Why was GEORGIA-TRIP founded?

Created: 2025-10-14

1. You are a master in ski mountaineering and now primarily focus on freeride. What from your racing career helps you the most in the backcountry and when guiding clients?

For me, ski mountaineering is a completely natural way of moving in the winter mountains. That is, if you love mountains, you’ll run through the summer Giant Mountains, the Alps, and beyond, and in winter, you naturally strap on the skis for more than just moving downhill. And then you realize that higher mountains in summer also have snow, and you take ski mountaineering even on expeditions to higher peaks. It becomes a part of you all year round :-). The races were more about meeting friends. You are in the mountains all the time, and sometimes it’s nice to meet people, chat, and run through the mountains together. In the early days of ski mountaineering races here, it was a group of people spending weekends together and racing. Then you try races elsewhere, meet like-minded people from Czech Republic, Slovakia, and then across Europe.

Freeride is, of course, an integral part of mountains and ski mountaineering… a shorter but crucial part of the ski tour. You climb up for that descent. Then it’s a question of the conditions. It could be completely windblown ice or crust, yet everyone hopes for powder. On expeditions, we met a Georgian, Bidzina Gujabidze, who told us about his homeland – the Bakhmaro area, where powder lasts from October to May and accumulates up to 10 meters in winter. So we went to check it out and more or less stayed there. So he discovered Bakhmaro for us, which we first offered to friends and later to our clients. For guiding them, we have certified mountain guides. I stayed in the background at the computer, and I have to carve out my own time for the mountains. So my dream of being constantly in the mountains completely shifted, and our enthusiasm is now under the Georgia-trip banner.

2. In Georgia, thanks to the Black Sea, you have unique snow conditions. What makes the local powder so special compared to what you were used to in the Alps, and how does it affect skiing itself?

At first, I said the powder in Bakhmaro is absolutely exceptional because even when the snow softens due to warming, by morning the moisture sublimates and it becomes light, dry powder again. We experienced this even on HELISKI in Uzbekistan. Of course, there are situations when wind packs the snow into a firm layer, especially on ridges, or when powder doesn’t fall every day, and you ski looking for a fresh line. But because our guides know the entire area perfectly and love exploring, the skiable area has expanded at least threefold since the beginning of our CATSKI. So even returning clients always find something new.

And the Black Sea helps by providing relatively regular precipitation, so fresh powder is much more frequent than in the Alps. Here, we ski on fresh natural powder!!! Sometimes the snowfall is so intense that it becomes more than a manageable calamity, and you can’t even ski down. But that only happens roughly once every three years.

3. Bakhmaro is quite a remote area. What is your biggest logistical challenge when running such a large project like CAT-SKIING in peak season and keeping three snowcats operational?

Interestingly, our biggest logistical challenges are not the remote Bakhmaro area but Georgia itself, as a non-EU country. Almost all mountain area challenges are managed with the help of technically skilled people, two local families we employ year-round, and a reasonable degree of success. But administrative obstacles slow us down the most—they are bigger, harder, and especially more expensive! So if anyone wants to replicate this, I wish them a lot of mental resilience for handling bureaucracy.

Another challenge is the Georgian script and language. Both are completely different from what we know. We communicate best in Russian with the older generation and in English with younger people. So we always look for an intermediary to stay as close as possible. Our clients, however, manage fine with English. The base employs locals, but both guides and base staff come from our Czech or Georgian team, and they work really well, which is fantastic. Combining the experience of amazing skiing and social evenings with excellent Georgian cuisine leaves a truly strong impression! So come join us :-)

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