5 a.m. It has just stopped raining, and low clouds close the horizon toward the head of the valley. I am driving a Lada Niva 4×4 through the muddy streets of Mestia, looking for three guys from Tbilisi. My beard, after a month in the field, rivals theirs. For the first time we have a chance to organize an “alpine-style” or better, day trip, light, without the help of either porters or horses. I feel a bit at home, moving in a jeep with glaciologist friends toward the village of Zebeishi discussing, more in gestures than words, glaciers, universities, the Caucasus and Adriano Celentano, a timeless myth in these parts.
Arriving at the village we waste time trapped in paperwork, with the military controlling the Tviberi valley. Now we need someone to look after our car during the day, lest we risk finding it without a drop of fuel on our return.
Riusciamo a muoverci a piedi solo verso le 7:45, risalendo il ripido versante sinistro della valle. Il militare di frontiera ci ha sconsigliato questa via, poiché l’accumulo di valanga che riempie la forra del torrente, e che di solito funge da “ponte” per attraversare il corso d’acqua, è collassato. Noi decidiamo di provarci comunque, visto che non conosciamo altre vie per penetrare all’interno della valle, e raggiungere così il ghiacciaio.
La giornata è magnifica, la neve fresca, caduta stanotte per la prima volta a tremila metri ci avverte che l’estate sta lasciando il posto all’autunno. Superato il suggestivo bosco di abeti secolari, scendiamo nella forra tra mille dubbi sull’effettiva percorribilità dell’attraversamento. In breve ci troviamo di fronte una voragine di trenta metri, contornata dai residui della valanga; poco più a monte, un ponte di neve sembra ancora utilizzabile, ma per raggiungerlo siamo costretti ad una deviazione attraverso un terreno molto difficile. La vegetazione è davvero rigogliosa, e la pioggia del giorno prima, accumulata sulle foglie e sui rami, ci procura una lunga doccia indesiderata. Dopo un’ora di pura fatica riusciamo ad attraversare il ponte di neve, per poi continuare il nostro cammino, muovendoci più velocemente sulle tracce già percorse due settimane prima.
The goal of the mission is to recover the thermo-hygrometer datalogger that is recording data from the front of the glacier, and the recovery of the ablatometer poles that, once read, will be able to give us an understanding of how much ice has been lost since August 8, the day measurements began.
We reach a big rock called “mother rock” by the locals, from where we can observe the valley tongue of the Kitlodi Glacier. We finally get out of the vegetation and can reach the datalogger. It is now 2 p.m. and we have little time to perform the work. The birch log bridge built 2 weeks earlier by the porters to cross the Tseri stream is fortunately intact and we can thus reach the front of the glacier. The Georgian friends prefer to stop, and so I climb as fast as I can in search of the poles. I find them quite easily and in less than 2 hours, without even having time for a snack, I am back to them. The poles, placed in an area of the glacier where the surface is covered by rocky debris of varying thickness, have lost from 64 to 99 cm in a little more than 2 weeks. Such low values, compared with areas where the ice is in direct contact with the atmosphere, are due precisely to the insulating power of the rocky debris, an excellent protection from solar radiation.
It is very late and the bogeyman of a dark re-entry makes us limit our breaks to the bare minimum. The re-entry is not linear; at least three ascents must be made, which steal time and energy. It is 7 p.m. when we reach the avalanche again: the snow bridge has fortunately held and we manage to pass it. We now opt for a different route than in the morning, one that is longer and full of unknowns, but safer. We climb with the last of our energy up the bed of a stream in search of a trail that will lead us back to the main path; we need to climb about two hundred meters, but the trail is there and the tension suddenly melts away. The mood returns high and inspired by the beautiful sunset lights illuminating the magnificent Chvabiani plain, the boys sing characteristic Svan songs. Night catches up with us as we travel the last few switchbacks above the village: we have been walking for thirteen hours almost nonstop. Levani, Georg and Romani, strong and proud, do not declare their fatigue while I give thanks for the training of the previous two months, without which, after four days of antibiotics, I would never have been able to close the mission in a single day.
A friend of the boys, in an exquisite gesture of hospitality, invites us into his home offering us an excellent khachapuri, which we devour hungrily, sealing a wonderful day of work and fun in a magnificent and wild Caucasus valley.
