Through the Greater Caucasus mountain range that forms the northern belt of Georgia, the slim road of the Abano pass cuts a treacherous path. In fact the term “road” is a little generous; for 45 miles, this dirt track cut out of the edge of the mountainside swells and contracts as it snakes upwards to a height of 2,000 meters. The sheer drop along the road edge claims several lives every year, and its reputation was cemented when it featured in the BBC World’s Most Dangerous Road documentary in 2013. But this is the only route to reach the villages of Tusheti, a region tucked deep within these mountains. At the end of the pass, the mountains give way to a grassy plateau as Omalo, Tusheti’s largest village and administrative centre, comes into view.
From June to September, Georgians travel along this road from their homes in Kakheti to escape the lowland heat and spend the season in family homes dotted across Tusheti’s 49 villages. For the rest of the year, the Abano pass is engulfed in snow, with temperatures dropping to -30C, cutting Tusheti off from the rest of the country.
The recent upswing in tourism in Georgia has boosted what is a small and slow-growing economy, and for places like Tusheti, it’s filling a gap left by the shrinking shepherding tradition that’s been the core of Tush culture for centuries. For hikers and adventure seekers, their journey begins with braving the road to enjoy the hiking and wild beauty of Tusheti, and to stay in traditional wooden houses in Omalo or camp in the mountains.
Omalo itself is split into two halves; where Upper Omalo is concentrated into a smaller pocket of buildings beneath centuries-old stone towers that dot the hillside, Lower Omalo is newer, with dozens of houses spread out among the plateau. Many of these are still used, either as summer homes or guesthouses. Others are abandoned or are used as farms for cows and horses for the summer months before the migration to the lowlands ahead of winter. Since the 16th century, in autumn shepherds have walked their flocks down from the Tusheti mountains to the Kakheti lowlands
Migration in Tusheti has been both a product of tradition as well as a source of trauma. Since the 16th century, shepherds have walked their flocks over 120 miles down from the Tusheti mountains to the Kakheti lowlands in autumn, where they live until the spring before reversing their tracks and taking their sheep to the pristine summer pastures in the mountains once more.
But in the 1950s, the Soviets instigated a forced migration of all communities in Tusheti, moving families who had lived there for centuries down to the towns and villages of the lowlands and effectively banning their return. The rupture never fully healed; even after Georgia’s then leader, Eduard Shevardnadze, allowed families to return to their ancestral homeland in the 1980s, few moved back fully. The relative warmth and comfort of the lowlands compared to the harsh conditions of the mountains means that today all but a handful of people leave Tusheti for the winter.
Text: Nadia Beard - The Guardian