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The Trans-Caucasian Trail is a trail in development. Based on our short experience with its most developed section-- between Dilijan and Sanahin, where we met only one other pair of hikers in four or five days' walking-- there are long stretches of reasonable route finding punctuated by some very idiosyncratic trail design choices and gnarly bushwacking through head and chest high brush. There are people doing the Armenian and Georgian section in its entirety, but I think for most long distance hikers it would be best saved for a later date when the trail is a bit more established. Mrs. Orca making her way up one of the passes between Dilijan and Sanahin, Trans-Caucasian Trail, Armenia.
We initially planned to visit Rila Monastery as part of our E4 hike. It is not actually on trail, but is near enough that you can look down upon it from a high ridge near Malyovitsa Peak (2729m). However, reaching the monastery from trail would involve a steep descent losing about 1400 meters of vertical elevation, and then regaining that elevation to get back on trail. In the end Mrs. Orca and I could not bring ourselves to do it, and we instead visited the monastery by car with a friend after completing the hike.
Some kind of swifts, viewed from the monastery's oldest surviving structure, the 14th century Hrelyo’s Tower, Rila Monastery, Bulgaria.
We spent about a month in Bulgaria this summer. We were there once before--in 2019, also for about a month--and instantly fell in love with the country. That summer we hiked the Bulgarian National Trail, the Kom Emine, which coincides with the E3, crossing Bulgaria from Kom Peak in the West to Cape Emine on the Black Sea in the East. That trail had some awesome scenery but was somewhat more of a cultural experience, since it had almost no foreign tourists and crossed through extensive stretches where people were engaged in shepherding, forestry and agriculture.
While we were there we made friends and learned of the Five Mountains Trail, which coincides with the E4 and crosses Bulgaria from Sofia in the north to the Greek border in the south. It is a more developed, heavily traveled, and rugged alpine trail. We knew we would return to do that some day, and when the opportunity presented itself this summer we jumped at it.
In about 250km the trail passes through five mountain ranges: Vitosha, Verila, Rila, Pirin and Slavyanka. There are many peaks and passes over 2000m, and the scenery in Rila and Pirin rivals that of much more famous European ranges. The trail also boasts a very well developed hut system so that you can end most days with good food, drink, company and shelter, which is usually what we chose to do.
Mrs. Orca on the first day of the E4, near the top of Cherni Vrah (2290m), Vitosha Mountains, Bulgaria.
We camped the first night of the E4 on the slopes of Vitosha next to the abandoned Smilyo Shelter, then woke up very early for the eight hour walk to Klisura. This stage is the lowest of the whole hike (around 1000-1400m), as it crosses the Verila Mountain range, bridging between the Vitosha and Rila Mountains (the high ridge in the distance). The first half of the day was beautiful meadow walking with lots of wildlife, but on the whole this was the only somewhat tedious stage of the hike, mainly because it grew very hot on that day and there is little or no water on this stage of the trail. Mrs. Orca crossing the Verila Mountains between Smilyo Shelter and Klisura, Five Mountains Trail, Bulgaria.
A coach trip to London and we immediately got a tube and a bus out of central London to visit Strawberry Hill House, lots of photos taken but a bit tired now so here's a couple of phone snaps to be going on with
"The Tsar's Fortress," Veliko Tarnovo's acropolis during the Second Bulgarian Empire. The hill was ringed by defensive walls and towers, enclosing many churches, residences and the Bulgarian Tsar's palace. The citadel was destroyed by the Ottomans in 1393, but partially rebuilt during the communist era to encourage nationalist patriotism. At night there is a popular but very strange sound and light show, where the buildings are illuminated in psychedelic colors and shoot laser beams across the night sky while a disembodied voice narrates Bulgarian history. I took this photo during one of the rare, subdued moments of more natural illumination. Tsaravets Fortress, Veliko Tarnovo, Bulgaria.
When I was cleaning up after the raccoons I picked up a rock and found this underneath. I've seen them in the forest nearby, but never before in the yard. Mrs. Orca and I have been planning to put in a small pond designed specifically for the tree frogs to breed in, but this discovery adds new urgency to do so. Rough-skinned newt, backyard Olympia.
Note (10.24.25): I turned over a rock in the course of some yardwork today and found another, or (less likely?) the same. It appeared to be in a state of torpor or hibernation, but it's hard to tell as they are slow movers in the best of times. Our frog and newt pond is in and just needs to be planted. Hopefully in a year or two we start to see their numbers increase.
Sanahin and Hagphat were both founded during a particularly rich period in Armenian history known as the Armenian Renaissance. After centuries of Arab and/or Byzantine control, in 885 the Armenian Bagratids became the recognized rulers of large parts of present day Armenia (as well as other regions beyond its current borders). The monasteries were founded in the tenth century with the patronage of that dynasty and quickly became important centers of teaching and learning. A kind of medieval university operated at Sanahin, with learned priests teaching courses in theology, philosophy, and science. Above, the Academy Hall at Sanahin, which seems to have been a sort of lecture or seminar hall. Notice the isles of nooks where scholars could sit while they listened, debated and studied. Also notice the elaborately-carved khachkars, or stone-crosses, at the end of the hall. They are a ubiquitous and uniquely Armenian art form. The Academy at Sanahin, Armenia.
We started the day a bit below freezing with a mix of fog and sun. Mrs. Orca and I made some rounds and didn't see a great deal of note except this frost beard, or hair ice. It occurs only in a unique combination of circumstances, specifically when freezing temperatures force water out of the pores of rotten broadleaf timber (in this case alder) that has been colonized by the fungus Exidiopsis effusa. The process has only been understood for about a decade. I won't pretend that it is understood by me, but somehow this specific fungus interacts with the ice in such a way that it cannot recrystalize into a crust. Instead it grows as hair from a follicle in these very fine 0.02mm filaments. Frost beard at McLane Creek Nature Trail, Olympia, WA.