Georgia

Georgia

We arrived in Batumi and were surprised at how different it was from Turkey. It was a lot less modern than Turkey and would have been a good place to go after India because back then it would have felt modern. Our guest house in Batumi was nice because we got the the “suite” on the top floor, all the walls were wood and we had a fridge. We often get nice rooms because the fancier double rooms often have fold out couches.

After one night in Batumi we got on a bus for six hours. We arrived in Tbilisi across the street from a metro stop but didn't know and successfully got ripped of by a taxi! After a few days in Tbilisi we took a 3 hour bus ride to Kazbegi, a town in the mountains by the Russian border. Kazbegi was really nice; we hiked a lot. The area around Kazbegi is really nice and we stayed four nights which is longer than most people. After Kazbegi we went to Borgomi with a one night stop in Tbilisi.

Borgomi was very nice. We did a seven hour hike in Borgomi national park the first day and went to the Borgomi water park the second. Both were very nice and Sam and I went on the roller coaster twice. It was even scarier than a normal roller coaster because we didn't see any body go on before us and we didn't even know if it was safe. We could not say to ourselves 'don't worry it's North American / European standards'. Because it wasn't. We went back to Batumi for a few days after Borgomi before getting on the boat to go to the Ukraine.

The boat was a very interesting experience. I will right about that later

Yusufeli

I am going to skip Pamukale, Istanbul, Orhaniye, Fethiye, Olympos, Antalya, Goreme, Kyseri and the train for now so that I can catch up.

We arrived in Yusufeli at 5 pm. We went for a walk and found lots of pide restaurants. We were not hungry because for lunch when Sam ordered 3 tavuk (chicken) doners (white fluffy bread filled with chicken and some veggies) instead of giving him three half loaves they gave him three full loaves!!

Later, Sam Dad and I went to go have supper but all the places were closed except two: one was a suckish lokanta with food from this morning and one was a tea shop full of Turkish men that served doner kebabs. We finally found a pide shop across the river.

When we asked the man in the pide shop what the had, he told us that he had a meat pide, a cheese pide and a meat and cheese pide. We got one of each and they were delicious!

We crossed the foot bridge on the way back home. The foot bridge over the river is a wooden bridge with metal rails and every time we cross it I purposely walk beside my dad matching his stride, emphasizing my landing so as to maximize the rocking because I know he hates it. But the last time we crossed he purposely waited until I had crossed the bridge to cross it himself. Humph!!

The next morning we had çorba (lentil soup) for breakfast then, at noon, set out for a 3km walk to see a Georgian church. We walked along the river on the road for awhile and then tuned off at a path which lead along a stream to a small water fall. A 100 meters above the water fall we made dams which diverted the water. We spent about 45 minutes doing this and it was fun! Then we continued on for a bit untill we had a good view of the church. We couldn't climb up to the church because it was on top of a small peak so we didn't bother going as close as we could. We got close enough for a good view and some pictures. We walked back to Yusufeli and then ate at the pide shop for the second time in two days.