“AZERBAIJAN BORDER—GOOD LUCK” read the sign as we rolled slowly towards the big entry gate. The name Azerbaijan has a magical mystery sound to it. We’re familiar with country names like Italy, Spain, Turkey, even Georgia, the country we were just leaving. They all sound familiar, but Azerbaijan? Where is it?
If you pick up a handful of dirt in Los Angeles or a handful in Istanbul, it’s the same stuff. Part of what makes travel fascinating for us is the people and their lives in the unique countries they live in. But there is something else interesting about these individuals, whether adults or children, regardless of religion or politics. Let me tell you a quick story:
Years ago when we traveled in Mexico, we used to laugh at people coming south with their motorhomes or campers full of canned food, on the assumption that people in Mexico didn’t have anything to eat. Now, as we travel through some of the most remote countries in the world, some may wonder how do we survive? What’s for dinner?
Our friend Tom Hughey back in California loves to read about our experiences, the people and the interesting places we visit but being a practical kind of guy, he was wondering, about the local infrastructure, so we started photographing items of different nature.
While visiting the Numisi Winery in Velistsikhe, Misha, the Russian husband of Nunu, invited us to tag along to visit their farm where he wanted to pick up some fresh milk.
We had been looking forward to Georgian wines since we had our last sip of Italian Nero d’Avila. To our disappointment, most of the stores in Georgia stocked plenty of beer, vodka and juices, but rarely wines. Much of the table wine we found in the country was either homemade or produced by wineries and sold in 5-liter plastic containers. It was invariably on the sweet side. This was not Napa Valley, where there is a winery every couple of miles advertising their wine-tasting rooms, tours and picknick facilities.
We were now starting to feel that we were truly following the Silk Road and imagined long caravans of camels carrying furs, hides, charcoal, iron, gold, wool, jade, silk and other luxury goods traveling from Europe to China and vis versa. Some of these caravans may have been made up of hundreds of camels, “The Ships of the Desert”. Their route was determined by safe stopping points where they could replenish food, water and exchange goods. Small fortresses called caravanserais sprang up.
