A Journey through the Caucasus! - October/November 2016

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Part 1: Georgia (Tbilisi) to Azerbaijan (Baku)

Drama at station whilst getting on train, our ticket says coach number 3 but the coach attendant has other ideas & tells us to go to coach 5 instead of 3, in coach 5 everyone is double booked, trying to figure out when no one speaks English....it's Russian, Georgian or Azeri only I guess! Now we are waved to head back to coach 3 again, we tell attendant to come with us and sort out, the one in 3 is still insisting we go to 5....eventually the attendant from 5 shouts something to her to let us stay! Phew we finally get to settle in and the trains sets off prompt on time. Next challenge will be trying to navigate through border control apparently it takes three hours !

Border formalities all done pretty painless. First stop Georgian border control, security guard collected passports took them away half hour later delivered them back to our seats. Train's moving we cross into Azerbaijan, half hour later the Azeri border control and we stop again. This time the customs official gets on and curious seeing sadiqs name and British passport asks to open our bags. First up my backpack he has a nose in it, Sadiq opens up the bottom part to reveal my underwear he quickly gestures to close it red in the face ????
Seeing all the gadgets in sadiqs backpack the poor guy is even more confused and then quickly leaves as we open up little Zaara's mini backpack! Probably never seen Indians with British passports backpacking on a train ? at the border!
Next up we are summoned to the next cabin, which has been turned into a temporary interview room where the border guard is sitting with a laptop and mobile camera; mobile border controls control; wow that's a first! Sadiq goes in first I hear him stamp the passport and it's my turn. I go in get my photo taken and another Azeri woman comes and joins me. Curious they start asking where I'm from, Hindustan? India? And when I say yes she goes Raj Kapoor and everyone laughs; I say Shahrukh Khan and the mood immediately lightens in the cabin including the border guard who has joined in the little joke. He stamps both mine and little Z's passport and says welcome to Azerbaijan! You don't often come across friendly border guards and less than 24 hours and we have crossed three countries!



Azerbaijan (Baku) to Georgia (Tbilisi)

Trying to get back to Baku station we decide to take the metro only to find that our cards from yesterday have no money left on them and we can't top them up anymore. we caused so much chaos at the ticket machine one lady decided to put our coins on her card and let us through using her card. We also only had two coins so she just let one of us through with her own money, very helpful people here. When on the metro train they were very concerned as we had big back packs and kept offering up their seats. Eventually one couldn't resist anymore and held Zaara by her hand and made her sit down ?. When we started chatting to the lady she asked where we were from originally and soon as we say India they start talking about Bollywood actors. This time it seemed like she was a huge fan of Deepika Padukone and said I even looked like her ?? never before have I been told I resembled Deepika ! Hahaha gotta love the Azeri's!

Once on train the journey was very smooth so far except the carriage was boiling hot they like to keep their trains a bit warm n cosy (more like an oven) it seems.
We got woken up at 6:30 not sure why as the border is still over an hour away, wonder what's awaiting there, keeping fingers and toes crossed.

Azeri border first, same border guards that we had on the way out are back on the train again, one must consider oneself as a seasoned traveler when you start recognising the border guards! The same immigration guys was back with his mobile office and we are summoned in the makeshift cabin office to get photo taken and passport stamped and off we are onto the next border.
An hour later we are at the Georgian border post Garbadani, this time the guy collects our passports first then next on is the customs official. When he heard we are from London he tells us he used to live in Eastham. Quick look at our bags tells us we'll need our hiking sticks in Kazbegi and off he goes.
Train provodnika comes to collect money for the tea, it's 3 Azeri manat, we don't have any manat so ask if could pay in Georgian Lari, it's 5 Lari this time. So the tea going from Georgia to Azerbaijan is cheaper than the journey back, what's the logic behind that !

Part 2: Georgia

Well the guards back with the pile of passports hands ours back checked and stamp ! Wayhay we are back in Georgia. Arrived in Tbilisi station on time in one piece met by our driver Giorgi who will be taking us to Kazbegi ! Next mission is to find some snow chains as its been snowing heavily in the mountains. So off we go to what looks like a huge tyre market, tyreland!

