Snapshots of Georgia

From Gori, we drove up the Georgian Military Road to Stepantsminda near the Russian border, a suitably romantic-sounding name for a road which, to quote Wikipedia, ‘follows the traditional route used by invaders and traders through the ages’. Its full length is 212 kilometres, running from Tbilisi to Vladikavkaz, just across the border. Its highest point, the Jvari pass, is at an altitude of 2379 meters (7815 feet). It skirts the disputed/occupied territory of South Ossetia for much of the time, although there was no sign of conflict from the road. (We did drive past a large camp for internally displaced persons on the main Tbilisi-Batumi highway, however). 

Many trucks ply the route through Georgia from Russia to Armenia, so there was often overtaking to do, but other than that it wasn’t a particularly tricky route to drive (as a passenger, haha) and offers some beautiful scenery as it winds through the Caucasus mountains. Most of the photos below are from our return journey, starting in the north, since I was sitting on the better side of the car for photos on the way back.

An otherworldly landscape on the side of the road near Stepantsminda with... cow?

I actually like the whatever that wooden thing is in the foreground, sort of gives a scale to the majesty of the mountains and river valley

The Russia-Georgian friendship monument (ironic), near the highest part of the road

We happened upon a large flock of what I think are turkeys (?) on a very rough back road on the way to the Kakheti wine region




A lonely outpost in the mountains

I like how this little gangster looks like he’s wearing a donkey disguise

Ananuri Fortress. I wished we would have stopped here, but we thought we wouldn’t have time to fit it in along with our visit to Alaverdi Monastery later in the afternoon. It turns out Alaverdi took hardly any time to see, so we could have done both, or just Ananuri, which has a beautiful location on the Aragvi River. Next time, I suppose.

The Zhinvali Reservoir, a beautiful man-made lake. I was surprised there wasn’t any sign of developments for camping around here. I suppose the beach on the left of the photo is pretty inaccessible.

When the Georgian roads weren’t busy being beautiful or gravelly pits, they had another key feature, which is the abundance of roadside stalls selling all manner of goods. The interesting part was that different villages or regions along the side of the road seemed to specialise each in their own product. You’d have a couple of km of watermelons, then further down a stretch of pottery, followed by bread. A lot of these goods (like pottery, bread or hammocks) don’t seem to be obviously region-dependent, so I’m not quite sure what kind of economic explanation lies behind these. They were pretty popular, too. We didn’t stop at any, but it was quite common for a car in front to suddenly veer off or on to the road from one of these stalls, usually without signalling.

Most of the next photos are from the Tbilisi-Batumi highway.

Stop here for woolly hats

“There’s hammock hut, that’s on third. There’s Hammocks R Us, that’s on third too. You got Put Your Butt There. That’s on third. Swing Low, Sweet Chariot... Matter of fact, they’re all in the same complex, it’s the hammock complex on third.” “Oh, the hammock district!”

Seriously, there were a lot of hammocks for sale. Not going to lie, I kind of wanted one.

One town was full of these “5+1” bread offers (I think it’s bread, at any rate). We never stopped, because what would we do with 6 loaves of bread. Along with the 5+1s, there was the occasional 6+1, which was surely an attempt at tomfoolery

A Georgian coffee shop that is definitely not infringing on any trademarks

Peach teats

Wai-o-Tapu was a pretty full-on morning, so we were both pleased to only have a short drive to our next stop, Taupo, where again we were getting out of the van for a night on terra norota. This time, we were staying at my parents' place, which is actually up for sale. It just so happened a real estate agent was showing prospective buyers around when we turned up, announced (politely, of course) that we were staying there and that it was our first time visiting the house. The real estate agent finished up and left without checking our credentials at all, so I think I might be on to a great scam here. Just turn up to an open home, tell them you own the place and then ring up a few days later with a funny voice and tell them you're taking the property off the market. Badda bing, badda boom, free house! Flawless plan. (Or at least just wait until the agent leaves and then steal a lot of stuff.)

We had two reasons for visiting Taupo - my parents' place and I have a cousin living there. Otherwise, it had usually been a drive-through kind of place on my itineraries through the North Island. Which is kind of crazy when you look at it, because although the town itself isn't the prettiest, it's on the edge of a huge and beautiful lake, fringed with impressive mountains.

There's even a bit where you can try to get a hole in one on a floating green!

The photos just show a tiny slice of the lake. I think you have to drive around Lake Taupo to fully appreciate just how big it is - 616 square kilometres. More impressive than its size is the fact that it occupies a volcanic caldera formed by the eruption of a supervolcano about 26,500 years ago. This was the largest known volcanic eruption in the last 70,000 years. It's truly impressive to sit on the edge of the lake and think that here was once a massive volcano, and to imagine the forces required to create a huge crater where it once sat. And there on the horizon are the volcanoes of Ruapehu, Ngauruhoe and Tongariro, as a reminder that New Zealand is still very much prey to volcanic and seismic activity.

In fact, I and my family were there during one of the most recent major eruptions of Mount Ruapehu, during the night of 25 September 1995 (celebrating my parents' Silver Wedding anniversary). We were staying at a hotel at the foot of the volcano, so had to be evacuated off the mountain. It wasn't a spectacular firey eruption, rather ash clouds, gases and mud flows (lahars), but still a pretty good story!

Driving on towards Wellington the next day, we got to get a better view of the mountains from the Desert Road. I teased Jules a little bit with this one, implying we were going through a real desert. In fact, it's just an area where little vegetation grows, due to the impact of volcanic eruptions through the centuries (I actually thought it was because of lack of rainfall, but apparently that's not true, it's because of the poor quality of soils and seeds and dry winds). Whatever the reason, it makes for a very different and impressive landscape. The variety of landscapes in a relatively small country is one thing that makes New Zealand so special.

With Mt Ruapehu, the erupty one

Ruapehu and Ngauruhoe (and Tongariro??)

The Desert Road

A van with a view!

Heather on the Desert Road

Mmm, Peach Teats. Calves love 'em!

The hills densely covered with NZ's signature sheep