Tbilisi Old Town Walk: Rike Park, Mother of Georgians and Shoti (Sandwich)
[Music] [Applause] [Music] worth we are [Music] Oh sh [Music] now to figure out how to get tickets for this cable car so I’m here at the ticket office and take note it’s cash only so that’s what you get and it cost me 7 gas so about 350 Canadian altitude at the bottom of the station 398 m at the top of the station 492 m and the incline length 508 m i got to get crammed in here i hope I got a window seat to give you a view of uh the cable car ride so that’s where we’re going way we go [Applause] that was fun spectacular view of Tlisi one of the unfortunate things about when you are going to the tourist areas is you encounter other tourists but uh nothing wrong with that but it’s also uh there’s a premium in a lot of countries for that and uh you do pay a tourist premium often and unfortunately being right down below there that’s the old town of Tlisi right [Music] there all throughout the Soviet former Soviet Union and even now former Soviet uh countries and as well as uh what constitutes Russia there’s all these huge huge statues uh usually painted painted in silver and uh they often in what they refer to as hero cities on the back side there’s a botanical gardens and what a beautiful urban respit let’s now go and check out the fort bye mother of Georgia and we’re going to the Narala Fortress now so here’s where things are at dear citizens and guests temporarily closed but uh that’s kind of what it looks [Music] like and it’s got quite the advantageous view of all of Tesli so small disappointment there but uh we did get to see mother of Georgia and have that great view of Tiblissi i’m heading back down on the cable car [Music] and now we go now let’s go and check out some of these new modern buildings down here i think that’s an air balloon but you know what it reminds me of for those fans of the prisoner at uh [Music] 1960s drama just one of the most brilliant pieces of TV ever made it reminds me of Rover the giant ping pong ball Rover he was part of the enforcement of the village a giant ping pong ball imagine that although you know in terms of what modern society has become really not that ridiculous actually anyhow they have soft serve here any one of these uh tourist areas lots of sweets i saw this building from up above so I was curious to see what it was all about so let’s go and take a look has some uh calatraesque energy to it piece of plastic and cantal leveros very much in his style uh there’s no labeling on the building so it’s all closed this uh edifice and uh what else to do but ask Mr google because the signage sucks and it’s closed uh so it’s actually called the Reich Music Music Theater and Exhibition Hall and the architects are Massie Milan Milaniano and Doriana uh Fuksus uh quite the very cool design it was completed in 2016 so it’s a musical theater and exhibition hall yeah I’m a sucker for modern architecture actually architecture that brings an interesting element and a whole new visual appeal to a city to emphasize that it’s part of modern society while being combined with the traditional so off in the distance there is the bridge of peace and those who know that I live in Calgary at this present time uh there’s a peace bridge there too and this one is actually called the bridge of peace so slightly different the bridge was designed by Italian architect Michael de Luchi who had also designed the buildings of the ceremonial palace of Georgia and the ministry of internal affairs in Tlisi and this bridge was its total length is 150 m and it was opened in 2010 right around the same time as the Peace Bridge in Calgary a lot of similar elements and it is gorgeous it really is that same glass and steel and also the walkway a single span design with two supporting elements on either side quite similar to the Peace Bridge in Calgary let’s walk across it this is very cool also connectivity to the uh pathway and roadway along the river where I came from although Georgia up there but more of this amazing bridge and takes you right into the old town of BC behind me here that’s a pretty darn cool bridge that’s a a lovely highlight of uh being walking around the city give you a view of the underside of the bridge here casinos are very popular here lots of advertising for them when you come in the airport just looking back on the other side of the river there’s also some interesting architecture that is cropping up here in Tucson and we’re going to visit another one of those architectural marvels here a roadside view of that uh music hall there very cool another casino over here casino are big business and uh people like to take uh some liberties with their money but my word of advice to anybody the house always wins sure there’s always a chance of uh making it big and there are professional gamblers who know when to hold them and know when to fold them to quote uh Kenny Rogers but save your money travel have experiences and uh leave the casinos to those people who have money to do it and keep that money to yourself putting aside everything one thing that casinos are really good for is if ever you’re walking about and you need to go to the bathroom no questions asked it’s very easy to go and use the bathroom there uh because they view you as a potential gambler so uh and the bathrooms are always clean if you go to a regular hotel you may have to pass through security in many countries but casinos do seem to have a bit more of a open door policy and uh they do take pride in having a clean bathroom so casinos not so bad anytime you got to go what a fun bit of public art here love the