"A mind that is stretched by a new experience can never go back to its old dimensions."

We live in a world today that is defined by acquisition, by what we own. Mankind today possesses or has access to more goods now than ever before in history. But think about it: are you excited about a single technological device you bought 10 years ago? Probably not. But a trip you took at the same time can create powerful &a lasting memories. Why? Because the true value of travel is found in its unique, unexpected, meaningful moments.

In Kazbegi or Stephansmida we are surrounded by the most majestic of the Caucasus mountains and looking at these I began to wonder what it must be like to witness the mighty Himalayas up close! So breathtakingly beautiful yet so wild. We take a hike up to the Gergeti monastery/church, the route says it takes 1.5 hours to get up there, great we think and off we head down. Little did we know what the route didn't tell us was that the estimate was for a warm clear summers day. As we set off the snow covered trail the temperature outside barely hovering around zero, the trek had turned icy and we were skidding and sliding all over using our sticks to keep us up. As the more sensible tourists went up in their 4x4's the drivers shouted if we needed a taxi saying 'problem' 'problem'! Down below we are like what's the problem, however as we went further up the track got worse impassable in the icy conditions on foot and we ended up bypassing the trail for clambering up the snow covered hills. One could only be called crazy for putting an eight year old through this. We persisted and continued met the track further up and eventually make it to the monastery. WooHoo!! It was blowing gales up here so little missy and me take refuge inside the church building and stand by the stove to unfreeze ourselves whilst sadiq is outside taking photos. Monasteries hold a kind of mystic charm, located always on remote mountains and you expect the monks to have never left there since the day they decided to renounce the world! The expectation would be that the monks hike up and down these mountains in search of their souls, well that is so not the case as we see here by the side of the church a Toyota Land Cruiser placed discreetly.

Driving along the Georgian military highway theres a huge queue of stationary trucks on the side of the road apparently waiting to be let to cross the border into Russia and onwards to mainland Europe. Little Z counted at least 220 odd of them. The drivers seemed to be waiting patiently hanging out outside socialising or having a smoke. One can only assume they are used to this and have come prepared for the long wait !
As we continue the drive to Tbilisi there's more obstacles en-route this time though at various points there's the sheep herders crossing the road with their flock, sheep in their hundreds with the odd couple of donkey or horses to carry their stuff and a fierce looking guard dog.

So it seems you can find an Indian in any corner of the world and we were very surprised to see them in what is little known Georgia. Walking around old town Tbilisi this afternoon we go up to the old fort and there's a little coffee van so the coffee addict in me goes to get a cup only to be greeted by an Indian man, Hello where are you from? We ask where he was from and turns out he's from Punjab apparently got here as his older brother lives here too. Wow ! Long way from Punjab living in an off the beaten track country ! We chatted a little they taught us a couple of Georgian words and his brother said he prefers here to Europe as its more chilled out ! Plenty of Indian tourists here apparently mostly from the UAE as you don't need visa to visit Georgia if you are a resident in UAE!

View across from Uplistsikhe, an ancient cave city through which the Silk Road ran. The distant mountains over the horizon is the disputed region of South Ossetia, formerly part of Georgian but now autonomous republic which continues to have frequent conflict with Georgia. As we wander around the cave city gunshots could be heard in the distance from the frequent warfare that continues.

