Free Walking Tour of Tbilisi: It Went Into Overtime

St. George high atop a pillar in Liberty Square in Tbilisi

  
The first full day in Tbilisi and that means: time to take a free walking tour of the city.

The designated meeting spot for starting the tour was the Rustaveli Metro Station.  Tbilisi has a small metro system, but it generally skirts the Old City -- they did not have underground subways in the Middle Ages -- so I did not take the metro to the metro station,  I hoofed it.

When I stepped out the front door of my hotel for the mile and a half walk, the street outside looked deceptively quiet.  The Old City section of Tbilisi is not quiet at all.  It is territory that has been annexed by the international tourist horde.  This is the calm before the tourist storm.

Across from the Rustaveli Metro Station is the most attractive looking McDonald's I think I've ever seen:

It was purpose-built to be a McDonald's. It was not a cool looking old building that was repurposed into a Mickey D's. According to Giorgi, the tour guide on this walking tour, McDonald's itself considers this to be the best-looking McDonald's. Still not enough to make me want to eat there.

And this is Mr. Shota Rustaveli.

Who is Mr. Rustaveli?  The man from this statue.  Also, the man for him the street was named for which the metro station was named. He's also a famous Georgian poet.

Behind Shota Rustaveli The Statue is the Georgian National Academy of Sciences.  It's where science is happening in Georgia, I presume.

And this is an olive tree.  In the middle of a major thoroughfare.

It was a gift to Georgia and Tbilisi from the people of Israel. Which is why is there, in the middle of a busy street.

This is another important building:

I believe that it was involved in government revenue collection, making it the Georgian equivalent of the IRS.

And this is the cable car (lower) station.  There are several cable car lines in Tbilisi.  This one goes to Mtatsminda Park, which also is the upper destination for the (foreshadow) Tbilisi funicular.

 

In the foreground in front of the cable car station is our tour guide, Giorgi, who, by the way, did an excellent job/

This is a private residence on Shota Rustaveli Avenue. It is right next to the cable car line.

If and when you enlarge that picture, you will see an actual cable car car right next to the house. I don't think I would want to live in a house that has a cable car passing by that close for about 12 hours or so each day, no matter how otherwise convenient the location may be. But that might just be me.

And this is a building in a Moorish style because why not?

It is the Opera and Ballet Theater of Tbilisi. You would think an Opera and Ballet Theater would spell "theater" with the more pretentious "-re" ending rather than "-er." But you would be wrong. Georgia the Country is humble that way.

This is the Ilia Chavchavadze and Akaki Tsereteli Statue:

These two men were very prominent in the founding of the independent Republic of Georgia in that brief period of time between the fall of the Russian Czar and the rise of the Soviet Union. 

The is the Georgia National Museum:

I enjoy visiting national museums in national capitals. It's supposed to rain on Thursday and when it rains when you are traveling, that makes for an excellent museum day. So Thursday, it looks like.

This is the rest of our tour group, sans me, outside the Parliament Building.

And this is Liberty Square, a.k.a. Freedom Square.

 

In the center of the circular square is St. George atop a pillar. Not a dragon in sight. St. George may be the patron saint of the nation of Georgia, but he is not the namesake. Shocking, right? The name "Georgia" is an Americanization of the Persian word for "wolf." Georgians don't call their country Georgia when speaking in the Georgian language. They call it Sakartvelo. Finland to the Finns is called Suomi. Germany to the Germans is called Deutschland. And Georgia to the Georgians is called Sakartvelo because that's the way they like it.

Having walked south from the Rustaveli Metro Station to Liberty Square, we cross an invisible line separating the bustling downtown from the Old City. Liberty Square is the point of delineation.

This a photo of the old city walls in the process of excavation.

I believe I took this photo because the restaurant in it is very highly recommended by the tour guide.

Unfortunately, the name of the restaurant is cut off at the top of picture. Fortunately, for some reason, I remember the restaurant name: Muse.

And here is something you don't see everyday.

A cat with a QR code.

This is a more traditional cat, without a QR code:

It does have a balcony, however.

This is the Clock Tower:

The clock puts on a show twice a day, at 12 noon and at 7:00 p.m. The nooner draws the bigger crowd, so 7 o'clock it is.

Here is our guide pointing about the very small clock that is part of the structure (in addition to the large clock at the top of the tower:

Let's go in for a closer look, shall we:

It's in the golden ring.

Church doors:

Sleeping dog to the left of the church doors:

Sleeping dog to the right:

As I said yesterday, Tbilisi is a Dog Town.

And we walk near the Bridge of Peace but walking on the bridge is not part of the tour.

