Mineralnye Vody is the front door to the North Caucasus. The name means mineral waters, and the town grew up around the railway junction and later the airport that serves the spa towns of Kislovodsk, Pyatigorsk, Essentuki and Zheleznovodsk, a group known since the nineteenth century as the Caucasian Mineral Waters. About seventy-six thousand people live here, and many more pass through it on the way to the mountains or the sanatoria.
For a rider it is a landing pad and a supply point, and it does that job well. Fuel, cafes, car hire, hotels and mechanics are plentiful, and the roads around are flat and straight over open steppe. Ahead, on a clear morning, you may see the Caucasus ridge floating on the southern horizon, and on the very best days the twin white cone of Elbrus rises above it, a sight that makes you immediately want to turn the bars south. The ride toward Kislovodsk, Dzhily-Su and the Elbrus approach starts here, and so does the Dombay route. Early morning light is the best for the long view.
The region's history is bound up with the springs. Russian officers and doctors found the healing waters in the early nineteenth century, and the spa towns became fashionable for the aristocracy and for writers. Lermontov set parts of A Hero of Our Time in Pyatigorsk and died there after a duel in 1841, and Pushkin and Tolstoy both visited the region. The sanatorium culture grew in the Soviet era and still draws visitors. Locals will tell you that the water tastes of iron and eggs, and they are not being unfair.
The land around is also unusual. A group of small volcanic laccoliths, steep hills of hardened magma that never reached the surface, stand up from the steppe like loaves, and the best known, Mount Beshtau, is visible in the distance and gave Pyatigorsk its name, meaning five mountains. This is a rare piece of geology, and the sight of the hills against the plains is memorable.
Practical advice is to stock up here. The roads south have fuel at the larger towns, but supplies thin out in the valleys, and prices rise. Check the weather for the mountains before leaving, because the steppe can be warm and clear while the high valleys are wrapped in cloud.