.

I touched the silver Saint Christopher sitting around my neck briefly for luck and started a tentative slide down the hill, using my stick as an oar to press me into the side of the gully where thick grass could be used to slow my descent.

Underneath the small 5m cliff where Mike's bag had been launched into space I spotted some debris: some cheese, a plastic bag, some Tylenol...

With clouds of angry dust at his heels Mike slid down to meet me. He was in worse shape than me. By losing his stick he'd had nothing to slow his fall. Blood covered his hands and his face was matted with filth and sweat.

"Where did my mug go?"

"Over there somewhere. Into that thicket. Its gone, buddy. It was catapaulted miles."

"Shit!"

I showed him the bits and bobs I'd collected. There was nothing useful.

We suppressed the communal despair we could see growing in each other's eyes and continued.

Below the slope of the gully disappeared into a thick jungle of giant rhubarb-like trees. From the valley side they looked like innocous shrubbery, but their depth was hidden by the gully. We entered the jungle.

"I see it! I see it! Your bag." I let out a whoop of victory.

I scrambled over a dirt mound and dived into the thicket which was postered with the word "Berghaus".

"I see your mug!"

"My mug!"

"It must've been your water bottle I saw fly off."

"Damn. I loved that bottle."

"No, no... I see your bottle. I can't believe its still on there."

"My bottle!"

We reached the bag and took stock. The main pouch had held. Only a side pocket had opened up. Everything else was still in there, its state of repair after the violent fall was unknown, but at least we still had most of our stuff.

We were still dejected but at least it wasn't complete worst case scenario. We'd only lost some goat's cheese, a can of ravioli and a plastic fork. We never worked out what the silver thing I saw flying into the bushes was. Mike's camera was also smashed and no longer worked.

"Lets get down to the river."

"OK. Give me room."

Mike moved away and I began beating my way through the jungle with my stick, giving complete vent to my fury and despair with primal, mindless violence.

Damn, damn, damn!

It was utterly ridiculous. We were covered in dust, bleeding and beaten down and just wanted so much to be by the river. I almost wanted to sit down and cry.

On top of that was the dejection of defeat, knowing we were so close yet somehow managed to screw up the pass. And I had the guilt of almost getting us killed by choosing to go down the stupid gully welling up inside me.

It took one hour and we limped out of the rhubarb forest and to the edge of the river.

Mike undressed to his boxers and went and sat down in the cold water. I set out my t-shirt to dry and washed the blood and grime off my arms and face.

"I could've got us killed," I said.

"But we survived. Its no one's fault. You didn't know it was going to be super-slippery," said Mike.

"But still..."

"Bullshit. No one's to blame. We both screwed up and thats that. No point dwelling on it."

I splashed some more of the icey water over my face and suddenly realised an old man was walking past us.

"Mike, a person!"

The old man suddenly had two half naked crazy men way lay him on the edge of the river. We must have looked like creatures out "Where the Wild Things Are."

We interrogated him and he looked at us in disbelief. Mike's russian again saved the day.

"What is this river?"

"The Andaki. Andaki village is down there." He pointed downstream.

We'd looped on ourselves. We later realised we had walked too far south on the ridge line and had completely missed the pass. That is why Tony Anderson's description didn't match ours: we'd been 300m or so too low to cross the true pass. I felt shame at the memory of my doubting his path.

We'd come about 11km and dropped about 2000m of altitude. The mistake had been a complete and utter disaster.

"Who are you?" asked the old man.

"Tourists. He is from New Zealand. I am from Canada," said Mike.

The old man shrugged, made the sign of the cross over us and resumed his walk up the river. He must have been doubting his sanity after meeting us!

I took the stove out of Mike's backpack.

When I bought it, I asked Stealth at the camping store if it would survive a fall down the side of a mountain.

"These things are tough as guts. You'll have no problem."

Little did I know that it was going to have to survive exactly that.

It lit on the first attempt and we cooked up some instant noodles. We needed familiar tastes to try and boost our morale.

As we sat and slurped down the MSG-infused broth, we began to talk about the day and its implications. We still had plenty of food and the stove worked fine. I'd been carrying the tent and it was undamaged.