It's a long slow drive from Tbilisi to Davit Gareja the ancient cave monasteries inhabited by monks for centuries. Once there we started the long steep hike to see some of the frescoes. We ask the way to some guys who look like workers digging channels and they point us the way which I'm convinced is the wrong way as it's barely a path just muddy slippery rocks and especially when I see the large group of Russians heading the opposite way.
We give up this path and head back in the other direction where we spot some caves convinced they must have those frescoes. Only what we didn't realise was that they were inside the caves that were on the other side of the mountain which faced into the Azerbaijan border. Well now we're here we may as well continue to them, and especially when we saw the Bulgarian lady we met earlier in a bright red coat heading that way, we think if she can do it without even any hiking shoes ? why can't we and off we went. Little did we know that the path on the other side of the mountain was hanging onto the cliff edge, no barrier and about eight inches wide. One wrong step and we'd be straight down into Azerbaijan, or maybe that's one way of a quick getaway in the hope that the Azeri border guards would come and rescue us! Down below we could see the border fence and some army buildings and trucks. We press on keeping an eye on little Zaara making sure she walks in a straight line rather than her usual jumping and clambering over paths.
Well as they saying goes 'don't speak too soon' just as I'd mentioned the border guards we spot two of them heading up the path towards us from the opposite side. Sadiq is taking photos so I warn him, Zaara and I keep walking but slowly and then fall silent and stop as they come close. Both carrying guns in two different uniforms; one Azeri and one Georgian doing a joint patrol. With a stern look on their face they pass us without saying anything and head towards Sadiq. Immediately I turn back take out my phone and take a sneaky picture as they stop by to say something yo Sadiq, I wonder what ?!!

Drama at dinner time, we end up in a small Turkish restaurant, we double check we can pay with a card as we have no local currency and they confirm they do. Delicious dinner but come payment time they try to use the card machine and it seemed like there was a problem. Sadiq adamant goes but I asked before we ate and I only have dollars I can pay you in dollars. The guys go we don't take dollars maybe you can change outside then come back and pay. Sadiq refused to go get money changed so eventually the guys agree to send one of their own staff to exchange the dollars for us and finally we pay up and leave. All staff and couple of customers all collected around our table trying to work out what the little paper receipts from the broken machine said. Only thing they managed is to translate was problem problem !!

Part 3: Armenia

Another day another country!!
Ok so we choose to go to Armenia as British citizens we don't need a visa so guess all will be straightforward and easy right ? hey little did we know that this border crossing will be a whole new experience. We set off from Tbilisi early morning and get dropped off at the Georgian side of border at Sadakhlo checkpoint. We carry our bags to passport control get our passports stamped and off we go across no-mans land and cross the river into Armenia. Excited at seeing a sign saying Armenia we start taking photos in front of it just then a guard comes running over shouting 'NO NO' !! 'Delete Delete'!! So Sadiq had to delete all the pics in front of him. What the guards haven't clocked on yet is that even when we delete photos on the iPhone they can recovered from the trash folder later which is exactly what we did! We won't tell them our little secret for now ! Now, into a new country we are shown the way to the Armenian passport control. We hand our passports and wait for the sound of the stamp, instead we hear the guard mumble the word 'Azerbaijan'...he's obviously seen the Azeri stamp in our passport, and as the history between these two countries goes this didn't sound good at all. He calls someone, more officers come in, we think maybe it's a shift change. The new guy looks at the passports again there's no conversation with us just some stern looks and he signals us to move to one side and continues stamping through the queue that's now formed behind us. More officers arrive, more conversations in a foreign languages take place, then they take the passports and go to a room. We wait by the side nervously wondering what if (thinking the worst)?!! We think maybe they'll call us in for an interrogation. Nothing yet, then Sadiq notices they are trying to photocopy the passports but can't work out how to. One officer pressing random buttons, and looking quizzingly at the photocopier, then two officers, then three! How many immigration officers does it take to copy three British passports. More faffing about with papers and finally the first guy walks back with our passports and three photocopies and summons us back to the booth. Then for the first time in what felt like an hour speaks to us but I guess in Armenian, lo behold when we say English he obviously doesn't speak English so are sent over to the next booth. The new guy now starts checking passports and asks us in English: 'Tourist?!' He obviously doesn't see many English tourists with a eight year old girl walking across from Georgia. We say yes, he asks how long and where we headed to. I show him the itinerary and he asks for the hotel name and details. I point to the itenary again and eventually he starts copying out the Armenian part of the itenary on a piece of paper! Why didn't he just photocopy it i wonder?! Wait it'll take them another half hour to work out how to do that...will be quicker to write it out. Finally satisfied he stamps our passports and says 'welcome to Armenia!' Phew we are finally in!! For the first time today while waiting there I wondered what would we do if they refused us entry?!!!

