A.B. Away: Juta Sno valley

(Lesley) Today we had a lovely family day. We set out early for Juta at the end of Sno valley. We had a comfy Mitsubishi with the extra seats in the back and a good driver with a sense of humour, no English though. We shared the ride with John, a fellow traveller who had come up to checkout out our accomodations and to share the cab and fare with us to Juta. The drive was about an hour on a dirt road with some spectacular views. It was only 22 km but one can't go quickly a road cut into the side of the hill of a deep valley or one so full of potholes.

Once we arrived in Juta we didn't stick around but set out straight away for our hike. We had the valley to ourselves; we saw one old woman collecting herbs and perhaps mushrooms, and a small group of Georgian hikers returning from a weekend of camping. Then we saw no one else for 6 hours. The hike to the glacier took about 3.5 hours with a stop for lunch. We took photos all along the route and I'll include some in the blog just to make you all green with envy. We had to cross a few rivers and do a few climbs but mostly it was just a steady, not too steep uphill until the end where it was steeper and more rocky. It was great to make it all the way as John and I had tried to get to another glacier a few days ago and had stopped just an hour short of it. Although our first attempt was a 9 hour hike and we hadn't actually set out with intentions of making it, food, water or enough time. We stayed at the glacier for awhile relaxing and taking more photos then headed back to Juta, stopping to play for a bit. It was nice family time in a beautiful setting. It was cool and a little rainy but not cold nor too wet. We took some photos with the timer of us jumping, but getting the timing was hard; Sam was best at this and we got some funny shots.

Eventually we returned to Juta 75 minutes before our pick up was due. We wandered through the town of less than 20 houses looking for a cafe (we knew there was one) but either it is a false rumour or it was closed. So we showed up at our pick up point in front of Soso homestay with still an hour to wait. I figured we needed a pick me up in the form of tea and having found no cafe I boldly went to the door and asked politely if it was possible to get 4 cups of chai. ( I needn't have bothered; 5 minutes sitting and waiting for our ride and someone would have come and offered us tea anyway) But the couple at Soso smiled and welcomed us in. The fellow brought out a map and showed us where he was from and we showed him how far we had got. We showed him our route through Georgia, described how beautiful our walk had been. He talked with gestures about snow experiences and we joined in miming skiing. They do that a lot. His wife came out with 4 cups of chai, cheese and bread and home churned butter. It had been raining lightly on and off all afternoon and while we ate and drank it started to pour for 20 minutes. We were warm and happy and learning more Georgia words too. We watched a little Georgian TV as it was on in the background. It was election day in Turkey and we were keen to see who had won but I don't think the results were tabulated yet because they showed all the candidates and it wasn't obvious who was the winner. We can check on the internet in Tbilisi tomorrow. If we had more time up north I would have gone back and stayed at Soso, as we got a good vibe from the couple. She accepted some money for the food and tea and wanted to send us with extra cheese as she could tell I liked it, but I explained that we would be having supper soon back in Kazbegi. Our driver arrived and on the road three fellows we had met a few days earlier strolled along. They had walked 7 hours from Kazbegi so they piled in with us to get back vowing to return with their bags the next day for a longer stay.

We returned to a fresh crew at Emma's Homestay, (a German family with a son who works in Tbilisi), and a nice meal. Four days in Kazbegi may be a little longer than many travellers stay, but for us it was the right number of days as we had a chance to relax, read, hike and spread out a bit. It was good family time and restful as both kids were a little under the weather with colds. Sam is fully recovered and Mhari is on the mend.