"We should have another crack," said Mike, blowing the steam from his dented metal mug.

I could tell we were both thinking the same thing. Part of us was saying "you're beaten. Give up. Go home before you get yourself killed out here in this forsaken place." Another part was saying "if you give up now it will haunt you forever."

"We could follow this river back around and climb back up into the bowl we'd dropped down into," I said.

"One more try. Then at least we can go home knowing we'd given it a go."

"I agree."

I had a restless sleep, my body was sore and my mind alight with worries and plans.

We both woke with a new sense of resolution. We were getting back up to that pass and that was final.

Mike tested out a new staff of birch wood he had found nearby and I tied on my bandana in place of my lost stick.

"Lets do this."

We followed the river for a couple of hundred meters until the tributary which led to our target broke off. No people ever came this way. This was evident by the thick jungle growth and complete absence of any paths through the tangle and along the cliff edges leading to the roaring river.

We took turns bush-whacking through the trees and thorns. The canopy blocked the hills from our eyes and insects tormented our every move. The sweat mingled with the filth of days of not washing and the madness of our resolve grew.

I began to play the part of Charlie Sheen in Platoon, leading a patrol through impenetrable enemy jungle.

We climbed rocky ledges, smashed through thickets of vines and grass, waded waist deep through the river. Our shoulders ached and wet socks rubbed the blisters on our feet raw.

If one person stumbled and fell, the other would use their staff to stop the fall into a rocky torrent of cold water.

Obsession with passing the river grew and grew until finally the gorge walls climbed up like a raven's wings and we could go no further.

So we climbed up, up the grass slope before the gorge. For hours we crawled through the grass and spiderwebs until exhausted we once again sat on the cattle path which we had followed to our folly the day before.

"I have a plan. You may not like it, but I have a plan."

"OK. What is it?" said Mike.

"We climb as high into the bowl as possible. Camp about 300m under the ridge line in case there is a lightning storm. Then in the morning we cross the pass or retreat back to the POP if the weather is bad."

Mike took a few seconds.

"Agreed."

The path led us back into the bowl we'd so flippantly walked into, thinking it was Tusheti.

It then dropped and rejoined the river as it climbed into the shadow of the black mountains ahead. There was no jungle now, we were too high. Only grass and low wirey plants lived at this altitude.

When we hit a huge snow bridge engulfing the river, we decided to climb to a plateau we could vaguely see about 800m above us.

The way was steep and the wild mountain grass provided the momentum to pass patches of treacherous scree like what we'd fallen into the day before.

Hours passed and the skies darkened above.

Somehow we eventually lay on a grass plateau, too exhausted to move. I lay on my back, my pack still strapped on, staring at the ominous clouds which were moving in above us. A sheen of sweat like a sense of victory lay on our brows. After our heroic effort we were 300m short of repairing the damage done by our navigational mistake.

"That was really stupid," I said refering to the climb up from the base of the valley. I could've been refering to any of our actions of the past 2 days.

"Yes," said Mike.

"Let's never ever do anything like that again."

"OK."

"And let's never tell anyone about it."

"Good idea. Especially our parents."

We cooked a quick meal before the approaching storm arrived. We were camped at over 3000m and were prepared for a cold night.

We'd covered 6kms and risen over 2000m in 9 hours. That gives you an idea of how tough the terrain was.

Lightning illuminated the tent like an x-ray and the wind threatened to pick us up and throw us into the ravine below. Huge bellows of rolling thunder screamed at us, trying to tear our sanity and nerve away from us.

I lay there, willing the tent to hold out, while finishing my copy of Lermontov. I didn't fancy sleeping the night rolled up in my emergency survival blanket if the fly of the tent tore open.

My fears were for nothing and the storm blew itself out in a few hours. We settled down and slept, restlessly but with thanks at the new calm that had fallen over Khevsureti.

The morning was cloudy yet held a promise of clear weather later.

After the success of the previous day, we were amped for the Atsunta pass.

