Tbilisi, Georgia

Beginning another adventure

Since there are many more flight options out of Madrid (vs. Valencia), we often start a trip with a train ride to Madrid. The high speed train gets us to Madrid in just 2 hours and because we’re fond of the “take it slow” approach, we often stay a night in Madrid before heading to the airport. There’s always something interesting to see at any one of Madrid’s fabulous museums. This time, we spent an afternoon enjoying a special exhibit at The Prado.

Stopover in Athens

We began our trek to Tbilisi, Georgia with a brief overnight stop in Athens. The were two compelling reasons for this stopover. When we were in Athens in May, we didn’t make it to the National Archeology Museum to see the amazing Mycenaean collection. Also, we have a wonderful new friend in Athens. We met Elli, a long time friend of Nayan and Jo, when we were visiting in May and looked forward to spend more time with her. Both the museum visit and our time with Elli were wonderful!

New Friends

After a brief layover in Istanbul, we were finally on our way to Tbilisi. On the plane, I met two Turkish women who live in Istanbul and were visiting Tbilisi for a brief holiday. One of them had been to Tbilisi before and explained to me that Tbilisi is a “very small city” and she was sure we’d see one another around town. Tbilisi is a city of one million people, so I wasn’t so sure. We laughed about this over dinner on our first night in Tbilisi. I can understand her perspective – Istanbul is a city of over 20 million. As my new friend had predicted, in less than 24 hours of leaving the airport, we ran into them having a coffee at a small cafe. We joined them and enjoyed sharing travel experiences and getting lots of recommendations for our next trip to Turkey. We traded contact information and delighted in making two new friends.

Graffiti

As with many European cities, there’s plenty of graffiti in Tbilisi. Anti-Russian graffiti blanketing Tbilisi’s streets tells the complicated story of the two countries and their peoples. The current ruling party in Georgia, the Dream party, is closely tied to Moscow. This contrasts sharply with the staunchly pro-EU sentiments on the streets and you can see and feel this tension.

Soviet Wine

In the afternoon of our first full day in Tbilisi, we met our fellow adventurers and our two guides, Kristo and Maka, who would be our companions for the next seven days. After introductions, we had a brief explanation of the recent history of Georgian wine followed by a tasting.

We learned that after the invasion of the Red Army in 1921, winemaking in Georgia was dramatically changed. The ancient methods of Georgian winemaking were almost lost under Soviet rule, which lasted for 77 years. During these years, Georgian winemakers lost their land, vines were ripped out and replaced with high-yielding varieties, and the old methods (which we will learn much more about on this trip) were “industrialized” to meet Stalin’s economics plans. While the “Soviet wines” were plentiful, they were sweet, bland, and lacked character. The objective was volume, not quality. Then, in 1985, nearly three quarters of Georgia’s vineyards were ripped out when Gorbachev launched a campaign to combat alcohol abuse.

Our first tasting was one of the “Soviet wines” and after just a small sip, we gladly dumped the remainder of our glass.

Revival

After the fall of the Soviet Union in 1991, the winemaking industry in Georgia did not immediately bounce back. In 2006, when 90% of the wine made in Georgia was still going to Russia, Putin placed an embargo on Georgian wine. This was a catalyst for young winemakers to revive the indigenous grape varieties and the ancient methods. Families throughout Georgia’s countryside had continued the old traditions in spite of Soviet domination and when winemakers turned their attention to Western markets there was a shift toward quality. After dumping our Soviet wine, we enjoyed a couple of Georgian natural wine.

There’s a promising future for Georgian wines as they embrace diverse indigenous grapes and natural wine making processes along with a revival of the ancient methods. The shift is toward quality and we were looking forward to learning and tasting more!

After a full week in Tbilisi and the Georgian wine country, we have a lot to share. Stay tuned for our next post. In the meantime, we’ll be exploring a few Greek Islands, starting with Crete.