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Relive the day's action and insights with daily journal entries, digital photos, audio reports and more. Select one of the teams below to visit their latest entry.

FIELD TEAM
Follow Pat O'Hara's search for the perfect moment in the national parks of the Eastern Caucasus. Eleanor O'Hanlon reports, with photos by Russell Sparkman.

Research Team
Georgia veteran Peter Nasmyth returns to guide us into the history and heritage of the region. Denise Rocco captures it all in digital images.

April 29:
In Ancient Groves

April 28:
Batumi and Beyond

April 26:
Fly Tusheti Air

April 25:
An Image of Eden

April 24:
The Road of Friendship

April 22:
Patriarch of the Forest

April 21:
Monastery in the Desert

April 20:
Vashlovani Reserve

April 19:
The Living Pillar

April 18:
Preparing for the Journey

April 17:
Georgian Table

April 12:
Tbilisi Overview

Email Teams in Georgia
 
Epson
 

 


Previous Dispatch

People lived here for almost 700 years, from the 5th to the 12th centuries It is a natural defensive formation of the landscape so high, so fantastically made that it was almost impregnable. The climb up to the fortress leaves me breathless and shaky; I grab exposed tree roots at times to stop sliding back down. But from the top I look at the Alazani River far below, then across to the Caucasus Mountains, lifting their lovely, cold, white heads above the fields and meadows of the river valley. Queen Tamar rebuilt this stone fortress in the 12th century, Paata tells us – and the stories say this room was hers.

For thousands of years the tides of conquest and invasion have flowed through Georgia. Khornabuji was a place where the inhabitants of this valley could find shelter until those tides passed. Paata shows us a round hole dug into the ground by one of the walls. An earthenware wine jar, or khevri – maybe a thousand years old and still perfectly intact.

People meet in Georgia around the rituals of wine and food. Vashlovani's zoologist Amiran Khodiashvili cooks meat over an open fire and pours us homemade wine from a huge glass jar. We are not strangers – Pat has visited Vashlovani four times already, and he brought me here for the first time last autumn.
 

Next Dispatch
 

Georgian Girl
 
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Fisherman
 
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