First we had to get to the top of the ridge. It was a one and a half hour walk straight up the side of the hill. Once on the ridge, it was another hours walk up along it to the highest point.

We stopped as the ridge turned from lunar waste to the sharp teeth which made up the left hand side of the mouth of mountains within which we'd spent so long inside.

Sitting there we took a bearing. A line of mountains sat to the east at the head of a large rising valley. The mountains ran north to south and joined the bowl we had just climbed out of.

We knew that Tusheti was behind these black mountains.

But the pass...?

We could see no break in the rock, no paths, no obvious features. Thick cloud hung to the peaks, hiding the details in its jealous tendrils. We knew we were right on the edge of the Chechen border. One of our main concerns was accidently climbing across the border and getting ourselves into some real trouble.

"Where the hell do we go?"

"The map says the pass is right here. I swear it," said Mike checking our position again. This time we were determined to do it right.

"Lets wait 10 minutes and see if the cloud clears."

We sat and waited.

A rumble began to reveberate around the hills.

"Sounds like the OSCE helicopter patrol."

The noise grew and, BOOM, the chopper cut through the mountains ahead of us, over a noticeable low point and headed west towards the POP.

"Thats the pass! The chopper is coming from Girevi patrol base!" I said. Pieces of the puzzle were beginning to fall into place. Snippets of information from the OSCE guys, Tony Anderson's book, the guidebook all were tied together by the helicopter's miraculous appearance.

"Thats Girevi through there! The OSCE chopper wouldn't be allowed to violate Russian airspace. Its still Georgia!"

"I was just thinking the same thing," said Mike, smiling. We knew where to go but we were several hundred meters higher than the pass and about one kilometer across the valley from it.

Below us was a forbidding landscape of sharp gullys lined with broken slate and thick shifts of hard ice and snow.

"We either drop right down, cross the valley and climb back up or we rope together and try and get across this snow."

"Lets rope it," said Mike.

I had the rope slung around me as I'd had a suspicion we'd need it that day. I quickly secured each end around us with a carabiner and we began the long traverse. It was about midday and we'd already been walking for 3 hours uphill. The weather threatened to break but the sun was desperately holding the clouds at bay.

I led the traverse.

We slid down an intial scree slope and then worked our way around the bowl. We carefully crossed huge patches of ice, using the sticks to steady ourselves and check the integrity of our footholds. We ducked under giant protusions of crumbling slate which cut upwards from the scars of scree gullies.

Slowly, we moved, dropping down, climbing up and steadily moving closer and closer to the pass.

As we approached we still couldn't see a way through the wall of mountains. There was a lowest point but the ascent up to seemed as perilous as any of the other peaks.

We'd worked out which terrain was the easiet to climb and I stopped beneath a thin chimney of mud which wound its way up into the rock underneath the edge of a monolithic piece of slate which marked the true edge of the mountain range proper.

The pass lay several hundred more meters to our left.

"This looks good," I said. "We could climb this mud and try and weave our way through."

Mike caught up with me (the second always tried to keep the rope with no slack in case someone fell). He examined the route I had suggested.

"I'll lead if you like."

I gladly let him take charge as I was exhausted from the traverse. Plus he was much better at going uphill than me.

It was slow and arduous. Mike would double kick each piece of mud to create rudimentary stairs behind him. I would follow as the rope threatened to get tight but keeping my distance so not too much slack appeared.

The way began to cross very loose shale as well as the small mud-plastered scree. We could see the top as we zig-zagged through the chimneys leading upwards.

But we soon found that the top was the promise of a false ridge. We were exhausted and sitting on a little outcrop of solid rock we looked upwards at the gates of stone above.

There was definately a vague path through the rocky maze but it just seemed to get steeper and steeper and looser and looser.

The ground began to become so loose it threatened to completely shift beneath us. Each step we took sent an avalanche tumbling down below us to the valley floor.

Up ahead, Mike was having difficulty getting over a small ridge. My feet were sinking into the mud and I could feel the rocks shifting below.

"Mike, how are you doing? Are you anchored yet?" I yelled up, trying to not let my panic infect my voice.

"Not yet. I'm almost there."

