Caucasian Tale

I mean, Caucasian Male. 186cm tall, of slight build, heavy sleight-of-hand, goes by the names of Oleś, Olzza, Owlish, Oldish, the Oligarch, the Ol Factory, the Pigeon, Smallish and Osh. Among others.

But all that's not gonna help anyone find me out here. Cos no one knows where the Caucasus even is, let alone Azerbaijan, let alone this out-of-the-way town of Şəki.

Şəki is actually pronounced 'Shaki' or 'Sheki,' or somewhere in between.

Yeah, I've just been exploring this super interesting town, and have ended up back here in the Lollipop Café, listening to Azeri pop, which is quite interesting actually. I've also been tucking into a couple of qutab, these yummy greens-filled pancake thingies, and a large cup of black tea.

This town's really cool. I'm in a super nice part of Azerbaijan, a million miles away from the glitzy facade of Baku. Well, I guess it's not necessarily a facade over there, it's real, there's serious money there, and people wanna show they have it in any way they can.

But this place is historic. It has its own class. People are proud of their heritage, their art and their culture. They don't need to be ostentatious about it.

Today I strolled way up the hill, to the older part of the town. I mean, where I'm staying is already pretty old, but parts of what's known as the old town are centuries older.

I was imagining a scene from an old Soviet spy thriller movie when I saw this retro phone box.

In the dead of night a scared man wearing a brown suit and a black hat takes a call in the phone box, looks around nervously, and then as he goes to leave a woman in a trench coat passes by, and "accidentally" pokes him in the butt with the spike of her umbrella, curtly apologising to him as she hurries away.

Thirty minutes later the man dies a gruesome painful death from poisoning, his butt blowing up to the size of two cosmonauts' large space helmets, before it totally explodes, all over his dark and dingy apartment, the secret information he just garnered, along with the man, splattering into oblivion forever.

Hmmmm. You can tell I'm not short of time, can't you.

The older part of town is right on the edge of the forest.

Carpet seller

Another barbər

It started drizzling. This is the view from under my umbrella.

I strolled through a part of town that the world seems to have forgotten - old, weed-infested cobblestone laneways, very old but rundown stone buildings, old men and the occasional old woman hanging around doing nothing much.

I passed an old cemetery

And the winter palace of the ex-Khan of Sheki

Eventually I reached the old city walls, the boundary of the Shaki Khan's Fortress.

The Shaki Khanate was a khanate under Iranian (and later Russian) suzerainty. Established in the 1500s, and like most other kingdoms around the world (even to this day), the khanate underwent huge power struggles and leadership challenges throughout its history, and often suffered the fate of the larger kingdoms which controlled it.

The Palace of Shaki Khans was a summer residence for various Shaki khans and their royal court. It was built in 1797, and was intended to permanently house the khans who controlled Shaki. But the Russians came, didn't they, and annexed the region.

Today the magnificent building, and other buildings within the fortress walls, are UNESCO World Heritage listed, and are truly stunning.

The fortress is surrounded by 1300m of stone walls, including garrison buildings and defense towers.

The palace itself is totally sublime, but you can't take pics inside. So as usual, I'll borrow some from the net, so you can enjoy the beauty I've just seen with my own one and three quarter eyes.

After that magnificent eye feast, I headed off for another, to the Shaki State Art Museum.

A young woman staff member decided to practice her English, and actually described, in detail, every single painting and sculpture in the whole bloody museum.

It was so interesting, and sooooo long.

But I learnt a lot about Azeri culture, as one tends to do in art galleries.

A bunch of paintings were about the pain of war.

Funeral for a dead soldier

German soldiers, and a representation of an explosion

Hubby's off to war. It's 50-50 as to whether he'll make it back. That's a real statistic for Azeri men, unfortunately.

Washing corn in the village

Working the gold mine

Then there were a bunch of paintings about traditional Azeri games

Chovkan, basically equestrian polo.

Arm wrestlers

Caucasian wrestling

Traditional spiritual fire jumping ritual. And they don't have 65 beers each before they do it.

Slacklining it

Random woman, by a sculptress

I love her face

Listening to the gramophone

Sidney Nolan-esque

Amazing peacock face. This one's called, "Adam and Eve's Regret, Satan's Deception."

Muso art

Tree mama

Beautiful fabric design. I'd love a shirt with this design.

This one represents the power of music, to transport the mind, and to relax the body. The golden spires represent sound waves.

Hey guess what! It's raining!! I haven't seen the rain for months, but as I'm sitting here in the café it's just starting to come down heavily, after a little light drizzle earlier. It's so nice to see it, after being in the dry deserts and high barren plateaux of China and Central Asia for a long time now.

When I left my room this morning there was water about, it'd been raining a little overnight, so I ducked back into my room and grabbed my little umbrella. I'm so glad I did, because now it's pissing down.

In The Balakans

It was brisk as I left Sheki this morning, for the long 100km cycle to here, Balakan. It was also a climb of 700m, over the course of the day.

