Back to Tbilisi and new adventures

We made it back to Tbilisi. I have one day with my friend and then she flies back home.

We check into the hotel quickly and then walk to Fabrika again since the new hotel is closer. We stop at a fancy wine store on the way and grab a bottle just before it starts pouring rain again. This is will be the last bottle of Georgian wine we enjoy together before my friend takes off soon. But tonight we have reservations for a dinner show. The show we are attending is a traditional Georgian show with music, dance and food. We’ve been wanting to see one of these shows but they no longer have any like these in Kutaisi so this is our last chance before my friend leaves.

Tonight’s dinner show is at the Georgian House. They serve traditional Georgian food but we try something new -pickled cabbage similar to kimchi. There is a large traditional band that plays folk songs and periodically dancers come out to entertain us with the unique dancing style of Georgia.

The night is great but after lots of wine and it being a travel day I decide to sleep in a bit the next morning. We try a sulphur bathhouse close to our hotel, a great low key idea. This bath is recommended by another passenger on our bus ride back from Kutaisi yesterday. The spa is close, less crowded, and much cheaper than the ones in the main part of town. I am not much of a sauna person but I do alternate between the hot sulphur water and the cold bucket plunge. I may have even acted out a scene in the movie flashdance.

After the spa we visit more markets, view artwork, and of course there are more cats to admire.

There is once more another visit to the wine window and more town to explore. Having our fill of Georgian food we try italian food, some ice cream and dodge more rain again.

I cut the fun short because need to return back to the hotel to meet with my tour group for the next part of my adventures. The second half of my visit to Georgia is with a tour group from Girls Love Travel. I have been wanting to check out one of their tours forever.

I am introduced to everyone in our upcoming travel group and we talk logistics. After the meeting we head to a nearby bar with a DJ to celebrate a birthday of a new person I have just met on the tour. Only one other girl and I has never been on a tour with this company. It seems like a tight knit group but everyone seems open and nice. Looking forward to the next few days.

My travel companion leaves early in the morning while I am still sleeping. I am sad to see her go but I know she needs to get home. I am thankful I have some more people to spend time with. I love solo travel but there are moments I get lonely so this is nice for a change.

Arrived in Kutaisi

We wake early to take our 9am bus to Kutaisi, Georgia. This bus is newer and clean but they have strict rules about what bags they let you take to your seat so we have to quickly decide what we need for comfort for the next 4 hours. The driver swerves and occasionally honks and yells at cars going too slow but also at cars that pass him up while he is in the fast lane. Crazy drivers seem to be a theme of Georgia.

The apartment we have rented in Kutaisi isn’t the best place I’ve stayed in. It’s clean but lacking some things of convienence that make a stay more comfortable (like having to climb 5 flights of stairs or missing dish towels). Fortunately the host happily communicates with us through a translator app and we are in a central location.

We drop our bags off and walk around the corner to meet our day tour that is scheduled today. It is now shoulder season so our group tour ends up being a private tour instead. Initially it feels awkward but we soon value the personal attention.

The city of Kutaisi used to be a more popular tourist location due Kutaisi having direct international flights to certain cities but with the opening of the high speed rail between Tblisi and Batumi Kutaisi has become become less popular.

We start our tour in Central Park, a charming park next to the Colchis fountain and the Meshkhishvili theater. The Colchis fountain was installed in 2012 to feature the historic Colchi kingdom. All of the gold emblems on the fun fountain are enlarged reproductions of artifacts found during excavations of the colchi period.

While we explore town we are told local stories about some of the people honored with statues. We admire the street art and learn about one district that was settled by the French. We see a Catholic Church in its historic beauty before it is due to be “renovated” to an Orthodox Church. When it is converted, they will destroy all the original catholic parts. While not the only religion in the country, Eastern Orthodox Christianity is the most popular.

Kutaisi is a sleepy town compared to Tblisi but has its own charm. This boy with a hat sitting on the bridge is a character in a popular Georgian film.

Our tour guide takes us through the local market and we learn about the Georgian spices and treats.

At tour ending we ask our guide for restaurant recommendations and she recommends the restaurant in the Magnolia Hotel, a charming authentic Georgian food experience. I am excited to try new dishes. I enjoy most of what we try except the chicken dish I ordered as my main dish. My stomach is still uneasy from the day before and I am having a hard time with the grease content of the recipe. I will be happy when my stomach is back to normal.