"Well you better get over that fucking ledge because the whole mountain is about to go on me."

He sprang over and drove his stick into the mud. With light steps I sprinted up the steep incline as the slide began. The rope drew me forward and I grasped onto Mike's shoulder as a couple of hundred kilos of mud, rock and ice began racing gravity's course.

From our small anchor point, a steep chimney led straight up to the main slate monolith above.

It was too dangerous now to go as a pair. One person had to be anchored, let the other pass and anchor, then pass them and anchor and so on.

We moved like this, painstakingly edging up the mountain. First Mike, then myself, then Mike again. We'd use our sticks and holds of the crumbling slate edges to brace ourselves if the other person slipped.

It was my turn and I heaved my broken body up the slope. Three meters away stood the slate monolith. There was a gap between it and the rest of the ridge.

"Hold on Mike, I see a good spot."

"Hurry, this is not very good here!"

And I was over.

Below me lay Tusheti. The other side of the pass was a gentle gravel bowl leading up to an obvious crossing point over 100m below us. In our ignorance we'd crossed the range much higher than the actual pass.

The cold burrowed through the layers of mud covering me and I smiled in possessed hysteria.

"Its the top, its the top! Come on up!"

"Are you anchored?" said Mike.

"I'm on the other side. There's no way I'm coming back down there!"

Mike scrambled up beside me. We both sat there and gazed into Tusheti, laughing our heads off in diabolical glee. A light sheet of rain covered us but we were already soaked from the ice on the rocks.

We slid down most of the hill on our arses until we reached a solid ice flow. We unroped and began the slow descent towards Girevi.

"My legs are killing me. I need to stop soon," I said after an hour of walking into the valley. "Can we stop at the next spring?"

"Of course," said Mike.

We found a nice spot and cooked up dinner. Afterwards we made some hot cocoa and devoured a chocolate bar in celebration of completing the hardest part of the trek. We'd now crossed 3 out of 4 passes before Omalo.

I looked back up at the wall of rock between us and Khevsureti and decided that it was not a pass but actually a part of hell placed on earth to test man's sanity.

I've climbed mountains before but never anything with that power and scale of earth. It was humbling, a reminder of the minuteness of my place in this world. Every breath felt like a gift, a fresh perfumed beginning.

I sipped my cocoa and was grateful it was over. Now all I wanted to do was lie there and laugh at our struggle.

I was each and every moment and heartbeat.

As we sat there we noticed two figures in the valley below, slowly climbing towards where we sitting.

"Probably just bored locals like in Gudani. Hoping to score some cigarettes."

Mike took all the dishes down to the stream and began the washing up.

The two figures mounted the nearest ridge and walked towards the camp.

"Mike!"

He could not hear me over the noise of the stream.

"Mike!"

Still no reply.

"MIKE!"

"What?"

"There's two locals coming this way and they've got guns."

"Oh shit."

He scrambled up from the stream and we walked a few meters out of our camp towards the new comers.

One man was dressed in full camo while the other was wearing what looked like a blue Adidas tracksuit. They wore camo caps, were laden with heavy ammo pouches, nasty looking knives and had their Kalishnikov rifles ready.

"Gamargabat!"

No answer.

They closed in. Suddenly a thought struck me: we've accidently gone into Chechnya after all. Damn.

"Stay calm! If they want anything..."

"... we give it to them," I said, completing Mike's sentence.

"Even the secret stash?" Mike said. He was refering to the $200US in a secret pocket on the inside of his filthy trousers.

"See how things go."

They approached and we both took a step forward to greet them, keeping our hands out in front of us where they could see them.

One of the men stopped and I heard a click. It was the safety of his rifle being clicked off.

"Stoy! Stoy!" yelled the leader, telling us to stop in Russian.

The man who had stopped, dropped to one knee and trained his rifle at us.

The leader approached, the barrel of his machine gun pointed directly at our chests.

"Tourists! Tourists!" we said as he entered the camp.

"Documente, documente!" he replied. He was pumped, his breathing fast and his movements always covering us with his rifle. The second man had moved in behind him and covered me from a few meters away as I opened my backpack and handed him some photocopies of our passports.

