In Kars

If you’ve ever looked at a map of Turkey , you’ll know that Kars is not on the border with Georgia.   But if you’ve ever looked at a map of Europe that happen to include 2/3s of Turkey in the bottom right-hand corner—which I was, and still am—then you won’t even see Kars, and you’ll assume that because it’s clearly so far from Europe that it could only be close to wherever in the Orient I was planning on going.  So, as my finger followed the train off the map—and, presumably, off the edge of the world—I was not expecting the task ahead of me in this former Russian colonial outpost/ancient Armenian city.  

This is basically the map I was using.

The first task was finding the bus depot, which was easy enough with the help of my hosts.  I took a dolmus (Turkish for furgon/marshrutka) to Ardahan, and then had to find the second bus depot, way on the outskirts of town where they told me that the next bus to Posov, near to the border, would leave in an hour or so.  I used this time to eat a second delicious chicken doner and access some internet, from which I had been absent for over two days.  I used this opportunity to get acquainted with the geography of the region and to find the right route to the Georgian border because surprisingly, not every Turkish person in the region frequently up and decides to go to Georgia for a wild weekend getaway and therefore could not advise on the best crossing point.

So Posov it was.  And the change in geography between Ardahan and Posov was nothing short of remarkable.  From the dusty and deserty plains surrounding Ardahan gave way to grassy rockland with mudhut villages, and finally to leafy hills and high, rocky grasslands, with hints of real mountains as we approached the lower Caucasus range.  Thanks to it being a former border region between NATO and the Warsaw Pact, there was no shortage of military bases as well, and I got to witness a lot of tank manoeuvres and fun examples of containment policy.   Another fun moment was when we stopped in the absolute middle of nowhere to pick up an old woman with several plastic burlap sack full of potatoes, or shoes, or something, and she sat on one of them in the dolmus talking on a mobile phone loudly the whole time.  Then we dropped her off in another middle-of-nowhere spot.  I’d love to know more about her.  

When I uploaded this, in the thumbnail these rocks looked like tanks. 

The critical moment came when I realised that Posov was up on the hill and that the turnoff to Gurcistan was at the base of the hill.  I was able to deduce this from the fact that we passed the turnoff on the way to Posov.  I urged the driver to stop and let me off, shouting “Gurcistan!” and lots of people responded with, “Yes! Gurcistan!” smiling in a treat-this-tourist-like-a-young-child sort of way while the driver continued to take me up the hill to the centre of Posov.  When I disembarked and started back down the hill, I was asked by several people to stop and drink a tea but I was on a mission.  So downwards I marched, and then up again because the turnoff happened to be in a valley. 

I was hoping for a ride on the back of tractor but as luck would have it got picked up by border guards.  They spoke no English but insisted I go with them.  Just before the border they turned off onto a gravel road and said something about a lake.  I thought, “Ah, this is where they kill me” so I naturally behaved irrationally and began speaking rapidly and panickedly.  They said, “Time problem?” and then turned around and drove me straight to the border.  So it turns out they were actually really nice and just wanted to see this lake, but the good news is that when I go into survival mode, people sit up and take notice.