We are tired from traveling today so we return to our flat for an earlish night, enjoying a nightcap from one of the few bottles of things we have picked up to sample along the way. Tomorrow it is supposed to rain all day so we re-arrange our excursion plans last minute to turn tomorrow into a lazy in town shopping day. It proves a good idea because it does start raining early in the day. I brave the rain briefly in the morning to get a decent cup of coffee but eventually we have to eat so we choose an art cafe not too far from our flat. We share a pizza and delcious salad.

We visit the market afterwards. Thank goodness the market is mostly under a covered area. First we visit an underground clothing and accessory market, much of it catering to older conservative women. We then return to the food market where we buy some spices and various goods. We spend some time trying to shop in the cheese section but it is impossible to get the attention of one of the cheese women since she is currently occupied with yelling at a woman at another booth right now. We return later to buy some samples of cheese from a woman who is not yelling.

We feed some street dogs hot dogs and are tired of the rain. We return to the room to try the pomegranate wine we have purchased yesterday from Armenia. I am not sure if we have a bad bottle or the wine is just really that bad but we end up pouring most of it down the drain. A wine has to be pretty bad for us to waste and this vinegar wine is terrible.

We finish the evening at the fancy restaurant around the corner. We are entertained by a pianist and violin player.

Tomorrow we have another day tour planned in town. Hopefully the weather is good. We’ve had too much rain so far.

Free day in Tblisi

Last night ended up being a bit of a late night so we are grateful we have no early morning is planned today. We finally take advantage of the breakfast offered by the hotel.

It is a rainy day, one of many of our time in Georgia, but we plan to visit markets today and some are luckily indoors. I am not usually a big shopper but during the last couple of trips I seem to buy more souvenirs than usual. Today it is earings – I buy an unspecified number of unique pairs today. I also discover some artwork I may want to purchase on my return trip to Tbilisi. We visit the Median Bazar, a smaller underground store where all the different local tourist items can be purchased.

We finally try the wine ice cream. It is quite lovely.

The rain has halted and we walk down to dry bridge market to see what is being sold there. Dry Bridge Market is an expansive market of local art, antiques, and jewelry.

We shop until we literally drop into a cafe where we order a khachapuri and a bottle of wine that gives us a free local cheese board. We use this time to plan our evening. We attempt to see the special seven o’clock show at the clock tower but our walk takes longer than we anticipated. We catch the shortened bell at another hour instead.

We stop at the famous Caravanserai Bakery for bread for an early morning breakfast tomorrow; we have a long day scheduled in Armenia tomorrow and no time for breakfast.

Dinner is at a casual restaurant where we have to choose our seat based on where the resident dog is not sleeping. In between his naps he wakes up periodically to guard the place. Dog would occasionally run off barking at random people or cars. During outr meal a guy walks on the terrace wearing a knockoff Louis Vuitton jumpsuit asking each table for money. The dog senses bad energy and chases the man off barking. My meal is lackluster and unfortunately I think is the cause for my gastrointestinal distress for the next few days.

We have a charming walk back to our hotel to rest up for tomorrow. Tomorrow will be a very long day.

Some more pictures from the day around town.

Wet Marrakech

After we eat our prepared lunch we leave our group and take a short walk to the Le Jardin Secret, a 19th century courtyard garden. It is slightly wet here and very overcast. It is nice but probably better to be enjoyed on a sunny day.

We then head into the heart of the medina. We plan to do some shopping as we each have a list of souvenirs we want to buy. We practice haggling with the salesmen who start off very high for us tourists. We attempt to drive a hard bargain but some will not budge much in price. We get some sellers to agree but sometimes with attitude. It’s all a little dramatic. We probably don’t get the optimal price for all our items but at least we don’t walk away feeling severely ripped off.

I buy a purse that I’ve been looking for. I am aiming for a purse like I viewed at the tannery shop in Fes but I had a hard time finding the exact colors I wanted. In one shop I find a bag in a lighter blue but they are able to make it darker before my eyes using some special kind of oil that may have been a vegetable oil. I think I’ll be happy with my unique bag that was made around the corner by the salesmen’s father who I also met today.

We walk down the busy corridors as we browse. There is extra bicycle and motorbike traffic that we need to dodge while we walk. Perhaps they are also trying to avoid the rain outside.

We also take some time to say hi to some more kitties.

Later that evening we have reservations at the popular restaurant Safron by Koya. It is a nice dinner environment that after 9:30 PM has periodic belly dancers, a dj, and even some live music performers. We are seated in the section they seem to put the less fun people since we don’t have as much action or show in our area. Despite our location it is still good fun. They have a strict two hour limit for each table but luckily we are ready to head back to the hotel after two hours. They do give you an option of watching from the bar though if you wish to stay. I took a chance on a new Moroccan dish and it was delicious. Our appetizers were quite good as well.