"Cigarette?" asked Mike. He held out a pack of Camels. I'll never travel without cigarettes again.

They had realised we were no threat to them and took the pack. We were still unsure if they were a threat to us. Were we in Georgia or Chechnya? Who were these guys? Bandits? Soldiers?

Between puffs on his Camel, the leader barked into his walkie-talkie in Georgian. He held it up to Mike's face and told him to say where we were from.

A new voice spoke, this time with a thick Yorkshire accent.

"You're from New Zealand?" said the radio.

"I am," I said.

"We'd like you to come into our base. It will be safer there."

The voice had to be an OSCE monitor. These guys were probably their Georgian army security detachment.

We quickly packed up our equipment.

The two soldiers smoked and panted. They'd been pumped and ready for a fight. I realised this when the leader took out the clip of his rifle and unloaded the bullet that had already been cocked to fire. The sharp pointed monstrosity landed at my feet. I picked it up and handed it back to him.

Evening was growing long and we began our march.

The soldiers, who we discovered were brothers from Batumi, set a quick pace but after all the hills we'd climbed lately we had no problem keeping up.

The leader explained to Mike in Russian why we were being moved. He pointed to our left: a pass to Chechnya. And to our right: a small valley leading directly to the Pankisi Gorge, a base for 3000 Chechen refugees and, depending on who you talked to, Al Qaeda.

We'd inadvertantly camped between a modern day Scylla and Charybdis.

We crossed a small ridge facing the pass. The two soldiers cocked their rifles and aimed up the pass while we hurried behind them. After that we dropped down to a small earth bunker where half a dozen soldiers sat around and smoked.

The pack of Camels made a once round and after a short rest we continued, this time with two more escorts.

We crossed a strong flowing river which soaked our nice dry socks. The rest of the walk was to play havoc with our tender feet, especially Mike's blisters.

The night fell and a shining three quarter moon rose above the southern mountains.

We kept our breakneck pace along the valley, occasionally stopping to rest. The cool night breeze would cool your skin and then you would be moving again, running down blind paths in the dark, waiting for your foot to disappear into a rabbit hole and your ankle to break.

We crossed the river several times, often having to pair up with a soldier to fight the strong current.

After an hour our forced march came to an end and we entered a stockade populated by tents.

Our escort led us into a large tent. A burst of heat hit us as our eyes adjusted to the light. In the hazy light in front of us stood a dozen soldiers, armed to the teeth and staring at us in curious boredom.

Room was cleared and we dumped our packs on the ground. We were sat down and handed a big enamel cup of tea each.

It was like we'd suddenly entered a World War 2 movie. The soldiers' thick woolen jerseys had a very red army feel and more than one wore Soviet belt buckles. The tired, swarthy faces watched us as if we were British troops who had crossed the Nazi lines and had joined up with the Russians outside of Berlin.

A new level of surreal.

After we'd shaken various people's hands, an older man in civilian dress came up to us.

"You eat? Bread? Meat?"

The man explained that he was the OSCE patrol's doctor. He was the only one in the tent who spoke english (the actual OSCE POP was 400m up the hill).

Levan, the doctor, explained how the monitors had spotted us crossing the Atsunta pass in the afternoon and had thought we were Chechen terrorists. They'd dispatched our captors to see what we were up to. No wonder they were so pumped when they came into our camp.

In retrospect, its not too surprising. All they saw was two men, Mike and I, dressed in black mountain jackets, dirty combat trousers and beanies. We'd just crossed a high pass next to Chechnya and our light complexions could easily be Russian if not Chechen.

But if I was a guerilla I wouldn't be camping out in the open with a bright blue tent.

We tried to explain that we'd eaten but it was futile. We were served up bread, butter, fried potato mash and nasty bully beef. Cup of tea after cup of tea was given to us and the soldiers crowded around to listen to their strange guest's stories.

Misha, the camp commander, insisted we stay in the camp barracks and we were taken to another tent full of bunk beds. Soldiers sat cleaning their rifles and a wonky set of shelves at the back of the tent held dozens of flak jackets ready in case of attack.

