Ski Georgia

Everything you need, wine, cha cha, fruit and Churchkhela,
which are a string of nuts dipped in thickened grape juice

We believe in the policy of doing what is close and easy.  Even though Dubai is not far from Mumbai in terms of flying time, it has opened up a number of new opportunities.  For skiing, three places that have been on my ski radar for some time suddenly became very accessible, Iran, Kyrgyzstan and Georgia.

The middle of February was school holiday time and the prospect of a ski holiday seemed like a good tonic for the usual challenges of settling into a new country. From Dubai, Georgia is easy and cheap.  A three and a half hour direct flight with Fly Dubai, at around $600 per person, is not to dissimilar to flying to New Zealand from Australia.

A mosaic covered viewing platform on the Georgian Military Highway

From the Airport in Tbilisi, the highest ski area in Georgian Caucasus, Gaudari, is about a 90 minute drive in good conditions.  Gaudari has about 7400 acres of skiable terrain and a top lifted point of almost 3300m and a base at 2000m and the runs split roughly evenly between beginner, intermediate and advanced runs. We hired a Renault Duster with winter tyres for around $100 per day and we set off from the airport.  It wasn’t hard to navigate and, although the roads were not too bad, the local drivers were a little crazy but we are acclimatised to that after India and the UAE.

Traffic jam on the Georgian Military Highway.  Normally the road through the pass is one way for trucks
but this bus managed to sneak through and cause chaos.

Rooms Hotel in Kazbegi, a world class place to stay!

There were many good and affordable accommodation options at Gaudari but we decided to stay in Stepantsmida, a town further down the Georgian Military Highway, a few kilometres from the border with Russia.  We were staying at Rooms Kazbegi  www.rooms.ge , a recently developed, luxury hotel with an off the chart Trip Advisor rating and a smattering of exposure in international travel magazines.  It was around 30km from Gaudari and, based on Google Earth, the road did not seem to present too much of a problem.

We had planned to ski for three days at Gaudari with and a day of ski touring before returning for a day in Tbilisi. Conditions in the ski area were great. Reliable but slow chairs and a new high speed gondolas combined with no lift lines, uncrowded piste and plenty of off-piste options provided something for everyone. 

Some of the off-piste terrain available just outside the boundary

Did I mention that it was cheap?  A day pass was $18 for an adult and $9 for a child and a hot bowl of borsch and a Coke for $6 makes a days skiing at Hotham seem like highway robbery. The two other great aspects of Georgia is the wonderful food and wine. Before I started my research, I had assumed that Georgian food would be stodgy and heavy but nothing could be further from the truth. Although there was lots of meat, vegetarian options were available for Kate and the mixed cuisine reflected Georgia position on traditional trade routes from Turkey, Armenia, Iran to Russia and the Ukraine.

Wide open slopes, cheap lift tickets and great food! What's not to like?

Borsch and coffee for lunch

Although I had heard that old Joe Stalin, a Georgian native, was fond of a drop of Georgian wine and that Georgia had a 4000 year history of wine production, I had assumed somehow that the wine wouldn’t appeal to my unsophisticated “new world” tastes.  All I can say is that the wines were wonderful and a premium product could be purchased from any wine store for around $15! This was in addition to the homemade wine and “Cha cha”, the local homemade white spirit/anti-freeze/rocket fuel, which was available from roadside stalls in all manner of plastic containers.

Kate, in blue, organising a multi-national rescue of an Azerbaijani 
 as she coordinated Siberians and Georgians to help out.
It didn't help that the boot (trunk, dickie etc) was full of vodka!

Everything was working perfectly, then we had about 20 cm of snow. What soon became apparent is that the Georgian road authorities had no proactive avalanche management strategy which allowed then to keep the pass between Stepantsmida and Gaudari open. The road was shut and we were stuck.

Kate patrolling the beautiful library at Kazbegi.
A great social environment

It was like a mountain adventure, trapped by snow in a wooden high mountain hut.  Except this hut had a 25 metre indoor pool, a wonderful restaurant, a comprehensive wine list and more staff than guests.  The circumstances and the huge library lent themselves to making friends.  Fortunately for us we met Malvena, her brother Joey and three boys Diego, Jose and Raphael.  Ada had the boys as instant playmates and I soon discovered that Joey was a professional mountain biker and skier from Colorado with ski touring gear so I had a playmate too!