The next morning we have reservations for the famous Marjorelle gardens (Yves Saint Laurent gardens) and we go hoping for a break in the rain but we are initially miserable there, rushing through the wet gardens so we can stop getting soaked. We have raincoats but they aren’t enough. We spend some time in the Berber Museum and shop towards the exit. We plan to leave the gardens when the rain temporarily lets up. Luckily since it isn’t too busy today they let us tour through the garden again instead of exiting. It is still overcast but it is a much more pleasant experience this time.

I love the Berber blue and all the cacti.

We buy the ticket that includes the Yves St Laurent Museum. I know very little about fashion but the museum is very informative. I had no idea on the impact the designer had on history nor that he was formally a designer for Christian Dior.

The ticket we purchased also includes a visit to the onsite Berber museum. While the museum was a great place to escape the pouring rain, it also is a good historical museum of the Berber people. No photos are allowed but there is a good selection of historical items such as clothing and jewelry from different regions.

It seems like it is about to start to rain again so we hop in a taxi for the souks once more. We both have more shopping to do. I purchase a tagine bowl and a lantern among my purchases and my friend has a very successful shopping day as well. Multiple times prior to this vacation we are told to drive a hard bargain. I don’t know if it’s all for show or that we really do negotiate hard but I know this bargaining activity exhausts me emotionally and physically. I am happy we are heading home soon due to being tired and all the rain. We finish the evening with a quick dinner, trip to the grocery store and spending the last hours here trying to fit all our purchases in our luggage. Wish us luck.

We’ve discovered it snows in Morocco and it can be wet when it wants to, even in the desert. Some of our days traveling have been plagued with rainy weather – mild sprinkles and some all day rains, like most of our stay in Marrakech. Luckily we already decided to skip some of the outdoor activities in Marrakech due to the similarities of the sites to places we visited earlier in our Moroccan travels. Our exploration did include two wet visits to famous gardens and shopping at souks that are partially covered but with the constant rain streams of water flow on the ground of the very old souks making it hard to stay entirely dry.

Since there are places to still visit in Marrakech and other parts of Morocco I might be coming back. We have a not so terrible direct flight from Atlanta now to make it easier. Only time will tell if/when I return but it was a good trip overall.

Route of 1000 Kasbah

We start in Tinghir, one of the cities that is mostly populated by the Amazigh people (berber) and also along the route of 1000 kasbahs. The kasbahs are large structures that served as fortresses along this popular route but later turned into residential structures. The city is close to nearby gorges. These kasbahs held feudal lords that were in charge of surrounding lands. Tinghir is now expanding quickly due to nearby silver mines.

We drive through many oasis like towns that have mud built kasbahs during the route of 1000 kasbahs.

During our journey police frequently pull over tour buses to have a record of stops, seat belts, and sometimes look at the cargo. Mileage, speed, stops and more are stored on a disc that they view. This disc looks like a CD.

Ouarzazate Solar Power Station is a complex power facility that harnesses the power of sun and stores energy as heated molten salt for energy production at night. The power station provides energy for the region. It is quite impressive, I wish I could have seen a facility in person.

We get closer to the mountain range again as we can see the snow covered mountains in the distance.

Today is cold and rainy as we expected. We get a slight break in the rain when we stop to see a kasbah in Ouarzazate. We learn about the history of the building and what it is made of. The walls are a mix of straw, earth, and gypsum (or adobe).

The interior is an earth and sand plaster. The foundation is stone.

Then ceilings are made of reeds and interior rooms have tile floors and no windows for privacy.

We stop briefly at a Amazigh (Berber) pharmacy to learn some natural remedies. I buy some medicine and herbs for cooking here.

Ouarzazate used to be more of a tourist stop along the desert route but better roads have tourists choosing to stay in other towns. We are staying here tonight in a really nice hotel. Unfortunately the rain and cold have us not enjoying all the outdoor amenities the hotel has to offer. Also the constant rain has us getting soaked whenever we walk from our outdoor rooms to the main lobby. Netherless we find a lull in the rain and walk around town on our own. Commerce has come to a halt because of bad weather but we visit some souks and get in views before the rain starts up again. After some shopping we head back to our hotel and camp out in our room the rest of the evening.

Tomorrow we continue our exploration of the region and then head through the mountain pass to get to Marrakech. We are entering the last part of the tour. We must make the most of these last few days.