Yet again I had an amazing opportunity to go out into a village to experience a new subculture and way of life.  After the two-hour bus ride we arrived in a town to stay the night in a hostel but one of the locals, who the guy I went with knew, invited us into his home for the night. Once again the hospitality of the people here emerged but I’m sure we now owe him something for the favor since that’s usually how it works. Anyways, the next morning we proceeded to find a driver to take us into the mountains to the village.

     The road to get there was sketchy to say the least and impassable if it had snowed recently. With a cliff on one side for you to slide off of and a mountain face on the other the only option when two vehicles met was for one to back up into an infrequent pull out. On our way there we had to back up to wait for a vehicle to pass only a few times. Fortunately our driver was patient enough to let me get out to take some photos while we waited. The view was breathtaking but it felt like people shouldn’t be there due to the isolation and difficult access. However, even on the way to the village there were multiple settlements on various mountainsides! This provoked the thought of why would people centuries ago come to live there? Our driver said that the earliest settlers in the region lived in caves on the mountainside and migrated with their herds but this also didn’t make much sense to me. A family had a cave on the side of a cliff and had to walk kilometers to a river just to get water or they could use the snow that was even further up the mountain. I was perplexed by the choice of habitat and each time I took a photo I couldn’t help but think back to when people first started building and the insane endeavor that would’ve been.

     After only one night there we were leaving in the morning so I woke up early to go catch the sunrise over the mountains. The colours were spectacular but I wanted to find the perfect scene. I don’t think I found it but I found some that were pretty close. Next week I will be posting the portraits of the particularly photogenic people I encountered and share a little bit about them. Have a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year! Be sure to spend time with family and those you love! If you enjoy seeing my photos or reading my blog a great gift you could give me would be to share this post or even donate to my Globetrek internship. Thank you for reading!