I'm tired, my body's still not at 100%. That's why I've been choosing to stay in hotels rather than camping, just so I can rest fully at the end of the day, without needing to set up camp and cook. Plus the hotels are pretty cheap, and the quality's actually pretty good, most of the time.

It snowed in the hills overnight. It really was quite a stunningly beautiful morning, after the night rain. And by the way, just over those snowy hills and down the road a bit is the southwestern corner of the vast land of Russia.

Russia is by far the largest country on the planet, and is nearly twice as big as the next largest country, Canada. It's 2.2 times the size of Australia. But it's not enough! We need more territory! Make Russia Great Again!

Notice the police in the foreground of the pic, by the way. They're everywhere in this country, and super active, stopping motorists and pedestrians regularly, checking this and asking that, blah blah bloody blah. Revenue raising I guess. Every town entrance and exit, as well as many major intersections inside towns, seem to be full of them.

Turning right leads you to sin. Watch out lefties.

More unfortunate roadkill. Poor flattened hedgehog. RIPPFH.

Beautiful church on a hill. OMCG!* A church!

*Christian

I stopped for qutab at this little stall. The old woman was the sweetest ever, she kept smiling at me and wishing me luck.

She makes up the qutab beforehand, some are just plain unfilled pastry, others are stuffed with local greens. Then she heats them up on this hotplate on quite a low heat, and then brushes butter on them before serving.

They're actually seriously delicious, and have become my current most favourite food. Shame, because I'm leaving the country.

Although maybe they've got something similar in Georgia. Probably. It reminds me a bit of Turkish gözleme, without the cheese.

Bet that's got you salivating.

Azerbaijan - Great Country. Yeah I know that already.

World War II only started in 1941 around here. But it wasn't called that, it's still called the Great Patriotic War. But it's really a misnomer.

It should've been called the Unspeakably Tragic Slaughter of Millions of Innocent People by a Bunch of Psychopathic Megalomaniacs.

And the slaughter was worst in the Soviet Union. An unconscionable 27m Soviet citizens died during the 4 years of the war, 19m of whom were civilians. This is by far the greatest death toll of any of the countries that were involved in World War II, including the victims of the Holocaust death camps, all those people bombed to smithereens in Germany and the UK, and the huge numbers killed in nuclear-annihilated Japan.

Over 300,000 Azerbaijani troops also lost their lives, which was almost one out of every two men who fought. Not very good odds.

Another big flagpole, this time in the town of Katex. Central Asian governments love their flags.

There was a mad sculptor on the loose in this town.

Oh deer

Maiden, with dinner

Guards atop the oblast gates

Horny ibexes

Cartooney eagle

Huge leopard. Leopards actually exist in these parts, but, unsurprisingly, they're critically endangered.

I've now realised that I've also been critically endangered here, riding on deserted roads with all those leopards, bears and wolves about.

Random sign decoration

Very very old wall. Archaeologically significantly old, apparently.

A guy stopped his fancy car right in the middle of the road, and gave me this. And he didn't appear to be a middle-of-the-road type of guy either. So nice of him. It's sparkling water that's so sparkling that when you drink it it immediately comes out of your nose. And it's got some sort of interesting flavour that I can't put my finger on.

Finally in Balakan City, after a huge ride

Another parky for the ex-Pressy

My hotel pool. I considered it, but already feel like a complete Martian walking through these towns, so didn't want to add to the effect.

Sunset colours

Plain black tea, plain rice, one plain omelette.

You can't always get what you want.

Border Line

Well, I'm very close to crossing yet another real live artificial frontier.

I've only been in Azerbaijan for a couple of weeks, it's the shortest amount of time I've spent in any country on this trip.

And this was the route I travelled through this great land.

I started in the east, in Baku, and then rode northwest, into the foothills of the Caucasus, and have now finally reached the northwestern corner of the country.

Tomorrow I plan to ride the short distance to the Georgian border, and to cross yet another historical line, a line that only exists because of the past actions of random political players, not because of the needs or desires of the local people who live there.

Yes, the amazing country of Georgia beckons, and, as usual, I have little clue as to what awaits me there.

Well, I do know it's amazing. I've heard that. And I do know that I can stay there for a whole year if I want, without a visa.

Now that's novel.

I don't know any other country like that.

But I won't be there for a whole year, or at least not right away.

I have plans.

They're mainly written in pencil, of course, but some involve other people, and for those ones I've used a biro.

A biro is a ballpoint pen.

A ballpoint pen is something you write with.

Writing is what people used to do before they had computers.

Computers are what people used to use before they had phones.

Phones are what people use to try and stay connected.

And that's where the connection ends.

Crash And Learn

Well well well. Today was a pretty memorable day, for so many reasons.

And one of the reasons was pretty shitty.

But .... I've made it to Georgia!

I'm warmly rugged up in my bed in my little room in the amazingly beautiful town of Sighnaghi, an incredible historic and picturesque town way up on a ridgetop, overlooking the wide Alazani Valley.

