Take an oddly interesting photo tour of an abandoned former Soviet resort called Gagri, in Abkhazia, which is officially part of Georgia but now administered by Russia. Looks like it was a pretty grand place in its day, especially in the workers' paradise. It's only some miles from Sochi, home of the 2014 winter Olympics.
Photo from English Russia.
Political skirmishing continues, but it appears Turkey and Armenia will at last bury enough of their differences to reopen their border, with protocols for establishing relations set to be signed on 13 October. That should help tourism as well as trade on both sides of the very rural border, in the shadow of Mt. Ararat not far from the Armenian capital of Yerevan.
Turkish Airlines flies from Istanbul to Tbilisi and Baku, capitals of the other Caucasus countries, Georgia and Azerbaijan, but when we flew to Yerevan we had to catch a plane from Vienna. Anything that will facilitate freer movement of people through the cul de sac that Armenia has become is bound to improve the lot of its people.
The military transport vehicle in this photo, taken in the early morning light from the Khor Virap monastery in Armenia, is on a highway on the Turkish side of the border. See Khor Virap in Armenia, with Mt. Ararat in Turkey looming in the distance, in the Armenia Gallery at EarthPhotos.com.
(See also the Turkey Gallery, the Georgia Gallery and the Azerbaijan Gallery.)
The crackle of Cold War confrontation could be about to resurface. Russia has made no secret of its unhappiness with next week's defiant NATO military exercises in Georgia.
Today, Reuters reports that Russia takes control of rebel borders with Georgia. Formal Russian control of the South Ossetia and Abkhazia borders puts Russian and NATO troops in not quite eye to eye proximity next week at the NATO exercise.
The Georgia Times says "NATO military training will be held on Vaziani military base in Tbilisi from May 6 to June 1. 1100 soldiers of the 18 countries will take part in the maneuvers." Tbilisi and the South Ossetia border are roughly thirty miles apart.
(Photo of a billboard in Tbilisi celebrating Georgia's "Rose Revolution." More in the Georgia Gallery at EarthPhotos.com. See also the Russia Gallery.)
Our mailbox is laden with expensive glossy catalogs from high end travel providers. Mountain Travel Sobek, “Celebrating 40 Years of Adventure Travel,” sends a very nicely done 204 page 2009 catalog offering, for a couple of examples:
12 days in Namibia for $7795 per person, starting and ending in Windhoek, including internal airfare and the company of others (price offered is for four or five people). Including Clara and Herb from Cleveland, your close proximity partners for nearly two weeks of Land Rover trips and box lunches, whom you’ll meet on arrival, this epic journey departs from Windhoek twice each year, on Mountain Travel Sobek’s schedule.
Or how about 13 nights in the Republic of Georgia from $3695 (again, not just you, but from 4 – 12 people)? This one starts in Tibilisi, twice a year, again on Mountain Travel Sobek’s schedule.
Not to fault Mountain Travel Sobek. This is what they do. You’ve seen the Perillo Tours ads for travel to Italy? Same thing. You’re buying it? They’re selling it.
So don’t buy it. Do your research and hire local people. They not only have local knowledge, but they’re also often quoting in local money, and the money you spend with them stays local.
My wife Mirja and I flew into Windhoek, for example, by ourselves, and spent a bare fraction of that group price. And it was simple:
Continue reading "Maximizing Your International Travel Dollar" »
from EarthPhotos.com
Photo of Rustaveli Boulevard and the Parliament building, Tbilisi, Republic of Georgia from EarthPhotos.com.
More protests in Moldova (more later) coincide with a protest being planned in another former Soviet Republic. Watch the Republic of Georgia tomorrow at 13:00 local time, when organizers have promised a "Tulips - No to Violence" rally in Tbilisi, in which "participants will hand tulips to police officers."