Now if we thought that was the end of our troubles then oh no that was just the taster the fun was about to begin. The main highway to the places we needed to get to was closed, so we had to take a detour via the mountain road which skirted all the way along the Azerbaijan border, quite scenic I thought until I found that it was the little villages dotted along were frequent victims of snipers....oh dear what have we let ourselves into, I'm sitting nervously. As we move on, the snow blizzard moves in and the road is covered in snow, on the sides the snow is piled high over a foot! Progress is slow with frequent traffic jams where cars and trucks have broken down or skidded and stuck in the snow! The car in front turned almost 180 degrees.....We can only sit and pray that we manage to get out of this before the darkness draws in and we still have a long way before we reach Yerevan! What looks like the most picturesque winter wonderland is also the most dangerous place to be driving along especially as we head along the hairpin twists of the so called mountain highway! Finally several hours of crazy driving we are in Yerevan in one piece!!

Here's a little prayer to our safe arrival; "Dear God I want to take a minute not to ask for anything from you but to say thank you for everything, Alhumdullilah!"

Now if we thought that was the end of our troubles then oh no that was just the taster the fun was about to begin. The places we needed to get to the main highway was closed so we had to take a detour via the mountain road which skirted all the way along the Azerbaijan border, quite scenic I thought until I found that it was the little villages dotted along were frequent victims of snipers....oh dear what have we let ourselves into, I'm sitting nervously. As we move on the snow blizzard moves in and the road is covered in snow, on the sides the snow is piled high over a foot! Progress is slow with frequent traffic jams where cars and trucks have broken down or skidded and stuck in the snow! The car in front turned almost 180 degrees.....We can only sit and pray that we manage to get out of this before the darkness draws in and we still have a long way before we reach Yerevan! What looks like the most picturesque winter wonderland is also the most dangerous place to be driving along especially as head along the hairpin twists of the so called mountain highway! Here's a little prayer to our safe arrival in Yerevan; "Dear God I want to take a minute not to ask for anything from you but to say thank you for everything, Alhumdullilah!"

Armenia (ՀԱՅԱՍՏԱՆ); the land of ancient traditions, oldest temples and mystical monasteries with a complex history laced with tragedy, a place where you will be intrigued by history, awed by monuments, amazed by the landscape. It's not an easy place to explore – roads are rough, transport is often hard to navigate and those who don't speak Armenian or Russian like us have to often resort to communication using sign sign language along with a hello or thank you in Russian, and yet travelled here is rewarding.

Goodbye Yerevan & Armenia, what an experience it has been, we enjoyed the love and warmth from your super friendly people, Ani the cafe owner, the little old women in the local market, the kind lady who let little Z use the toilet in her house when she was desperate and there was no where else to go in the snow covered monastery !!
Despite knowing just one word of your ancient language "Shnorhakalcutyun" meaning thank you, most of our communication was through a friendly smile and a few hand gestures, just shows that a 'smile' the universal language of love and humanity goes a long way to survival in unknown places. We've passed through amazing landscapes, biblical sites, mystical monasteries and towns buried under the historic ancient Silk Road! Encountered some extreme weather from snow blizzards and nerve wrecking drives through the crazy roads, pristine blue skies and glorious sunsets.
One lady train to take, one last border to cross and we wonder what awaits next....one last Kachapuri, one last Ajaruli...

