Etseri & Pari, Svaneti, July 2010

Mineral water spring just outside Etseri

Mt Ushba peeking its southern peak above Pari

Fence gone horizontal

Etseri, Svaneti, Georgia

Near the village where I spent Easter.  A mineral water spring, with delicious, slightly gaseous water, one of nearly 2000 in Georgia.  Well enough protected from livestock getting to it; but I took these photos of Valya in action after having cleaned up a whole large sack of plastic and glass bottles and metal tins from arond the site.  C'mon, Svans, I KNOW there's no garbage collection anywhere in your whole province; but at least take your rubbish away from such places as this, if you consider them holy!

Mineral water spring, nr Etseri, March 2007

Such springs are almost sacred places in Georgia. There are close to 2000 of them, generally protected from the elements, many ancient like this one, used by locals, with various claimed curative powers depending on their mineral content. (There's a "weeping wall" right in Tbilisi the water of which is supposed to be very good for eyesight.)

Mineral spring, nr Etseri, May 2001

Georgia is blessed with great water resources, many of them enriched with various minerals, some bottled and sold across the former USSR. Tbilisi was founded some 1500 years ago on a hot spring which is still in use today, the basis for a public baths complex. This mountain spring in the photograph, like many of the more than 2000 around the country, is protected from pollution and much revered for the quality of its water. This is Nodar's teenage son Lasha several years back, filling bottles.