Batumi

The sun has come out and Batumi is looking up. It feels more "normal" to me now. It wasn't quite what I expected but nothing ever is, is it? I always forget that this is the Caucasus, not the old USofA. It's nice out now with people out and about, the sun shining, etc. I just had khachapuri at Tserodena, a bright little restaurant near the main park by the sea. Oh my, not good food for the gall bladder, that's for sure. Heavy duty butter, bread, cheese, salt. I think it was good - I ate it all :o) - but I'm not sure it's going to sit well with me.

I got my bus ticket for Istanbul, will leave here tomorrow at 10:30am and arrive in Istanbul at 8am the next day (Wednesday). They'll provide me a free shuttle to my hostel, which is nice and will certainly save me a hassle.

Next stop today is the Adjara art museum, a collection of Georgian artists as well as works by European and Russian painters from the 19th & 20th century. Should be interesting.

A bit on the history of Batumi from the Lonely Planet guide:
"Batumi developed in the late 19th century as the western terminus of a railway from Baku that then carried 1/5 of the world's oil production. A pipeline and refinery built by Ludwig Nobel, brother of the Swedish dynamite inventor Alfred, woon followed. Batumi gained free-port status, over 20 foreign consulates set up here, and the town developed into a fashionable resort at the southern tip of the Russian empire and a crossroads between Europe and Asia.
"One of the first decisions of the post-Abashidze administration in 2004 was to make Batumi an attractive place to visit, something in which they are, happily, succeeding. Charming old buildings have been restored, renovated and floodlit, attractive new ones are joining them, and strolling around the leafy, low-rise central streets is a real pleasure."

That's all for now. Time to go take some photos and get some culture followed by a little sun and fresh air. I will sit by the Black Sea for awhile this afternoon and soak up that delicious sound of waves against the shore.