I've just had the most incredible Mexican food, believe it or not, served by a Georgian guy who used to live in California, and who learnt to cook Mexican food there. I've been hanging out with two amazing German guys from near Frankfurt, Wolf and Christian, we met at the border today, and just by chance met again here this evening.

We went off for a beer before dinner, and I've just eaten the most delicious vegetarian burrito ever, and a piece of tres leches, a creamy lemon cake extravaganza draped in milk and two types of cream. So good!

This is us after dinner.

My German friends insisted on paying for everything. They're so sweet, and are just out here for a twelve day holiday, to see a few places in Georgia and Armenia.

I mean, the countries are small, yes, and full time working life doesn't leave you much holiday time, so they're checking out what they can in the time they have, even though each of these countries warrants way more time to explore, if you have it.

Christian's actually one of those extremely well travelled people. He's lived and worked all over the world, including over 20 years in China, and has a Chinese wife. So the conversation was super interesting for me, because he has a deeper perspective on what's happening in China, plus knows a lot about a lot of places.

The road from Balakan in Azerbaijan to the border was really beautiful this morning, and super quiet. I was expecting the usual massive numbers of trucks and vehicles heading to and from the border, but there were hardly any.

The countryside was basically fully forested, the sky was blue, and the birds were singing.

And so was I.

Local grazesite

And there's the border

And then into Georgia! The crossing was as smooth as silk, and fast. I changed money, got my bearings, and headed towards a beautiful town I'd read about the previous night. And while the countryside looked pretty much the same, the roads were a little skinnier and a bit rougher, and the place feels a little more rustic.

I love the Georgian script. It reminds me of Burmese or Thai, or even Keralan.

Those clouds look ominous

Ancient walls and gate

I wanna live in this town

I stopped for lunch, and, as usual, they didn't have much vegetarian food on offer, but they whipped this up for me.

The café looks like it becomes a bar later in the day

I'm down on the plains now, and this is the first wider river I've seen for a long time

I was gonna stay in this town, but I probably wouldn't get much sleep, because I heard that if you stay in the dorms it's snorey.

For a short time I was riding on the big highway towards Tbilisi. In fact, this highway didn't appear on my outdated offline map, so I couldn't access the side road to the village I was headed for, Sighnaghi, and had to take the long cut through another town, Vakiri.

Slam Dunk

And that's when the shit thing happened.

I was riding along this tiny laneway in the hilly village, and really wasn't concentrating when I rode over this drain.

SLAM!!!

My front wheel slid in between two bent metal drain slits, my bike stopped immediately, and without any warning whatsoever I was thrown over the handlebars and slammed headfirst into the road, before my brain could even register what was happening.

Thank God I had a helmet on, because it absorbed the lion's share of the impact.

It's such a weird feeling when something like that happens. I was basically on the ground before I had the chance to really piece together what the fuck had just happened.

Luckily I was ok. I was a little bruised on one knee and on one hand, and a little shaken up, but everything seemed fine. Phew.

But then I noticed my phone was gone. During the heavy impact it'd been jolted right off the quadlock phone holder on my handlebars and had flown right down into the drain. Fuck!

There was water rushing through the drain, but, luckily, I could see from above that my phone had landed in a shallower part, and was lying facedown in the flowing water. It could so easily have fallen in the deeper part, and been washed away to oblivion. That would've been a massive hassle. Unfortunately I really rely on my phone here, which is, I guess, what we all do. Some of my stuff is backed up on my iPad, but not everything.

There was no way I could get to my phone from above. The grates were impossible to lift or move. Eventually I realised I could actually squeeze my whole body into the side of the drain and squirm my way through the water. So I slowly squeezed my way along the inside of the drain, getting saturated and filthy as I did so, and was finally able to retrieve my phone, which was right across the other side.

It was such great fun, I can assure you.

My little drain entrance

Miraculously, my phone appears to be totally fine, despite being underwater for ages. I was actually really lucky, as it turns out. I could've been hurt, and I could've lost my phone for good.

But by some huge stroke of good fortune neither of those things happened, and I could eventually get back on my bike, in my wet and filthy clothes, and ride on.

The climb to the village was long, and steep, about 600m up, over a distance of about 6km. That's what they call a gradient of 10%. Good maths huh.

It didn't take long to get some height, and some views.

After riding through the small village of Vakiri the roadsides were fully forested, all the way to the top. There was almost no traffic either, as I wasn't taking the main route to the town, but the back route, to reach it from above.

The placement of these signs is so funny. So random - sometimes they're erected in some easy section, and then sometimes completely missing for the really steep bits. Ours not to reason why.

Eventually I made it to a beautiful lookout, at the outer walls of the town.

I read online last night that this town reminds some people of the province of Toscana in Italy, and I scoffed. But goddamn it, it sorta does.

I found my cheap room.

Glad there are insect screens

My view

The family who owns the house are winemakers. The grandpa, Gollam (so precious), showed me this trough, which they use to manually squeeze the juice from the grapes. With their feet, of course. Looks like it'd be fun.