Multi-Day Trekking

The route follows the water. What governs it is the chain of springs still running in August; length and line come second. Everything else about a multi-day walk in Syunik or Vayots Dzor you can shift around. That order you cannot.

You carry your own load. Sleeping bag, mat, spare clothes, three litres of water for the stretch between two springs, plus your share of tent and food. Twelve to fifteen kilos add up, and you only notice them on the third climb of the day.

The stages are short and the days are long. Twelve to eighteen kilometres sounds like a morning; over scree, without a path and with a pack, it becomes six to eight hours. In between lie passes where the wind stands still and valley floors that are already in shadow at four in the afternoon.

Nights are spent in tents, occasionally with a herding family who spend the summer up on the pasture. The camp site is chosen for wind and water: not on the ridge, not in the stream bed, not under the only tree for miles. That sometimes costs you the better photograph and spares you the night when the tent wall slaps against your face.

There is no mobile coverage over long stretches. We carry satellite communication, and the day plan is left with somebody who is not coming along.

In the evening it is quiet in a way that has become rare in Europe. No traffic in the background, no aircraft, only wind and, at some point, sheep bells two valleys away. On the first night it wakes you, because your ear is searching for something that is not there.

After the second day something shifts. You stop looking at your watch and start looking at the sky and at the next saddle. Under three days that does not happen, which is why our routes start there.