Borjomi, Bakuriani, & Around Georgia

This weekend, we went on a daytrip to Borjomi; Bob & Gillian are PCVs stationed in Borjomi, and we went to visit them. We went to their house and had coffee, then headed out to the big park in Borjomi, where we examined a huge, room-size map of Georgia. This was really cool; none of us had realized quite how steep the Greater Caucasus mountains are in Georgia, nor how much of the country, really, is mountainous (FYI, we are 1650 meters up in Akhaltsikhe, which is roughly 5400 feet above sea level, higher than Denver). Basically, there is a strip of the country running horizontally through the middle that is near sea level, and the coastline along the Black Sea is (mostly) low. The Greater and Lesser Caucasus mountains take up the rest of the country (the Greater Caucasuses run along the border with Russia in the northern part of the country; the Lesser Caucasuses are in the southern part of the country, so we are in the Lesser Caucasus mountains). Anyway, after that, Brenden tried out the Borjomi spring, which he was not fond of; apparently, it's rather sulphuric.

Bob & Gill had suggested taking a scenic train ride to Bakuriani, which Brenden was excited by, so we didn't get to explore the rest of the park, but went instead to the train station. The train was modern and clean, and the ride promised to be a 45-minute scenic ride. About 15 minutes into the ride, one car of our train derailed. The train wasn't going fast, so no one was hurt, but we waited around for about an hour for them to decide what to do; finally, they moved everyone to the first car, de-coupled the other car, and we continued n our way. However, the train was still quite slow, and it turns out that though by marshutka, it's about a 45-minute ride, it's more like 2 hours and 15 minutes by train. It was quite beautiful, but we just didn't think we'd be there that long. When we arrived in Bakuriani, we walked to the closest maghazia and bought Snickers and popcorn (by this point it was after 4pm and we hadn't eaten since breakfast at 8am). We walked around the town for a few minutes, but we took the next marshutka back to the Borjomi. It's definitely a trip worth making, but I don't think we'll try the train again.

I know we're referencing a lot of cities and towns, and most of you have probably have no idea where those are or anything about them. So, our region first: Akhaltsikhe is the regional center, and our district has about 50,000 people, but I don't know how many of them live in Akhaltsikhe proper (the region as a whole has a little over 200,000 people). Our friend Josh, also a TEFL volunteer, lives in Minadze, which is a tiny village (400 people) that is basically a suburb of Akh; it's about a 10-15 minute marshutka ride. Akh is about as far south as you can go without hitting Turkey (the border is about an hour away), and the Armenian border is about 3 hours away to the southeast. Akh has a huge Armenian population (40%) but there is a lot of intermarriage and intermingling. To the east about 2.5 hours is Ninotsminda where our friend Ryder is located. Ninotsminda is 95% Armenian, so Ryder started learning Armenian during training, and he was already fluent in Russian (which is why he was selected to be in the minority region). 45 minutes to the northeast of Akh is Borjomi, which is famous for its water (Brenden loves the bottled version, but it's an acquired taste, as the water is salty; I have not acquired the taste) and it is a resort/amusement center during the summer. It has a big park with the largest ride in Georgia, a big ferris wheel, and cable cars. Bakuriani is a ski resort in the mountains about 45 minutes southeast of Borjomi; we plan to go there to ski this winter sometime.

Finally, here are some of the major cities in other regions. Due west of Akh, on the Black Sea, is Batumi, which is Georgia's 2nd largest city; I think it has something like 300,000 people, and it's a big seaside resort. North of Batumi on the Black Sea are Poti and Kobuleti, and they are also seaside resorts. As far north as Georgia proper goes (not including Abkhazia, which is one of the autonomous regions) and a bit inland is Zugdidi, which is about the same size as Gori (50,000 or 60,000); this year is the first year anyone has been posted to Zugdidi. Southeast of Zugdidi is Kutaisi, Georgia's 3rd largest city. Those of you with a memory for details may remember this is where we went for our cultural trip; I don't really know what Kutaisi is famous for, other than being a big city. The big cultural landmark is the Bagrati Cathedral that we went to see in July, and it does have a great American-style pizza place, which some say is the best pizza in Georgia (although my sitemate Jason insists that there is a pizza place in Tbilisi that is better). So that's basically Western Georgia. About three hours southeast of Kutaisi (and about 2 hours northeast of Akh) is Gori, which all of you should remember. :) About 45 minutes west of Gori is Khashuri, which is one of the big transportation hubs. Gori is a little over an hour west of Tbilisi, the capital (and Tbilisi is a good-sized city, about 1.5 million). An hour and half northeast of Tbilisi is Telavi, the regional center of Khakheti. Telavi is rumored to be a “posh” city (what exactly that means, I'm not sure) and Khakheti is the major wine country area of Georgia (despite the fact that every family in Georgia makes their own wine, regardless of where they live). Telavi, for reference's sake, is probably about 5 hours from Akh. An hour and half east of Telavi is Lagodekhi, which as far as I can tell, is notable because one of my clustermates is placed there, and it's about as close as you can get to the border with Azerbaijan. So, an educated guess (not actually having actually traveled to any of these places) says it's about 6 hours to the most southwest and most northwest areas of Georgia from Akh, and about 7 hours to the most northeast area of Georgia (I have no idea about the southeast area of Georgia). Once our 3 months are up and we can travel on the weekends, we plan to visit a lot of these places for weekend trips, along with a lot of other, smaller sites that we have friends stationed in, so you'll be hearing about these places again. :)

- Carissa

I'm having huge Blogger issues right now...it hates my photos :(
SO....I will publish them later