Mestia, Jan. 25, 2011

Only one photo today, but it's assembled from three (same shot, different exposures) in the HDR style in order to capture the full range of tones such a contrasty scene offers.  Mestia, with Mt. Tetnuldi's pyramidal peak in the background, this midmorning.  This is also the first time I used my new circular polarizing filter.

K'ala and Ushba Vertical Panorama, late July 2010

(From now until January 16, I'm in Canada, but still posting Georgian images for now.)
Mt Ushba again, top centre, with part of the village of K'ala below, and the Enguri River.  Also taken on Kvirikoba day, also a panorama assembled from several photos.  Clouds coming would soon obscure the mountain as usual, but until then all they did was add more interest to the sky.

As for this day being Christmas Eve... no apologies for refusing to wish you a mere "Happy Holidays".  No, this season is called Christmas, like it or not.  Have a Merry Christmas.  Or don't take it off at all, if you're serious about protesting a Christian holiday.  Grinch, grumble, &c.

Mulakhi & Ushba Panorama, late July 2010

July 29 is Kvirikoba, possibly Svaneti's most important Orthodox festival of the year, held in and outside a little church high above the village of K'ala with a fabulous chased gold icon of Christ, one of the Orthodox world's most important.
This panorama I took on the way to that festival, near the pass between the villages of Mulakhi and Ipari.  Here we are looking back towards the former at centre, with Mt Ushba peering over the top in the distance just left of centre.

Mestia@NIGHT, 5

I think this is the best Mestia evening shot of mine so far - it's also HDR, as are the previous examples.  This one has it all for me:  depth given by the various sizes of towers, good colours and detail, nice blue mountains in the background, car headlights streaked into blurred trails of light.  It'll do.

Mestia Panorama, October 2010

Not panoramically formatted, this is nonetheless a stitching together of several frames.  Again, from just outside where we used to live.  The clouds and snow are a bit over-white, but I like it anyway.

Mestia Panorama, October 2010

Time to switch from Ushguli panoramas to a few more from Mestia - this was autumn, October, from just outside our first host family's house.  (We've now moved to a new host family, and even bought a little wood-burning stove to heat our room with.  MUCH cosier.)

Ushguli p a n o r a m a

From April 2009, just to be different.  It was only then that I felt it to be safe enough to slog up to Queen Tamar's Summer Tower fortress in heavy snow without bringing an avalanche down onto myself.  The fortress's remains are at left, the village spread out far below.

Panoraaaaama...

...of Ushguuuuuli.... February 2009, as usual.
Well, this one's hardly a panorama as the technical definition of such is an aspect ratio of at least 2:1.  But it was assembled from a few shots put together.

Panorama: Upper Ushguli, February 2009

Another stitched panorama - I took so many sets of these from different locations, now it's time to reap the rewards at last.  The small house just left of centre is where I spent 2 winters while teaching English in this fabulous location.

Panorama: Above Mulakhi, December 2008

This one's got Ushba's twin peaks at left of centre, in the distance, and more to the right of that (near centre), the long village of Mulakhi.

Panorama: Lower Ushguli, December 2008

Another stitched panorama, featuring the lower 2 hamlets of Ushguli, also from December 2008, before we had much snow.  (Later in the year there was enough, lasting long enough, to make the village sick of it, as they usually are by the time of mid-April.)  Right in the middle is a church with fresco fragments on its outer wall.

Panorama: Above Ushguli, December 2008

I've begun stitching together panoramas from old sets of photos, some digital originals, others scans from film.  This is from digital frames, above Ushguli, with Mt. Shkhara in the distant left-of-centre background - Georgia's tallest mountain.

Mestia Panorama, September 2010

From the newly renovated concrete road to the ski resort, scheduled to reopen in December by Presidential Decree.  One of the best places from which to see the town, IF Mt. Ushba is cooperating and poking its twin peaks above.  Lali & Giorgi, the son of our host family, visible at far right.

Koruldi Lakes, above Mestia, 12/9/2010

It was plenty hot up there, but the last of the previous winter's snow still clung on in this place of extremes.

Koruldi Lakes, above Mestia, 12/9/2010

 Three more from that memorable walk.
Top:  dandelions in front of Mt. Tetnuldi
Middle:  Try walking up that!  "Slip slaaadin away"... but it's not as bad as it looks.
Bottom:  This, however, is every bit as good as it looks.

Home sweet home (Mestia), Oct. 7, 2010

Only one shot today, because it's such a good one, IMHO.
I looked out of my bedroom window at 0745 in the morning on the 7th - clear skies at last!  Mt. Ushba's not visible from there, but I took the chance that I'd see its twin peaks from the height of the new ski resort road, and it paid off.  Left home without breakfast, took a few shots, then off to school for my 0900 teaching start.  Clouds, sky, lighting and all other details had combined perfectly for me.  Happy happy.

Interesting Facts about Mestia, No. 8

Mestia is presided over by Mt. Ushba.  If you walk up the side of the mountain where the old ski resort is being renovated, and then look back down onto the town, before long you'll see what I mean.  From here, as more and more of those twin peaks come into view, they seem to glower above the town clustered in its valley below.

      And Ushba seems

       HUGE.

And you, the viewer, seem so


                 small.

Harvest Time, Mestia, Oct. 2, 2010

 It was good timing to get these shots when I did, 2 days ago.  Since then we've had almost nonstop rain, day and night, and I'm expecting warnings for floods and mudslides.  Top, squash and (in the distance) corn; middle, corn; bottom, just a favourite view.

Koruldi Lakes, above Mestia, 12/9/2010

Left of centre in the top shot is Karl, my walking partner for the day, on what looks like crazy-dangerous sand but is actually nice knifelike teaspoon-sized bits of slate.  Their very sharpness makes them slide very little, even at such angles.  But as the way got more and more vertical, and the rock more and more rotten - coming away in my hands, all that sharpness digging into my palms and filling my boots - I decided to stop, no more than 3 or 4 metres from the place from which Ushba would re-emerge (middle shot).  What made me turn back?  2 thoughts:  1) this is getting very risky for my level of experience, and 2) I'm not single anymore.
The bottom shot has our vehicle for the day and Ushba's twin peaks, just to the right of which is the slate hill which defeated me. This time.

Koruldi Lakes, above Mestia, 12/9/2010

Described by one recent visitor as "Hardly lakes at all - more like ponds... not worth the trouble".  (And trouble it was - 1.5 hours of very rough roads in an old Soviet-era Vilis 4x4.)  But to a photographer a real gift, natural reflectors of the already magnificent scenery.  This blog's header panoramic photo is from the same lakes, the same day.  Near these lakes, hidden by an interposed hill of slate, Ushba's twin peaks brood hugely.  More soon on my attempt to scale that hill and see the monster up close.

And... Happy Birthday Gill, hope you have a great one, Lali & I are thinking of you massively today!