We were given a cot each and sat down. We still had an audience of over a dozen men. Our original captors had now become our personal body guards. They stationed themselves close by and gave us some cold Nescafe mixed up in a plastic bottle.

Mike showed the crowd some of his photos of home, which they loved and I wrote a quick entry in my journal: "We should be in the tent, settling down to a night's sleep, listening to the running river beside us and the wind above. But we're not. We're in a military barracks..."

We lay back, the dark punctuated by the glow of our captor's final Camel cigarette.

"I think that after a nescafe, three cups of tea and someone pointing a machine gun at my head, I may have a little trouble getting to sleep," I said.

I was wrong and was woken in the morning by the sound of soldiers going about soldierly business.

We breakfasted with the officers in the mess tent (sounds a lot posher than it was) and then went to talk to the OSCE monitors.

While we discussing the previous days events, Mike mentioned to the doctor, Levan, about his bad blisters.

He was sat down and Levan examined the gaping wounds. Walking in wet socks the night before had been the final blow: the skin was mottled and infection was threatening to set in.

Levan cleaned up the wound with lashings of white bandages and iodine.

"You get helicopter to Girevi," he said.

"We'll we're kind of walking to Omalo. That will be cheating," said Mike.

"You walk 100 meters and infection. Then... swoosh!" The sound effect was accompanied by a flick of his finger. The meaning was clear: foot infection = gangrene = amputation.

Mike paled a bit but and after a few minutes discussion we decided that cheating was OK if it was done in a military helicopter!! The closest I'd been to one was in Shatili, now the possibility of a flight...

Ian, the OSCE team leader (and the Yorkshire accent we'd talked to on the radio the night before) requested permission for us to join them. They'd never do so normally - they're not a taxi service for tourists, but on the doctor's recommendation the flight command agreed.

We packed up our gear in the barracks and said goodbye to our gracious hosts. If anything we'd at least provided a bit of excitement to an otherwise boring assignment. We also managed to leave behind some of our stuff in the rush: Mike's Petzl head lamp, my survival blanket, a can of tomato puree and one of my juggling balls (rendering the other two now pretty useless).

We joined the monitors at the grassy hill where the helicopter was due to land. A dozen soldiers fanned out in a circle and created a defensive perimeter just in case someone in the hills decided to take a pot shot at the chopper.

After a few minutes, a low drone filled the valley and skimming across the line of the river, the white shape of the MI-8 moved towards us.

It flew by and turned into the wind to approach. We lay low on the ground, holding our packs and sticks, braced for the down draft, ready to run forward on our cue.

"We get the guys on board and their equipment off, then our equipment on. Then you board. Turn left and go right to the back," Ian said to everyone.

Levan said something to a Russian monitor in Russian. Mike later translated it for me: "I cannot understand a word this man says! I never can!"

The Ukrainian pilot touched the huge machine softly on the ground. A small door on the side opened and several passengers disembarked, their hair and clothes pressed wildly in different directions by the intense wind of the still rotating rotor blades.

The monitors and soldiers loaded their equipment and we were rising from the small hillock.

Below us the valley spread out like an open volume, its sheer sides now our passage to
Girevi.

We completed the 12kms to our destination in 15 minutes. It would've taken us about 3 hours to walk.

As we circled Girevi, we were given a fantastic view of the town's defensive towers,
standing high and proud on the ridges overlooking the valley.

The landing pad was busy with locals and soldiers. We jumped lightly to the ground and ran, keeping low, until we were clear of the chopper. Its work done, it lifted again and
disappeared up the valley towards the next base in Omalo.

Suddenly we surrounded by huge dogs.

It took a few moments to realise they meant no harm as a half a dozen of them began sniffing us with manic curiousity.

Here were the feared Caucasian sheepdogs we'd armed ourselves with sticks to fight off. But instead of being a threat, they had inexplicable taken a likening to us.

We now had a pack of guardian angels, the biggest of whom came up to my midriff and could
easily take apart a person.

