Davide Cassenti

Day I

The trip to Shatili didn’t start in the best way: the initial plan was to go to another town on georgian mountains, Omalo in Tusheti, but for a series of reason we had to change our mind and Shatini, in Khevsureti region, was the choice. I’ve argued for many stupid organization problems with Mzika for long, especially the day before the trip, but at 8am I was ready, waiting for the Marshutka which had to take us over the mountains; which was late, as I could imagine.

When you go out from Tbilisi every road seems nice: new, not so bad, really pleasant; but it’s just a mask: when we saw the sign saying we were 100km far from our destination, the road begun to be worse; and worse and worse again: hundred kilometers of broken, but amazing roads that run around mountains, without any protection, but with a scenario around that is simply awesome. We stopped several times along the road: the wonderful nature of Georgia, with the green mountains, the snow, hundreds of waterfalls would leave you breathless; we were kust amazed by the beauty of things around us. We also met some men along the way and we had some lunch together with food we brought from the city: bread, cheese, tomatos, meat and drinks, nothing was missing, neither the traditional georgian gaumarjos.

After we left them, travel was still quite long: we had some problems with Marshutka which couldn’t pass over some big stones in the middle of the road without some manual help, but after many hours of driving, about 6 hourrs from Tbilisi, we finally saw it, Shatili. Situated in a wonderful valley between the mountains, along a little river that fills the nights with a beautiful sound, Shatili is a very small village with just few families living there, just not more than 8 in winter and some more in summer. Once entered in the town, the only thing that can be seen is an house, probably a guest house, nice and modern; but just continuing driving for 50 meters you may see the ancient village, with its towers above the rocks.

The place is incredibly beautiful and people who lives there are very nice: when we arrived they were near the river to discuss about problems of the village, as they’re used to do; one of them took us into an house, ready to welcome guests: big and nice house, we could stay all nine there for few lari. Our brave driver has been also our cook for the dinner: he prepared mtsvadi for us, a famous georgian dish made of grilled meat. Meanwhile, we went to visit the old village: you may freely walk between the towers, go inside and over the roof and you may enter from one to other through doors. Many little window were used in the past to shoot enemies and defend the town with rifles.

Dinner was great: we had a guest, the owner of the house, and some Czech people came also to ask us help to return to Tbilisi the day after. We spent a really nice evening, talking on the balcony under millions of stars in a total dark valley – except one house, lighted – and then was time to sleep: wake up at 7 for the second day around the mountains.

Day II

Night was not so nice: the bed was actually not really comfortable and I couldn’t sleep much, so at 7am I was already awake. Everyone got ready soon and after a fast breakfast we took our trustworthy marshutka and, with the owner of the house coming with us, we went to a little village named Mutso. Before arriging there, we met a road with a sign, saying not to pass because it was the country border; another building with a georgian flag over the mountain, just hundreds meters far from us, was the border limit before Cecenia. At some point, couple of km far from the destination, we found a road that we could not pass in any way: we decided then to continue walking, leaving the marshutka there; our driver decided to stay, not to leave it alone.

The walk was not very long, but to reach Mutso you need to go very high over the mountains; the view from there is amazing: green mountains, a river running fast and a wonderful sky were on the background. We reached the village, similar to Shatili with its ancient towers built over the mountains to defend the country from enemies. The return was quite easier and once back to Shatili, we met those Czech people who were waiting for us: we could take only three of them on the road back to Tbilisi.

If going up is scary, coming back is also more: the roads without any protection and the rain which begun to fall after we left Shatili made the trip really much interesting. We were about 50 kilometers far from the city, when we found a broken road: the rain and a waterfall broke it and a queue of cars and marshutka were stucked. One truck helped one of them to go over, but then disappeared: when we saw our driver wanted to try to pass, most of us went down from the bus. I decided to stay on it with other 3 brave people and it was really a great decision: after the first attempt, the marshutka was stucked in the middle of water and mug; a jeep came to jelp us, but it could not do anything, so we had to go back: that was really frightening, with the river very fast few meters down on our left, but we did it. We waited for some truck to come to help us too, but since nobody came, our driver decided to do a last attempt: driving the marshutka at full speed, we passed finally the water with a jump and the screams of excitement of us – riders.

The rest of the travel was peaceful: some rain for a while, then sunny again until Tbilisi, were we arrived 5 hours and 17 minutes after our leaving. Shatili is really an awesome place that worth at least a visit, even if it could seem so hard to reach.