Fourth year in a row… we’ve winterized our Svaneti house, left it for the long white season coming, and moved to Tbilisi until sometime in April 2026. Why? How?
The whys are: we get no guests at all once the trekking passes in Svaneti get closed by snow; the SPAR shop in Etseri is in its second year, replacing our own shop in part at least; winter conditions, while stunning, are a challenge; and we have SO many people to see in Tbilisi and eastern Georgia, including my wife’s family. Believe me, the beauty of Svan winter is as great to me as any other season there, and I hate to miss seeing and photographing it. BUT… more frequent power cuts in snowfalls. Roads demanding winter tires; and my wife’s hatred of being driven on such roads. Struggles to keep water pipes from freezing. And so on. So this double life is our solution.
This year it was different, because my wife was away for a week just before we left (a study course in Austria) and we weren’t even sure if she would come back up before I left, or just meet me in Tbilisi. So I had a huge list of things to do in house, garden and village before departing. Potatoes, pears, apples, beets, cabbages, herbs, pumpkins, all to harvest and take. Flowers to dig up or cut off. Closing all water inlets in both house and café. Removing both water filters and the house water pump, so they can’t freeze and burst.
Close curtains; leave on only the electricity to the main chest freezer and eight exterior video cameras (yes, would-be breakers-in: they work, I can SEE you on my phone from anywhere in the world!); empty all other fridges and freezers and prop their doors open; lock the café; pack all personal things to take (Lali had already packed her things before going abroad).
Smoke and dry the tomatoes, as I wrote about previously. Cut up and freeze a huge amount of excess pears, because there are too many of them. I worked methodically through the list, so as not to forget anything. In between doing this, though, I did make time to shoot some of the stunning fall-to-winter transition which was happening.
In the end, Lali DID return to help me with the job, which was just as well, because it was a lot to do solo. I had really hoped, then, that we would leave via Ushguli and Lentekhi down to Kutaisi. This road is much newer, and in much better shape than the now disastrously bad one from us to Kutaisi, which seems to be suffering from much neglect of its many fallen-away and frost-heaved sections: 34 of them we counted recently from us down 80 km. So I was watching weather reports for that pass, which goes up to 2800m in altitude, and closes for the whole winter anyway. Alas, there did come enough snow to make us rethink, and we took our usual route to Tbilisi, on October 27. If we could have left even a week earlier, it would have been fine, but there was just too much to do. I suspect the road situation between Mestia and Zugdidi needs its own article; it’s that bad. I’ve been returning to Etseri for the past few February celebrations of Lamproba, to reunite with the community then and also get my winter photo fix. But for 2026, I’m thinking hard about the risks of that road in deep snow. Even if I let someone else do the driving.
So we’re back in Tbilisi now. I hung up ALL the art we’ve had packed away while Lali was out for a weekend visiting her mother. This shows me how much free space we have, in addition to these 44 medium-size and small pieces, to print, frame and hang some really big photos, which I’ve been longing to do for years now. The hardest part will be narrowing down the list from hundreds from all over the world to… about 10 pieces! But she always knew that if she married me, we would live in my own gallery. So that’s no surprise.
We’ve left Svaneti with very mixed feelings, but I can’t deny that it’s good to be here, too. Tbilisi, show me what you have.
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
