120mi update from the Transcaucasian Trail (TCT)
Having never been to Armenia, Jetpack and I wanted to spend a few days exploring the capital city before heading out on the trail. After our 3 days, I’ve got to say that I was pleasantly impressed by the city. We had a lovely hotel with great breakfasts included for cheap. The city is very walkable with many great museums and art installations. Plenty of inside and outdoor markets with shopping of all forms. The food that we had was all excellent and affordable. We did some wine tasting as this region is the birthplace of wine (Armenia has been making it since 4100 BCE). The people were kind and talkative.
While in the city, I got a haircut and we did some last minute resupplying. Yes, mainly buying local junk food and snacks for our long bus ride south. They have excellent selections of dried fruits and nuts plus all flavors of fruit leather. Ice cream bars are cheap and plentiful so I’m setting a goal of sampling all of them!
To get to the southern terminus we scheduled a seat on the 7:30 daily minibus to Meghri. Here almost all public transportation is done via Sprinter vans. We showed up at 7:10 and started wandering around. Quickly a guy came over to “help” but then tried to sell us a private van ride there for a lot more. No thanks. Others pointed us in the right direction. We found our bus despite the number on the front being wrong. Nobody spoke English but they nodded to “Meghri”, so what could go wrong. Somehow they had seats for 21 people in the Sprinter, but no luggage area. We then learned that as everybody got seated, the isle was filled with stacked luggage. We stopped twice on the 8hr drive and we realized that the two of us were the only non smokers. The highway crossed the TCT a few times so we got to see a little of what we were in for.
Upon arriving in Meghri, we walked the kilometer to our guesthouse. Marietta, our host, was wonderful and offered to make us a local dinner from her garden for $12 each. It was beyond excellent and much more than we could eat. Breakfast was similarly wonderful. We then met the only other guest, a very kind and talkative Iranian man. We chatted for quite a while. It was a great reminder that people are just people and we can all get along. As a result of the morning, we got a lazy 9a start to the trail.
The trail starts off on the Armenia/Iran border. It’s arid and mountainous at an elevation of about 2,100ft. We started with a 10mi climb up to 8,000ft. Soon we were in beautiful green forests and grasslands. We were seeing bear scat and it felt totally different than the start. The trail was marked but proceeded to get more overgrown. Despite almost stepping on a viper we made it to the high point without much drama. From there the drama started. First, I realized I left my extra pair of socks drying on the line at the guest house. After a bit longer, the trail just stopped and we were bushwhacking to follow the GPS line. The next 4 miles took us hours to complete. To be fair, the TCT just officially opened the Armenia section in 2022 and they did warn us some sections are not well maintained. So we were warned, but didn’t realize the extent of it. This was grass over our heads at times. Steep slopes and a poisonous plant called giant hogsweed to avoid. Then a thunderstorm rolled in… We set up camp in the shortest grass we could find and hunkered down a bit shell shocked. This wasn’t perfectly maintained US or European trails any longer.
That night our tent blew down 3 times due to the strong winds. Finally we braved the storms and searched for rocks to supplement our tent stakes. Rocks seemed to be everywhere but the open meadow we were camped in. We found some rocks and it solved the problem and tried to sleep. Then Jetpack got a small hole in her neoair mattress and had to blow it back up every few hours… Let’s just say it was a rough first 24hr on the trail.
We woke up to a beautiful day. Day two was much better. The whole day the route was obvious even when overgrown. The giant hogsweed was more prominent and we had to work around it and walk through it more often than I’d like(we are hiking in pants for this reason). We were quite happy to hit a gravel road for the long 3500ft climb to Mt Khustup (10,531). It was getting late and looked like it might storm so we didn’t do the last 500ft to the summit. The trail down was perfect and we saw a herd of the bezoar goats.
That evening we camped at the trailhead parking lot and got some trail magic from a group of guys out joyriding. They spot great English and said we had already seen more Armenian nature than most Armenians did their whole lives. We got the air mattress fixed and despite a small storm slept well. Despite camping right above town, it was 30km of trail to get there. That section of trail was excellent. Well maintained and very well blazed. We both needed it. The big downside of day 3 was hoards of ticks. Each grassy section left us knocking 5-10 ticks off our pants. Instead of camping we decided to hitch the 7km into the good sized town of Kapan and get a hotel. We got a ride with two brothers Arthur & Roman. Roman turns around after a minute of driving and says “You like go fast?” And without an answer guns the engine. Next thing we know we are going 120km/Hr in a 40 zone passing cars despite incoming traffic. We got to town shaken but ok. We found a decent hotel room, and worked to get things dry. Somehow in only 3 days our tent was already stinking. I won’t tell you how bad my lone pair of socks smelled. I went on a sock finding mission and learned my choices were cotton or cotton… We got food resupplies we didn’t need but wanted and ate a wonderful dinner.
The following 3 days on trail have improved significantly with great blazing and a much higher percentage of obvious trails. We have been seeing monasteries and old fortresses. Eating great food and generally seeing nobody on the trails. Day 5 we saw our first hikers with 2 Armenian day hikers, then 2 nice Swiss section hikers. There is still quite a bit of overgrown trail sections with plenty of ticks but I think that is to be expected in these remote areas. This trail needs a lot more regular hiking traffic to pack it down. All the people we meet are kind and try to talk to us despite the language barrier. Yesterday, a man chased us down just to ask our names, where we were from and just to say hi. He seemed so excited people from America would visit his little village. That type of interaction has been a common experience. Many are now familiar with the trail and seem blown away people would come to walk across the country.
Today is day 7 for us and we are taking a zero at a guesthouse in Sisian. It’s another 100mi to the next bigger town of Yegheghadzor with a few small villages in-between. We are hoping for good trails and to be able to pick up our pace and get there in 4 days. But we’ll still resupply as if there will be a 5th day…
We were looking for an adventure and this is definitely an adventure!
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Disclaimer: This article was contributed and translated into English by Maral Chavushian. While we strive for quality, the views and accuracy of the content remain the responsibility of the contributor. Please verify all facts independently before reposting or citing.
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