The weather was somewhat improved this morning, but the rainy conditions over the past several days left the trails muddy and less than ideal for hiking. At least that was my excuse. Only one of our group wanted to hike (the oldest one, who will soon be 80!) so he and our guide Sofie would enjoy the hike by themselves. The remaining 5 of us traveled with them in the van to the trail head and sent them off. At that point in the road, the usually small river had grown large enough with all of the rain to pour onto the road, preventing another van from heading farther up the valley. We were fortunate that we were turning around to head back to Metsia.

Back in Mestia, we walked around town before having lunch on the Hotel Posta patio. Two of us will be getting Covid tests tonight, 72 hours before they leave the country. The remaining 4 of us will get our tests on Wednesday. We’ll leave Metsia around 8:00am tomorrow for the 4-5 hour drive down the mountain to Kutaisi, where we will check back into the Best Western Hotel. We’ll have enough time in the afternoon to take in the Old Town scene just across the River before dinner.