Wow and what memorable trip it's been one not to be forgotten easily, Armenia we will definitely remember you for a long time to come. Now safely sat on our train back to Tbilisi hopefully a much safer route than the road one we took on our way into the country. What we didn't realise until much later that roads we drove along skirting the border with Azerbaijan, the FCO warns against making all travel on its website on those roads due to the highly sensitive and volatile border situation! Oh dear a little too late for that!!
The Russian built sleeper train is very comfortable, little dark on the inside but I guess the whole point is you're meant to go to sleep ?. However how does one go to sleep at 9:30 pm when there's free wifi available on board??!! Yes you heard it right free wifi on a sleeper train; you don't even get that in England on a commuter train ? !! There are four bunks in the cabin so an orderly looking guy turns up, he tried to have a conversation sounds like he's from Iran heading to turkey but seems very drunk and thankfully quickly goes off up to his bunk and is fast sleep. Not sure if it's a good thing as he snoring away so loud that woman from the cabin next door comes over to see who it is, then the train attendant comes over and tried to poke and prod him to see if he wakes up no luck, oh dear what are we going to have to put up with all night !

03:48 am in the morning and there's bang bang bang on the cabin doors, looks like some guys in uniform I guess it's the border what a time for passport checks. The train attendant comes round going passport passport especially trying to wake up the drunk guy on the bunk above! So now it's wait and watch. Well the immigration officer comes on board with his mobile office, asks for the passports stands outside the cabin and stamps them, at least this time round it was simpler no getting pulled out of the train and made to wait on the side, guess we are leaving the country so it doesn't really matter now, little missy has been fast sleep all through this! let's see what awaits at the Georgian side. It's now 04:22 and the trains still standstill, so glad there's wifi on board I'm sat here passing time, what would one do otherwise oh wait perhaps read a book maybe I should get it out of the bag ?. Half an hour on the dot and the train pulls out of the station, they either have a super slick immigration process or at this random hour of the day they don't care and just stamp everyone out of the country so he can get back to his bed as quickly as possible. The train rolls along the tracks and rocks me gently to sleep, just as I was about to fall into a deep sleep it comes to a stop again and another officer gets on asking for passports, this time it's the Georgian border. He waits at the doors looks at each passport looks at our faces checks our names and off he goes with them. How long I wonder now!
So here's the difference between the train across to Azerbaijan compared with the train across from Armenia. The previous train was well looked after, little more modern, power sockets in each cabin, the attendant came round offering to make cay (chai or tea) from time to time. This one little older, curtains across all windows, carpets on the floor, broken taps in the toilet, no one offering to make cay (chai or tea), ridiculous hour at the border, however believe it or not but they have free wifi all along!
So the customs guys get on now, it's a woman and she asks us to get up, where we are going, why we are going, what we have in our bags? Cigarettes, alcohol, drugs, bombs and giggles herself!! Then asks us to open our bags, sees the first backpack, asks if it's just clothes in it? Sees the second backpack doesn't bother with opening either and the starts interrogating the man on the upper bunk. Few more questions for him, asks to see some papers, turns out he has a $1000, some more questions seems he's going to meet some Turkish guy can has come from Iran via Kazakhstan, Armenia, Georgia and maybe to Turkey!! Finally about 40mins the first guard is back with the passports, looks at our faces looks at the passport and hands them back. Phew and eventually the trains leaves Sadakhlo checkpoint and I try and get some sleep before being woken up again to witness the most beautiful sunrise as we approach Tbilisi which almost feels like a second home as we have been coming back here so many times since the start of the trip.





Yerevan is not the most enticing cities at first glance, the centre is full of soviet era buildings legacy of the USSR and feels like it's still stuck in those days. The core is surrounded by mostly concrete blocks mainly apartment buildings which look rather tired and run-down.
This is a city full of contradictions – top-of-the-range cars share the roads with Russian made Ladas so old they should be in a museum; old-fashioned teahouses sit next to chic European-style wine bars; and street fashions range from stylish chic to babushka with many weird and wonderful variations in between. You walk into a shop which looks like a boutique only to realise it's actually selling fake designer and European high street copies and to ones surprise it's not done in a back street market somewhere but legally on a mainstream shop apparently allowed here! When we questioned someone about it they say haven't you been to turkey as in why are you surprised?!
Few traces of the cities ancient past remains mostly the stolid architecture and
derelict Soviet-era factories now left. We are at the onset of the winter so all the fountains across the city of which there are plenty have been switched off so maybe it's a little more pleasant during the hot summers when the fountains are dancing.

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