After spending the summer riding toward Georgia from Greece, Ryan Wilson reaches the base of the Greater Caucasus Mountains and sets out to ride a classic tour through Upper Svaneti.  Read on for a glimpse into what it’s like to ride amongst Georgia’s snow-capped peaks with a local companion he met along the way.

Caucasus Life

Slowly spinning my way out of a rocky gorge along an empty single-lane road, I arrived at a tiny settlement with no more than a handful of houses.  There was an unmarked guesthouse tucked in here somewhere, which I’d booked for a couple of nights to wait out a big storm that was set to hit the region the next day, but I only had a vague idea of the location and no phone signal.  As I hunted around for the right house, I was drawn toward a small church that was filled with sounds that I’d never heard before.

I casually crossed in front of the open door to see if I could get a look, and as soon as I did, one of the men inside started waving me over.  Inside was a huge sprawl of food and seemingly every man from in and around the village uproariously singing polyphonic Georgian folk songs around the table (already a few drinks in).

Without stopping the song in progress, they immediately opened up a seat and loaded me up with a plate of various kebabs, occasionally passing me a big horn, the traditional vessel for drinking local wine. The lack of a flat bottom to rest it on the table seems to encourage you to down it faster than in a normal glass. I’d been in Georgia for a couple of weeks already and was starting to get a feel for the place, but this felt like my real introduction to Georgian culture.

The Road to Svaneti

When the storm cleared, I left the village via some steep backroads and slowly made my way up the long road toward the Greater Caucasus mountains that the country is famous for.  Hints of fall foliage started to crop up amongst the forested hills, which only became more and more prominent as I gained altitude.

With every village I passed, another local street dog would start following me out of town.  Often jumping on in one town and disappearing into the next village a couple of kilometers later.  At one point a couple of cyclists coming from the other direction had a pair of dogs following them for over an hour when we crossed paths.  But after chatting for a bit about our routes, we set off in opposite directions and the dogs switched up and decided to follow me back.  This is a region that gets a fair amount of bike tourers these days, so I imagine the dogs here have learned to spot us as easy marks for landing snacks.

A New Friend

As I was nearing the start of where the climb toward Zagari pass started to really kick up, I got my first real up-close glimpse at the Svaneti range and I had to pause for a minute to take it all in.  I’ve seen a fair number of big mountains in my day, but this was a special place, especially at this time of year.

Just before I started to ride again I heard the sound of nails tapping on the concrete behind me.  Not being near a village and having just seen bear prints in the concrete moments earlier, I looked back at the sound in a hurry to find another road pup jogging up.  I had no idea when she started following me or where she came from, but as she trotted up and casually plopped down next to my bike, it became apparent that I might have company for the rest of the thousand-meter climb to the pass, as there were no more villages until the other side.

The views only became more dramatic as I continued the ascent along the recently paved road (another classic dirt mountain pass bites the dust).  While my new dog friend seemed comfortable with me on my bike, she would relentlessly harass any car that attempted to drive by, trying to run in front of them and bark at the front bumper whenever one was in the vicinity.  Thankfully there wasn’t a ton of traffic here, but I had to wince with each one out of fear she’d get herself hit.  Apparently, this was a strategy she’d employed before as it got a couple of tourists to stop their cars and pay the toll to pass in the form of whatever food they had floating around in their car.

A Downhill Struggle

By the time we reached the top of Zagari pass, we’d been together for most of the day and she was clearly exhausted, plopping down next to the road the moment I’d stop for any reason.  Her pursuit of cars was now limited to a half-hearted bark as they went by.

I waited around at the top of the pass for a little while to give her a break before the relatively short descent to the touristic village of Ushguli, which I figured would be a good place for her to stay, but as soon as we got rolling downhill I could see she was struggling with speeds any higher than the 8 kph I was doing up the climb.  At one point I looked back to make sure she was still making progress and she had plopped down on the side of the road again.  I climbed back up to her and tried to think of options to get her to the village.  First, I emptied my handlebar bag into a backpack and saw if I could coax her into squeezing in.  Then I tried to lure her into a truck that passed by, but she was not going for either of these.

