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A Rail and Hiking Journey from the Balkans to Georgia’s Caucasus

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Mestia to Batumi – From Towers to the Sea

In the high thin air of Mestia, the morning began with the feeling that we were standing at the edge of something old and unspeakably resilient. The mountains here still carry an aura of fortification: they do not just exist, they defend. Lorena and I took the ski lift, an improbable machine of cables and steel grafted onto this medieval [...]

Continue Reading... 16th August '25 Maurizio Pittau

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Tracks to Trails Vlog
Posted by Maurizio Pittau on 1st September '25

Track to Trail: A Rail and Hiking Journey from the Balkans to Georgia’s Caucasus. From the heart of the Balkans to the peaks of...

Travel
Batumi to Dublin, via Istanbul
Posted by Maurizio Pittau on 18th August '25

The last day always arrives like a thief — not with the clamour of a border crossing or the solemnity of a mountain pass, but...

Travel
Batumi – Between Towers of Glass and Echoes ...
Posted by Maurizio Pittau on 17th August '25

Batumi woke us not with the silence of the mountains, but with the restless murmur of a port city—ship horns in the distance, the...

Travel
Mestia to Batumi – From Towers to the Sea
Posted by Maurizio Pittau on 16th August '25

In the high thin air of Mestia, the morning began with the feeling that we were standing at the edge of something old and...

Travel
Ushguli to Mestia – Stones, Ice and Shadows ...
Posted by Maurizio Pittau on 15th August '25

The morning began in the rarefied air of Ushguli, a village that pretends to be timeless and almost succeeds. Horses whinnied in...

Travel
Iprali to Ushguli – Between Glaciers and Gho...
Posted by Maurizio Pittau on 14th August '25

The last day of the trek has a deceptive gentleness to it. Twelve kilometres, a mere four hundred metres of ascent, five or six...

Travel
Adishi to Iprari – Of Horses, High Passes an...
Posted by Maurizio Pittau on 13th August '25

The third day of the trek—the day everyone warns you about—was always going to be both the most magnificent and the most...

Travel
Lakhiri to Adeshi – The Heart of Svaneti
Posted by Maurizio Pittau on 12th August '25

The second day of the trek was not simply a stage—it was an ordeal, and perhaps the most beautiful day of the entire journey. We...

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Mestia to Lakhiri – Into the High Caucasus
Posted by Maurizio Pittau on 11th August '25

The morning in Mestia felt less like a beginning than a summons. The mountains loomed above the town in jagged silence, their...

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Tbilisi to Mestia – The Silkroad Express to ...
Posted by Maurizio Pittau on 10th August '25

The train left Tbilisi at 08:20 sharp, its whistle cutting through the already warming air. Georgian Railways, once a realm of...

Travel
Tbilisi – Sulphur and Searching for Peace an...
Posted by Maurizio Pittau on 9th August '25

The day began with a bath – not just any bath, but the kind of sulphur bath that reminds you how ancient cities like Tbilisi...

Travel
Kars to Tbilisi – Borders, Fortresses and Am...
Posted by Maurizio Pittau on 8th August '25

Crossing borders on foot is a ritual that makes you feel history pressing against your ribs. You walk past the last Turkish...

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Ankara to Kars – Into the East: The Doğu Exp...
Posted by Maurizio Pittau on 7th August '25

There is a peculiar kind of time that belongs only to trains. On the Doğu Express — the long steel artery running from Ankara to...

Travel
Ankara to Kars – Bureaucrats, Trains and Une...
Posted by Maurizio Pittau on 6th August '25

Leaving Istanbul behind, I boarded the train to Ankara. This wasn’t the famous Doğu Express yet—that adventure was waiting for me...

Travel
Istanbul to Ankara – Heat Hammams and the Lo...
Posted by Maurizio Pittau on 5th August '25

Istanbul overwhelms in a way few cities can. It is not merely a place but a collision of histories, a palimpsest of empires where...

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Copyright © Maurizio Pittau - Tracks To Trails. 2025 • All rights reserved

Severn WordPress Theme by EckoThemes. Published with WordPress.