02-Jun-2010 – The owners of the hostel in Tbilisi told me it was easy to go to this confluence point. Just take a "marshrutka", a mini bus, from the bus station near Didube metro station. At the bus station there were lots of vehicles, but the only one going in my direction would drop me about 12 km from the Sioni reservoir. From there and onwards I might be lucky and get a lift with somebody. Or just walk. After an hour or so I succumbed to an offer from a taxi driver. 50 lari! He would take me there and wait for an hour or so while I rowed out to the cp. It was not far, he assured me, we could do the trip in about three hours. (It took almost six hours!) The road got worse the closer we got to Sioni, but the landscapes and the drive through "tunnels" of beautiful, fresh green beech forests were marvellous.

At the dam we met the custodian who showed us the remains of the boat the first visitors used, now a complete wreck. But he found the confluence point concept interesting, he knew about coordinates and turned out to be a geologist by training. He made a few phone calls and found a fellow who had a small aluminium dinghy with an outboard engine. The wind was a bit too strong for rowing the vessel, he knew his bargaining power and I had to pay 20 lari for his services. We went down to his little boat in a small jeep, put on the outboard engine. After a number of starting attempts he took out the spark plug and replaced it with one that had just worked in his jeep. Then we set off. The water was a bit choppy and sitting on the thwart of this flat bottomed boat was like having you bottom kicked rapidly by a hard boot. At the actual area of the confluence point the engine stopped and we did the rest rowing. The wind was not to our advantage and the boat drifted easily. I took a number of photos of the GPS, but the clearest one shows that we settled for 16 m from the confluence point. Fortunately the engine started again and another back kicking session took place. Back at the dam I gave the print out from the first visit and some Google maps to the custodian who was pleased since the text was also in Russian.

PS. The time on the GPS is CET.