Having been away from snow-clear roads in Svaneti for half a year or so, it has been educational (now that they ARE clear of snow) to see how things have fared this past winter. Especially because this autumn, Georgia will have an election of vital importance… and more things tend to get done before such occasions.
I returned to our mountain village house near Mestia over a month ago, which gave me that good chance at road observation. Other things, too, caught my eye. In February, when I last traveled up, I had never seen the Enguri dam lake as empty as it was then: Most of it was lake bottom. Now, it’s filling up nicely and once again resembles a lake rather than a leak.
The road… there are some newly asphalted sections, and some repairs done, to be sure. But there are also several long new sections where half of the road width, the half at the edge downwards, has dropped off and been lost. These sections are in need of urgent work, and are getting it. But a few such places, now years old, have been left as they are.
This is a road under constant bombardment from both rockfalls and avalanches. There were never any illusions that stopping those from happening would be possible. It’s the repair that is urgent. Also, the surface of the cemented sections itself is being worn away from the extremes between freeze and thaw in winter; this can be restored, but it’s a big job. Then there is frost heave, which pushes up and even cracks road sections from underneath, also ripe for repair.
It has been a great pleasure to see, over the years, the concrete-and-rebar basic road being extended from Mestia towards Ushguli, and preparation work for the latter down towards Lentekhi, Lower Svaneti’s capital town. Now the only bit left to do from the Mestia direction is the last 4 km or so before Ushguli, and there is active work on this.
The road after Ushguli goes to 2800m or so at its highest, and this has traditionally been allowed to close every winter by high snowfalls. Once it’s all cemented, it’s not clear if there will be plans or attempts to start keeping it open all winter; which would transform life in Ushguli. Rumors of a long tunnel from somewhere to somewhere else, making a much shorter journey from east Georgia to Ushguli and Mestia instead of only via Zugdidi, are waiting for funds, I’m told.
So, steps forward and back, both. Repairs and ignorings. As the tourism season from late spring through autumn gets under way here, it will be interesting to see what gets completed and what will be left. There must be a certain amount of triage, as it can’t all be done, maybe ever. But one can hope. Especially one who is a frequent driver or passenger on these roads, on which we all rely so much. I do remember 6-hour journeys from Zugdidi to Etseri on dirt and gravel roads, before the Rose Revolution, complete with bandits to spice up that long journey. Most of the road can be undertaken by light vehicle, today, not even a 4×4. This, too, is progress.
Blog by Tony Hanmer
Tony Hanmer has lived in Georgia since 1999, in Svaneti since 2007, and been a weekly writer and photographer for GT since early 2011. He runs the “Svaneti Renaissance” Facebook group, now with over 2000 members, at www.facebook.com/groups/SvanetiRenaissance/
He and his wife also run their own guest house in Etseri: www.facebook.com/hanmer.house.svaneti
