About 3 weeks ago an email went around among friends: let’s go to Georgia for one week to have fun and see each other again. A reunion of people from Netherlands, England, France and Switzerland who were living in Georgia in 2007. Great idea, and a great way to spend some last summer days in a bit warmer climate. September is the best month to be in Georgia, because the temperature is perfect then.
My Swiss friend and I arrived both on the evening of the birthday party of our British friend currently living there. A good welcome with a fair amount of vodka to start the holiday with :-). The first 2 days we were hanging around in Tbilisi, looking at the changes in the city and eating and drinking at our old-time favorite places.
Then after a failed attempt to go to the high mountain region Svaneti (no planes due to bad weather/ train tickets to Zugdidi sold out), we took a minibus to Kazbegi to get some fresh air at the foot of this 5000m high mountain near the Russian border.
Like written on a tourist map, ‘In Georgia it’s possible to ski in the morning and lay on the beach in the afternoon’, we acted like real tourists and went to sea the evening after we came back from the north. Arriving at 5 o’clock in the morning to see the sunrise at the beach, spending the whole day eating chatjapuri, drinking beer, swimming… until seeing the sunset and then more eating and drinking… Ureki was a short time paradise.
The last day it appeared not so easy to leave this paradise: the only bus back to Tbilisi (4-6 hours driving) went only at 10 in the morning an I had missed it… Luckily with the help of a Georgian friend I got a lift back to the capital and spend a nice last evening in Georgia with his family.