Enough time went by that when I slowly started coast down the hill again, she was able to follow, and so we inched our way down to the village and finally celebrated with some well-earned khachapuri and khinkali.  She was a bit of a picky eater but must have inhaled her half of the khachapuri in about 3 seconds flat.

The Second Wind

She seemed familiar in Ushguli, casually sniffing around with a few of the numerous other street dogs that were roaming around, and I imagined this would be where I would say goodbye.  But when I took off up a dead-end dirt road to find a place to camp up near the glacier, she weaved her way through the crowds of tourists and popped out on the other side, following me up a climb into the mountains once again.

She was back with a second wind, now instead of chasing down cars, she was sprinting across fields to harass cows.  I tried to convince her she was burning through all of her energy again, but there was no reasoning with her passion for chaos.  You can’t tame the wild Georgian street dog.

At the end of the valley, I found a spot for the tent and we both got some well-needed rest with a big view of the mountains all around.   She wouldn’t come inside the vestibule; instead, she sat just outside it all night, keeping an eye out for danger.

The End of The Road

Descending back to Ushguli the next day, I could see her paws were sensitive from all of the kilometers the day before, so we took it very slowly and stopped at a cafe for breakfast once we got to town.  She sprawled out next to my bike, totally exhausted, as tourists came by taking pictures of her and giving her all sorts of attention and snacks.

I ate my soup as I looked at the map and considered my options, but with a very long descent on deck for the day along a busier road than the day before, I knew it would be too dangerous for her to follow me down.  I asked around to some locals to see if they recognized her, and a couple of them said they’d seen her before, so I knew this had to be the end of the adventure for my Caucasus trail friend.  She was better off getting showered with love from the tourists in town than trying to chase me down random mountain roads.  At least that’s what I told myself to make it less sad to say goodbye.  This certainly was not my first time growing overly attached to a dog that I spent a couple of days with on the road with, but this part never gets easier.

I made my way to Mestia, the largest town in this region and a hub for all sorts of activities, as long as they involve mountains.  The towns in this area are famous for Svan towers, many of which date back to the Georgian golden age, where they were often attached to homes for defensive purposes.  These days they mostly add to the iconic medieval silhouette of these Svanetian settlements.

With the days of fall ticking down rapidly in late October, I got hit with my first proper Georgian snowfall that covered the landscape and even stuck around for a while.  The fresh snow on the mountains with the autumn colors still peeking through made for a perfect combination.  Being right in the dead zone between hiking season and ski season, I managed to thread the needle perfectly.  A month earlier, it would have been a lot more crowded, but a week later, Zagari Pass would have been closed for the year.

A Crossroads

Leaving behind the mountains of Svaneti I made my way back to Georgia’s lowlands, knowing I wouldn’t be able to make it to the Eastern part of the Caucasus route due to the snow.  Armenia had similar issues.  The land border with Azerbaijan was still closed since they closed it for Covid in 2020.  All signs were pointing me back toward the familiar lands of Türkiye, where the Black Sea keeps the climate slightly more moderate during the winter.

I had no real plan at first, but eventually, I decided to ride back in the general direction of Istanbul, mostly on paved roads.  I tried to get a little too cute by weaving in some dirt roads but was quickly punished with unspeakable amounts of peanut butter mud and gave up on that.  Taking three hours to cross a two-kilometer stretch of flat road is not a lesson that I will soon forget.

It wasn’t all bad though, I was able to visit the riverside town of Amasya, which might have become my favorite in all of Türkiye, and I’ve been to my fair share of Turkish towns.  No doubt I’ll return here one day to explore more of the area when the mud is gone.

The temperatures plummeted on the Anatolian plateau and soon the highs in the cities weren’t making it above freezing, with the nights in the mountains significantly below that.  I stuck it out for a few more days to get to the Turkish capital of Ankara, but after a particularly sketchy day of frost fog and icy roads and I called it.  With more snow in the forecast for the next day, I rode straight to the Ankara terminal, jumped in a bus, and made it to Istanbul for my first proper break from being on the move in about a year and a half.  I needed some time to scheme up what would come next…

Big thanks to Tumbleweed Bikes for sponsoring this trip!

See the Prospector frame he’s touring on and more at Tumbleweed Bikes.