So the wife said to me last week: “I have next week off, shall we paint the house?”
“I’d love to”, I said, “but why don’t we go to Georgia instead? There is a deal on and it’s so cheap.”
Phew! That got me out of ladders, brushes and curses.
So here we are in Tblisi and what a wonderful city it is.
Set in a valley between two ridges of hills, it is quite small to wander around and you can get a cable car up to see their version of the Iron Lady, who is called the Mother of Georgia.
The views across the city are stunning.
Tblisi is a bit small, so a five-day trip is a bit much and necessitates a couple of excursions.
We did two: one to the ski resort Gudauri, marked out for a further trip in winter, and another to the city of love Sighinaghi, where apparently all you need to get married are your passports.
“Sorry,” I told the romantic part of our pairing. “I left my passport at the hotel and, anyway, we did all that kerfuffle years ago at St Chris.”
Georgia is lovely and the countryside is so green.
In Kakheti there are miles and miles of vines growing lovely delicious grapes.
Everywhere you go you are presented with Georgia’s largest and most delicious export – and at BD3 a litre in a good restaurant, the whole trip was a bit hazy, if you get my drift. Hic!
However, the food! What can I say?
Georgians are proud of their food, but here is what I do not understand. Why are they not all the same size as Americans?
The food is wholesome to say the least, large chunks of meat and potatoes put together in at least four different ways.
You really only need one meal a day, or perhaps even a week.
It got so bad that when I found macaroni cheese on the children’s menu, I jumped on it and had a lovely meal.
If you do go, here is a tip for when you order food: ask them to serve it all at once, or you will end up with chips way ahead of the steak.
The people though are brilliant, so friendly, and once again we were put to shame because most speak English.
In fact, most of the signs and notices are in both Georgian and English.
There is a big affinity with England, as their founder and patron saint is Saint George – and their flag is pretty much the same as England’s.
One other thing to bear in mind is that Georgia is still rising from Russian oppression and is not a rich country.
An average government employee earns about BD100 a month.
This means taxis and other daily consumables are really cheap, but if you do not speak Georgian it goes up by about 600 per cent!
But do not take this out of perspective.
Debbie and I did a 20-minute hike up the side of a mountain because the hotel told us we should pay 800 fils for the taxi, but when we flagged one down and he heard our accents he wanted BD4.
So we walked and cursed for being so stupid.
For our trip into the ski resort we got in touch with a driver through a certain mad Finnish woman and Shako was brilliant.
Don’t worry about the food.
Please go and, if you want the contact details of Shako, send me an e-mail.
Jackie@JBeedie.com