Deserted building in the drainage

Between waiting for the pass to open we amused ourselves with and afternoon ski trips The first was around the village of Sno in the Snostskali valley. It was more a scenic trip up into a drainage behind the village than a ski trip but it got the juices flowing. With more time, it would be good to go further up the valley to the deserted village of Juta.

There was not much to do for the local's in winter.
The men seemed to stand in the street and smoke and even the tractors hibernated

The village of Sno, the drainage is behind the tower

Joey laying down the skin trail
on the way to the Church which 
you can see on the peak on the horizon

The next day while waiting to see if flying out of the valley was an option, we took a drive to the Russian border.  Once flying was cancelled for the day, Joey and I skied up to and down from the 14th century Georgian Orthodox Gergeti Trinity Church that dominates the Valley at 2170 metres.

Joey working his camera while descending from the
Church towards a fortified tower in the reentrant

Joey makes his living marketing for Yeti cycles and is basically a professional photographer and film maker, so, given the lack of other more skilled or better looking options, I became his ski model for a few hours. I would like to say that I don’t get out of bed for less than $10,000 but those who know me are well aware that I struggle to sleep past sunrise.  

By the time we arrived the sun was setting, the Church closed and the monks were tucked away for the night 

Meanwhile back at the hut, Kate was getting to know all the other stranded guests and it was an interesting group.  Austrian heli-skiers led by George, the Austrian/New Zealand guide;  Ed and his sister Alex who was visiting him from London while he was in Georgia as an EU observer in South Ossetia, the break away Republic and cause of a brief war between Georgia and Russia in 2008; and, Viktor and Linea, a Russo/Swedish couple from Moscow who were both keen yoga practitioners. It was briefly relaxing but people soon started to feel the pressure of return air flights and work and social obligations. 

Stepandsminda is in the Valley behind the Church.
We ascended to the left of the shot and descended to the right

There was little in the way of communication from the Georgian road authorities.  The avalanche risk on the road was real but it appeared that there strategy was to wait for a sunny day to allow the solar radiation to trigger any loaded slopes.  To make matters worse there was only one sunny day forecast followed by more snow . 

Mosaics on a deserted farm building

Government decision making regarding the opening of the road was heavily influenced by a recent land slide between Stepantsminda and the Russian border which had killed 16 so the bureaucrats were risk adverse.  On the other hand, this was the only road route between Georgia and Russia and there were approximately 200 trucks waiting on the Tbilisi side and 80 on the Stepantsminda side. The visibility was poor on both sides of the pass and no helicopters were flying.

The border to Russia and since the establishment of South Ossetia, the only land route to Russia.
In the two days the pass was shut, hundreds of trucks were queued along the road on either side of the pass.

Our sunny day arrived and we eagerly drove to the Police check point.  We were informed by the Police that they were waiting for the sun to do its work and there was obviously no plan to bomb the loaded slopes.  The Police confidently told me that it the pass would not open today and given the forecast would be unlikely to open for 3-4 days.  Other locals said it was no chance at all.  It was decision time, so we decided to charter a helicopter from Gauduri along with some of our new friends.  There were a few options for helicopters including a Russian MI8 and a helicopter from Tbilisi.  However, the Gauduri side of the range was clouded in and only the Gauduri heli-ski operator was willing to fly as George's heli-ski chopper were busy flying their skiers before the weather turned.

Taking off from the Hotel much to the excitement of the ladies

Everyone was excited as we loaded the helicopter and took our places inside with the head sets on.  It was Kate and Ada's first helicopter flight! We took off, getting great views of the valley and the fresh snow on the main range.  We later discovered that the Police decide to open the pass the next evening at night in a blizzard.  Given no explosive avalanche control was undertaken, I am not sure of the rationale of that decision.

The wind scoured Northern slopes of the Divide and the
blanket of cloud over Gaudari

As we passed over the divide, the landing zone at Gauduri was blanketed in cloud and their were a few exciting moments as the pilot searched for a hole to get below to the cloud.  One appeared and we dropped in to it and few moments later we were unloading the helicopter with both girls having a grin from ear to ear.

Happy girls, it just takes a 800 euro helicopter ride!