energy and that must be a traditional Georgian folk dance using the underpass to get to the other [Applause] [Music] side here was shitty reality by Gagosh now replaced with a beautiful screen saver by city hall as there’s no retail in this one some pretty cool graffiti as I said we’re in for some more interesting architecture and right across the road there is the public service hall and the House of Justice or it’s called the TLI uh public service hall as I mentioned earlier the architect for this was uh out of Italy Masame Lano and Doriana Fuksas and it is a fascinating structure i think the overpass it is closed which is an integral part of the design so I think we’re going to risk it by running across the road so this uh building also houses the National Bank of Georgia the Minister of Energy and the uh Civil and National Registry it’s uh 2800 square meters a little bit of uh influence of Kosier as well in that lovely blocky design of the windows right there and uh just very cool overhangs here actually windows that open kind of reminds me of uh that science fiction series from the ‘7s called Space 1999 anyhow my uh public service hall that was quite a nice visit to some incredible architecture let’s now uh go into a bit of the old city here and like a lot of these old cities in Asia and Europe and even Africa these cities are living museums and every corner of the city you will find some vestage of history and uh some part of a past that was either set out as part of a citystate or even part of the colonization so in this old part of the city this is where the sala springs are and you can go to one of the traditional hams and a uh big chapl over [Music] there it’s pretty cool nice to see food halls and uh diversity of cuisine that is available here in [Music] Georgia casheria you see some coffee here gelato lots of desserts mo most Asian cultures and Eastern European cultures do have a sweet tooth and their bakery is really good dagalora and that looks like a Georgian food place where you get uh that uh steep chicken in that broth you got vegetable plate like uh dumplings and their famous pastry georgia’s place that does seem to have a balance of food for uh most religions they also seem to have uh again halal stuff is readily available given his proximity to Turkey and also how many Muslims are in the country but also if you’re a vegetarian you can actually do pretty good here so I decided to get the uh chakan drilli with ve because I saw this place that had Jordan street food so I didn’t quite leave I decided to sample and uh as much as I shouldn’t uh I was saving myself up for a bigger meal later I have to give this a go so while I’m waiting for my Georgian street food sandwich I kept walking around and there is just this incredible wine bar and wine shop here that is just chalk full of only Georgian wine and this is mind-blowing that just a simple food hall has such an amazing selection of fantastic wines and they also keep a number of wines reserve wines yeah so reserve wines just here in a food hall and here we have the international wines and here’s my shaku drill and it’s a ve so let’s give it a taste that is full deal it’s mixed with a lot of fresh um ingredients fresh herbs ubiquous micro greens a slight sweetness to it but it’s definitely very beefy sorry vegetarians this is freaking delicious and one of the reasons why you do come to um these uh parts of uh central Asia and Eastern Europe and Tiki food is just a art form and just delicious i think it’s going to be an early dinner for me so snacks laterally and you’ll see why I have in mind for that one thing I want to emphasize this is a smoking great sandwich and you know what it was cheaper than the pomegranate juice I bought from that lady by the uh monster um just to go to show how much I got ripped off by that woman but there’s good value to be had from places like Shorty here that uh they’re doing honest work and cheers to them for delivering a fantastic sandwich at a great price shorty just just delicious just incredible uh I would I would love to be able to relive that sandwich again at some point but I will dream of it and I have it on video so for those of you who ever do uh come here come and check out this food hall it’s magnificent the choices are great you know it even has one of the best you know wine bars I’ve ever encountered and uh yeah just delicious food all right let’s move on from here right outside of Bazari you have another one of these uh kiosk that be able to do all sorts of transactions here so I’m backtracking a bit here going to check out another unique experience that you can have here in Kiss i know I’ve packed in a lot already haven’t I [Music] everybody’s waiting for the clock tower change let’s see what it looks like there you [Music] go i’m not going to wait but I’m sure it’s interesting but once you get off the main street there’s all these little alleyways that are chalk full with restaurants wine bars street retailers oh that’s cute cat drinking wine this is actually quite nice another wine bar here and the street dogs one of the interesting things about them is that they have tags and they actually look quite healthy hotel opinion holster here i guess I should be staying here all right erica Spain every little corner just very tweet this is a lovely city to walk around in really is very pedestrian friendly just greenery everywhere it’s delightful [Applause] [Music] [Applause] so I was walking onto the next experience and I noticed there were a lot of priests coming out of this place and the music was just Beautiful it’s gorgeous [Music] and I just had to stop [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] hallelujah hallelujah [Music] can I just say that almost anywhere you turn into the city there’s just so much beauty let’s see if I could Let’s probably take a look in and give you a taste of what’s going on here heat heat [Applause] [Applause] hallelujah sh [Applause] [Music] [Music] [Music] that was [Music] beautiful just beautiful there’s just a lot of beauty to be had here in unexpected [Music] ways really unexpected [Music] ways as I say I’m doubling back these are some of the areas that were in Old Tisi that we were looking down on from the cable car little city tour vehicle here so I am going to go and check out the hamomam or the sulfur bath i’ll take you to the door check in but because likely public nudity can’t really film so you just have to imagine me naked in the public baths okay i think I took the wrong route so I’m course correcting here that looks like the fancy expensive one over there you can smell the sulfur and there’s a whole collection of them around here and thermal baths were part of the original tourism back in the uh medieval times but uh people came here for health and therapeutic reasons and usually hotels sprung up around them so I’m actually looking for sulfa number five baths because again I’m not going to be paying for the fancy ones i’m going to check out the cheaper ones so I finally found the place and boy my directions were off and this is where I’m [Applause] heading let’s see what this hole is in store for me that was refreshing number five right there all told uh with a couple towels and uh um the entrance fee is 16 quack so eight bucks Canadian not too shabby um got a good bit of steam going it’s good to clear out the logs all right let’s uh let’s head back towards the city center and uh start winding down our day it’s been a full one saw some uh good stuff we’re not done yet just heading back uh towards the city center there’s a whole range of uh funky restaurants around here safe pub uh Tiscola and uh looks like there’s a uh Georgian cuisine restaurant down there very funky place that’s right here on the roof i walked by this earlier i really didn’t think much about it but here it is it’s a piece of the Berlin Wall and the German people’s gift to the Georgian people and it was presented not far from my birthday 7 years ago right here piece of the Berlin Wolf ain’t that something i got to admit it’s been pretty cool just having the time to slowly wind my way around the city to discover how to use metro where the key landmarks are find the central market just generally take my time to pack the tubi code well I have you know it will take me years to get the hang of the city and the culture of it again there’s just so many things that are done in the local language i feel pretty proud that I’m navigating a place on my own and that’s one of the fun things that when you travel like this that you get to have that sense of discovery and have that sense of wonder of finding out what’s around the corner that apartment building that is uh some solid Soviet era architecture right there just admiring this building here this is a very nondescript uh metro station like a lot of the TLI uh metro system it’s uh you got to really know where things are anyhow let me go on and I’m heading into the city center here as the sun is setting over here we got the resin uh blue ahead and some uh solid Soviet block rless architecture right there right over here uh this is where I realized that I was trying to get a taxi uh yesterday and taxis don’t have meters here and as I said earlier I really just like having to negotiate taxi rides so I’m back lit and but I didn’t have a reservation and I have 1 hour to enjoy a little bit of wine here so let’s get to it and I’m going to put in my order shortly and maybe get a snack and wrap things up here for the day [Music]
Hey Folks:
Here’s Part 2 of my first walkabout of Tbilisi.
I head up to the one of the lookout points to visit the Mother of Georgians monument, stroll around Rike Park and the Bridge of Peace, enjoy a sandwich from Shoti in the amazing Bazari Orbelianze food hall, enjoying a sauna at the one of their famous Sulphur Baths, and stumbling across the Berlin Wall Memorial. A truly unique experience was ducking into a church to experience the haunting chanting that seems to be the norm in the larger cathedrals of the city. It was a full day! And one of those days to slow it down and discover the sites, experiences of what Tbilisi has to offer. Every thing that I did in this video, I would highly recommend for any first time visitor. Especially, a sandwich from Shoti!
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Handy Resources
Mother of Georgians (Monument), Wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kartlis_Deda
Rike Park, Georgia News: https://georgia.to/places-to-go/tbilisi/rike-park/
Bazari Orbelianze (Food Hall): https://bazari.ge/en/
Georgia Today; “Georgian Sandwich Brand “Shoti” Sets its Sights on the European Union Market” (June 2023): https://georgiatoday.ge/georgian-sandwich-brand-shoti-sets-its-sights-on-the-european-union-market/
Eat This! (Tour Company); “Sulfur Baths in Tbilisi: A Local’s Guide for First Time Visitors” (Dec 2024): https://eatthistours.com/sulfur-baths-in-tbilisi/
Tbilisi Rocks!; “Visit the Berlin Wall in Tbilisi @ Europe Square”: https://tbilisi.rocks/the-berlin-wall-in-tbilisi/
Tbilisi Local Guide: https://tbilisilocalguide.com/tbilisi/tourist-information-center/
Lonely Planet, Tbilisi: https://www.lonelyplanet.com/destinations/georgia/tbilisi
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