We only got two hours! We can't see and do everything! Even with the tour running into overtime.

Here is a statue of a man drinking alcohol from a horn:

The tour guide, Giorgi, for the record, at no time drank from a horn on this walking tour.

And here is the cable car that goes over the Old City.

This is a different cable car from the one closer to the Rustaveli Metro Station, which goes to Mtatsminda Park.

Orthodox Church. 

I believe it is the Metekhi Church of the Nativity of the Mother of God, if I have my placement on Google Maps correct.

And now we arrive in the Bath House District.

Tbilisi is known for its medicinal sulfur baths.

The name of the city actually means "Place of Warmth," a reference to hot waters.

Most of the "bath houses" consist of private bathing rooms, with small pool of sulfur-scented hot water and other amenities such as a dry sauna. Rent for these can be steep as they are priced for tourists. But you get privacy.  The No. 5, that's its name, is the only one offering public, but gender-segregated, bathing in the sulfur water.

The blue bath house is the most opulent and upscale of them all:

This is the Orbeliani Baths.

This is a monument to the founding of Tbilisi.

The founding myth is that the King. This king:

The King was out hunting game with his falcons when one of them (and the game being chased) fell into a pool of water and, when they were fished out, the animals had cooked to a deliciousness that can only be found when the meat is boiled in sulfur water. So the King decided that this place of sulfur-stinking cooked falcon meat would make a great capital city. And thus Tbilisi was born.

You buy it?

Finally, right in the Bath House district, is a bust of Heydar Aliyev, the founder of the modern state of Azerbaijan. Georgia and Azerbaijan have friendly relations because Georgia gets along with everyone. Except for Putin's Russia. I guess Mr. Aliyev must have liked a good soak in the sulfur waters, so they placed him the Bath House District.

And that ends the Free Walking Tour of Tbilisi. Tip your guide and tip him well because (a) he did a great job, (b) he only gets paid in tips and this was a small group he was guiding, and (c) he went overtime by about a half hour and did not sacrifice any tour destinations that I could tell. Five stars.

Two Markets

It tastes -- and smells -- as good as it looks

On the agenda for the final day in Mexico City this trip: two markets. One for food. One for what is billed as "artisanal crafts."

The walk there was half of the fun.

It was a beautiful sunny morning, with an almost certain chance of afternoon thunderstorms. So what did I do? Slept in. But only after I got my breakfast pastries and coffee at El Globo. Then, when it was getting close to the time for the thunderstorms to roll in, I wandered the area.

I stumbled on this: 

I love a good clock tower in the middle of an intersection. So, of course, I loved the Reloj Chino de Bucareli. The Chinese Clock of Bucareli. The north-south street at this intersection is Bucareli.

To get to both of the two markets, I made a right turn at Reloj Chino and, soon enough, found a park with statues and fountains. Parque de la Ciudadela. Park of the Citadel.

I love a park with statues and fountains ALMOST as much as I like a good clock tower in the middle of intersection. It's close. But the clock tower will always win that battle due to the rarity factor. Every city of any consequence has a park with statuary. But how many of those cities have clock towers in their traffic intersections? Case closed.

This statue in the middle of the fountain is Ángel de los Aviadores.

Angel of the Aviators. Not sure why here in particular. But aviators are entitled to angels wherever they can find them.

And this is Morales.

Star attraction of the park.

Morales is looking decidedly less Botero-esque than he was in Cuernavaca. BTW, as the kids would text, I think this is called Park of the Citadel because it is adjacent to what used to be a military school. I think.

And the buzzing of the google maps on the phone means I have arrived at Market #1: Mercado de San Juan. The food market. 

It smelled awesome. Well, except for the fresh fish section. There actually was more floor space here devoted to meat than vegetables and I wasn't in the mood to photograph animal carcasses. Delicious though they may be. There even was a large Asian section. There also were a number of restaurants on the premises.

Labrador retriever approved.

I did not find what I was looking for here: Mexican vanilla. So on to the artisanal market it is.

Market #2: Mercado de Artesanías La Ciudadela.

Need a guitar?

While there was an over-abundance of stalls selling cheap souvenirs -- probably made in China and not locally -- there was some legitime artisanal crafts, such as the guitars. Lots (and lots) (and lots) of jewelry. Pottery and porcelain. There even was a shop selling those Mexican tile tin mirrors that I love. I almost pulled the trigger but worries over transport killed that idea. Next time. When I bring a bigger suitcase.

And when I left the second market, the skies clearly had darkened.

What time is it? The clock on the tower of the intersection says it is time for the skies to open up and for the afternoon thunderstorms to begin. The clock was right.