The National Interest has background on the event, which comes as reaction to a Presidential pardon after a murder many believe was government-connected. The period since last August's Georgia/Russia war for South Ossetia hasn't been kind to President Mikheil Saakashvili, and it looks like he's feeling the heat.
There have been calls for his resignation, arrests of opposition leaders and the voluntary suspension of the Georgian language version of the Georgian Times, which came with this remarkable article in the Georgian Times' English edition.
Georgia Poised for an Unstable Spring reads a headline in the Gulf News. We hope not. We remain in touch with a friend we met on our visit to Tbilisi in 2006. With his permission, we'll share his impressions of the current state of affairs in the coming days.
But besides all that, Georgia is just one gorgeous little slice of the planet. Poised near the spine of the mighty Caucasus Mountains, here is the 14th century Trinity Church (Tsminda Sameba) perched beneath mighty Mt. Kazbek, at 5033 meters/16512 feet, taller that western Europe's tallest mountain, Mt. Blanc.
See more photos in the Georgia Gallery on EarthPhotos.com.
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"The goal of Olympism is to place sport at the service of the harmonious development of man, with a view to promoting a peaceful society concerned with the preservation of human dignity." - Fundamental Principle #2 in the Olympic Charter.
It's time to start a new CS&W feature about all the harmony and human dignity going on near the site of the 2014 winter games, Sochi, on the Russian Black Sea (previous discussion here and here). Today's edition starts with this from the New York Times:
Blast in Ingushetia Kills 5 Police Officers
Now take a look at this map (which comes from Maplandia):
Surkhakhi, near the blast site, is marked with the arrow. Nicely positioned between Grozny, Chechnya and Beslan, home of the 2004 school hostage tragedy, Surkhakhi is roughly 260 air miles from Sochi, which is on the Black Sea coast, left.
Under 150 miles to the east of Surkhaki, RFERL reports At Least Nine Die In Armed Clashes In Daghestan. The Russian border with Georgia is scarcely 60 miles to Surkhaki's south, and across that border, RFERL reports Georgian Opposition Party Says Members Arrested.
And speaking of Georgia, RFERL also says Russia To Defend Abkhazia, South Ossetia Borders as part of the fallout from last summer's war. The distance up the coast from Abkhazia to Sochi? Oh, maybe ten miles.
Nice little post script: When the world's athletes arrive, including the U.K.'s, the mayor there to greet them just might be "Andrei Lugovoi, a Duma deputy with the Liberal
Democratic Party of Russia who is wanted in Britain for the murder of
former security officer Aleksandr Litvinenko."
Gee, better get your tickets early.
Business Week and Spiegel Online report that all is not well in planning for the 2014 winter Olympic games in Sochi. As they put it, "So far things are a bit of a mess."
Their report notes that, "construction costs are rising and the oligarchs who are supposed to build the arenas for the Games are running out of money in the financial crisis." Indeed, in the last week almost a billion dollars in budget cuts have been announced.
But there's something just a little more fundamental at work here, namely, the original IOC decision to award the games to the Russian Black Sea resort. Sochi is maybe twenty miles up the road from an internationally contested hot spot, the once Georgian province of Abkhazia. On a line, it's maybe 200 miles from Tskhinvali, capital of the Georgian, but Russian-occupied, province of South Ossetia.
And scarcely 250 miles west of Sochi lies Grozny, ground zero in the vicious Chechen wars. Today's International Herald Tribune carries the following story: Chechen leader imposes strict Islamic code.
Business Week/Spiegel points out that there have been six bomb attacks in Sochi proper over the past year, and four people have died.
The last Russian games were the American-boycotted 1980 Moscow summer Olympics. Perhaps the IOC decided that after 34 years, it was Russia's turn again. We'll see how it turns out, but the Olympic Committee's wisdom at picking the Russian Caucasus looks a little dicey from here.
See photos of the Caucasus and Black Sea region in the Russia, Georgia, Armenia, Azerbaijan & Turkey galleries at EarthPhotos.com.
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