We set up camp overlooking the river. Our dogs kept itinerant cows, donkeys and locals at
bay. The only people they didn't harass were the soldiers encamped nearby and the OSCE
monitors. Funny old situation.

The rest of the day was composed of relaxing in the sun. We later visited the OSCE base to thank them for their assistance in getting to Girevi. Doctor Levan also wanted to see to Mike's foot before we left the next day. His insistence was highlighted by the "swish,
swish" and amputation gesture. We did so and he was happy with how it was healing before we set off east towards Omalo.

It was 40km to Omalo along a reasonable 4WD track. It was a novelty to be moving along a
path again instead of following arbitary directions through jungle and up steep hillsides.

We reached Dartlo, another fortified Tushetian village, in a few hours time.

There we bumped into a couple of young Belgian walkers. They'd come from Omalo that morning.

We quizzed them on distances and also gave them a little info on the road before them.

"Do you think they thought we were a bit crazy?" I said to Mike as we left the village.

"Maybe, telling them about the snake attack and the soldiers. They probably thought we'd lost it," he said. "Plus, you look like a nutty American survivalist with that headband on!"

The road led up towards the final pass of our journey.

Despite the heat and incline we moved quickly, oblivious of the effort. After the madness of the past few days, walking up a simple road was simple.

A few hours later and we stood at the top of the pass. Below us a town lay spread out on a plateau, lazily overlooking the ravines below.

We waylaid a man coming up the hill. He wore a white t-shirt with OSCE emblazoned in blue
letters.

"Excuse me, is this Omalo?"

"Yes. This is Omalo!"

We'd done it! We whooped in delight and shook each other's hands. We had covered over 196km (184 minus the helicopter ride) in 12 days including 4 mountains passes over 2500m.

It was a day of celebration in the village. We camped on a grassy knoll next to a road and prepared dinner. A Georgian officer who had taken pity on us in Girevi had supplied a day's ration pack each to bulk up our meagre remaining supplies. So dinner consisted of the contents of 2 humanitarian aid rations which were "a gift of the people of the United States of America" (Thanks guys! It makes up for your rubbish exchange rate here).

Darkness fell and we smoked our last cigars - a tribute to what we had achieved.

On the mountain above us the villagers celebrated for their own reasons and in their own way.

We fell asleep to the sound of gunfire and drunkeness.

The day dawned like any other. It was hot and clear. We found a Niva (the common Lada 4WD) to take us back to the lowlands after a few hours talking to the few locals who were braving their hangovers to come outside into the strong sun.

By evening we were sitting in the shady courtyard of a grape vine entangled homestay in the town of Telavi. We were showered and our filthy clothes were being soaked. Dishes overflowing with wonderfully varied food sat around us and we rose a toast of cool Kakhetian wine to our adventure.

"To mountain men and being alive."

"Hear, hear!"

We arrived back in Tbilisi after several days drinking and eating in Telavi. Any weight we lost during our time in the mountains was re-added along with some more for the next adventure.

Mike departs in the next few days for Europe where he will meet his family who are on vacation.

For me... Azerbaijan beckons as my Georgian visa quickly comes to a close.

Until then...

Added 07/02/04:
I continued my trip but after the amazing adventures we'd had in the mountains of Georgia, I found it very difficult to write anymore posts.

Mike toured around the Med with his family and returned safe and sound to Glasgow to continue his stuides. I travelled through the Caucasus and the Middle East for another 2 months before visiting family in New Zealand and Australia. I got back to the UK in december 2004 to start work again.

"The tale of our heroes is ended and has passed away like a dream." -Shota Rustaveli


ps: We are going to try and get some photos developed in the next few days. I'll do my best to get them up on the web ASAP.

pps: The same disclaimer as the last post: The drawback of writing these posts on the road is the difficulty of verifying some of the distances, heights and names of areas we visited. Please excuse me if I've made any errors on the height and name of passes and distances between villages. I wholly blame our crappy 1:500,000 map.

Also the transliteration of Georgian names vary. For example, Djuta can also be spelt as
Duta and Dzuta. You will commonly see any of these 3 spellings on different maps and signs.

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