Tiblisi. Breaking Ourselves in Gently….not!!

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Day 2 Georgia

Breaking ourselves in gently



So where were we?

Ah yes, our luggage had actually arrived at the same time as us….weird…

So we enter into Georgia and our taxi guy is waiting for us wearing a red scarf as promised. Well it’s more like a neckerchief but let’s not split hairs here. The guy has made an effort to be noticed so leave him alone.

It is about 4:30am by the way but our man,whose name I instantly forgot, is happy to see us and then wants to know where we want to go despite me having let his firm know twice. I show him the Google maps link using the free airport wifi and he seems to know where to go.

He doesn’t.

But he gets there eventually thanks to, or despite, using Google maps. He seems quite enamoured by England and is hoping to visit later this year for a work’s meeting. Not sure there’ll be anything left by then with Truss at the helm but we can but hope. I’m guessing he won’t be allowed in now Braverman is trying to out-racist Patel but I hope neckerchief guy gets to see England while it’s still relatively intact.

He dropped us off at Nona’s (or it could be Nana’s) guesthouse at some time after five and made a lot of noise to rouse the host. She comes out, briefly shows us our apartment and goes back to bed after telling us to get some sleep.

Yes boss!

POINT OF INTEREST!!

Well, it’s all interesting of course, but I’m hoping this will appeal to people who think I just waffle and moan. Neckerchief man drove us past a huge, elaborate, glass building and told us it was a police station. The reason it is glass is because prior to 2004, the cops were rather corrupt (not as bad as our government) but pretty bad. The new PM sacked all the baddies and said the police stations should be glass to show their transparency and that they have nothing to hide (something we can only dream of).

Pretty interesting huh?

Anyway….

Our apartment is on two floors with some steep wooden stairs separating the accommodation. There is a double bed downstairs, another upstairs plus two single beds and an armchair. The miniscule bathroom is downstairs and is basically a wetroom as the shower is pretty much over the toilet and the sink. We have all this room yet they squeeze the facilities up the corner!

The courtyard has chairs and tables as well as a sink; oh and a rickety old piano obviously.

The best bed is upstairs so we lug stuff up there and think it a good idea to sleep. So we do.

We wake at about midday and head into town, no doubt for a gentle first day…. We find a cashpoint and get out some dosh before heading into Spar to find something to eat and drink.

Next decision is whether to walk up to the fortress atop the hill or take the cable car. It takes a while to work out paying as you need a metro card but we can buy these at the ticket office. A one-way trip is less than a quid but grumpy sells me a return-well puts enough money on the card for a return anyway. We can use this credit on other transport so it’s okay but this wasn’t the last of the miserable cashiers today….you’re working with the general public….smile, even if we are English!

The cable car trip is good and we are soon up top. There was a guy at the bottom who told me I am Russian as I have a Russian face…..and a few more people have spoken to me in Russian too….interesting…..

There is a huge silver statue at the top which symbolises Georgia (if you want details, read Claire’s blog) and it looks out over the city. There are some pricey tat shops with no prices on and the one thing Claire asked the price of would have been cheaper in Venice.

We decided to visit the botanical gardens before storming the fortress and descended lots of stairs to get to a ticket office. I sorted out the correct money (just over £1 each) and proffered it through a small hatch to an angry person. They didn’t even speak and I couldn’t even determine what sex they were but they definitely didn’t smile and just handed me a receipt without even taking the money I had left in the tray.

Customer service at its best.

We thought we’d be in the gardens for about 1/2 an hour, smooch through a greenhouse or two and that would be it. These gardens are huge and any greenhouses are closed to the public but there are a number of waterfalls. We were in there about 2-3 hours and there were lots of hills and some steps that Claire enjoyed making me climb.

They seem to be doing a good job of preserving species and looking after trees and stuff but the Japanese garden was absolute pants and the so-called orangery wasn’t accessible. It wasn’t what we expected but it was cheap.

We eventually found a way out that wasn’t where we went in so we missed the fortress altogether! Maybe tomorrow….

We wandered around the tourist area for a bit and ended up at a waterfall, before deciding that we should probably have something to eat. I eschewed the tourist places and found a cafe that was somewhere between local and tourist prices. The service was friendly and quick and we had chance to try some of the local delicacies for the first time.

A garlic tomato sauce (nothing like ketchup thankfully) was accompanied by some splendid georgian bread, Claire had aubergines with walnut paste, I had lobio which is a bean stew heavily dosed with fresh coriander and we both had kinkhali. The latter is like a dumpling but with a top that you would normally hold to pick it up. We ate with knives and forks. Claire’s had cheese in while mine had potato. Everything was really nice and, with 3 drinks, came to less than £20.

We had now walked about 18000 steps despite not getting up till late so Claire surprised me by saying we could go back to our accommodation, sit outside and moan in blogs….well that’s what I heard…. Not quite the easy first day most people would do after not getting here until the early hours!

The guesthouse owner gave me a plate of plums (my weird wife doesn’t like them!) and they have a cat who can jump up and open doors (even I was impressed!) so we are both happy. There are actually a lot of cats here, mostly strays, so getting around is going to be quite slow.

A few people were saying they wouldn’t come here at the moment due to its proximity to Ukraine and Russia but we have certainly seen no problems. On one rickety footbridge in the botanical gardens there was a message saying (rudely) what Russiansshould do and one guy, Russian I would imagine, tried to rub it off with his foot. Good job he hadn’t been there a few minutes earlier when Claire (and others) photographed it!

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