Country #63 - Georgia

The Bridge and The Churches

After a short but comfortable night’s sleep I woke up to eat a great omelet breakfast at Du Vin Rouge hotel before heading out to explore Tbilisi, Georgia for a few hours! Luckily Du Vin Rouge was located in the heart of the city and I was able to walk everywhere. My first stop was Tbilisi St. Trinity Cathedral, which was incredible! It reminded me a lot of the main cathedral in Helsinki - it’s grand and up on a giant hill with tons of stairs. The inside was pretty empty but the magnificent outside was incredible enough on its own. The gardens all around the cathedral were amazing too and I really enjoyed all of the time that I spent here.

I then walked back towards the heart of the city, stopping first at Metekhi St. Virgin Church. The church was very tiny and I just peeked inside, but outside it was picturesque and looked out on the rest of Tbilisi. I took tons of pictures from here of the city before walking into it and heading to the Sulphur Baths. I didn’t go inside but from the outside, the baths were domed and were really quite unique. I then walked through the city to another small church, The Sioni Cathedral of the Dormition. Once again it was small but beautiful.

My next stop was Liberty Square which had a large monument in the center. I enjoyed walking down Aleksandr Pushkin Street from Liberty Square towards the Mtkvari River. It was a very lively street with beautiful architecture. At the end of the street, I turned to walk past the famous Rezo Gabriadze Marionette Theater. There aren’t shows in the winter but the building was really cool and I was glad that I stopped by to see it!

I then walked to one of my favorite and final stops of the day. The Bridge Of Peace is a staple in Tbilisi and rightfully so - it was one of the coolest bridges I have ever seen! The glass bridge is stunning and leads across the river to Rike Park which I also really enjoyed. It was a large, beautiful park with other cool architecture (the Music Theater and Exhibition Hall were so cool) and there were many cool quirks to the park such as the giant chess set, giant piano, and the great views of the city. It’s also where you can take a cable car up to another part of the city, but it was not working today. Rike Park was a great last stop on my whirlwind tour of Tbilisi and I’m so glad I made it to where I would have a few hours here.

I went back to Du Vin Rouge where I wished Tigran farewell and thanked him again for all of his help! Du Vin Rouge was also very kind in providing my transportation back to the airport. I had an amazing stay in this new hotel and cannot recommend it enough! The staff were incredibly kind and caring and my room was very nice as well. Thank you again to Du Vin Rouge for everything!

The drive back to the airport was under twenty minutes but when I arrived I learned that my flight was delayed by two hours. This ended up being totally fine, though, as my layover in Dubai, UAE was already about six hours. This helped to make that layover shorter which was definitely a good thing. When the plane to Dubai finally departed I was exhausted and slept for most of the flight. I arrived at Dubai Airport (DXB) terminal 2 which is definitely the worst in the airport. It is home to Fly Dubai airline and is tiny, packed, and unfortunately very smoky when you walk in as the smoking lounge is located right by the entrance (and right by the food court… who thought that was a good idea?). I grabbed some food from Paul (the French cafe chain) and found a less hectic spot by my gate away from the smoke. It was still a very long layover but at least I didn’t have to spend so much time in uncomfortable terminal 2!

My second flight of the day was from Dubai to Manama, Bahrain and thankfully it was only an hour long, though I still didn’t land until about 2:30am. Thankfully I slept most of the flight again. I won’t have long in Bahrain but I’m really looking forward to what time I do have!

63 countries down, 133 to go.

To learn more about Du Vin Rouge click here.

Country #62 - Israel Day 2

The Old City

After an incredibly weird night’s sleep (5:00pm to 10:00pm, 5:00am to 7:00am) I surprisingly felt rested and got up and ready for my day visiting Jerusalem! My hotel, Dave Tel Aviv, has breakfast partnerships with two nearby restaurants and I chose the one called Bread and Co. It was a great little spot with a nice outdoor patio. I had french toast and apple juice that was green and tasted like it was literally just an apple - both were so good! I then headed back to Dave Tel Aviv where I checked out and thanked them for an incredible stay. I took a taxi from Dave Tel Aviv to Tel Aviv 2000 Terminal.

The terminal is both a train and bus station which ended up being so helpful. There were luggage lockers inside of the train terminal where I stored my suitcase for the day. I then headed out to the busses and found bus 480 which heads straight to Jerusalem! The round trip ticket was cheap at around $10. The bus ride took a little under hour and the drive was so pretty. It seriously looks like exactly where you would imagine the Bible takes place (which I know makes sense, but it was still cool). The bus dropped off at the Jerusalem Central Bus Station. From there I took the light rail (which I bought a day pass for and was incredibly easy to use) towards the Jaffa Gate.

I was immediately amazed by the walls surrounding the city - I entered the Old City through Jaffa Gate where I then walked to my first stop, Church of the Holy Sepulchre. The inside of the Old City is a bit difficult to describe but, basically, it is very old obviously, there are stalls along every walkway with lots of souvenirs and other items being sold, and then there are very historic spots throughout. There are four quarters that split the city into sections: the Armenian Quarter, Christian Quarter, Jewish Quarter, and Muslim Quarter.

It makes a lot of sense that my first stop was in the Christian Quarter, as the Church of the Holy Sepulchre is home to what is supposedly the Tomb of Jesus. There are a few of these in the world so it’s not definite, but it was still quite interesting to see and the church itself was unlike anything I’ve ever seen. There were multiple items that had some supposed relation to Jesus that people lined up to touch or pray at. The church was huge and there were many rooms to walk through. After walking through I waited in the thirty-minute line to go inside the tomb (it can be significantly longer during the summer). I was inside for maybe ten seconds but it was still very interesting!

From there I walked along Via Dolorosa which is the path that Jesus walked along on the way to his Crucifixion. My next stop was Mary’s birthplace where you just look in and see a room. Next I headed outside of the Old City to the foot of Mount Olive where Garden of Gethsemane and the Church of All Nations are located. The Garden of Gethsemane is where Jesus prayed the night before his Crucifixion, and the Church of All Nations is supposedly built over the rock where Jesus prayed before he was betrayed by Judas. Across the street I went to the Tomb of the Virgin which is believed to be the burial place of Mary. Like I said - lots of history here!

My walk back into the Old City was very uphill. I headed to the Western Wall which I was told by police officers was closed. This made no sense since I knew that it wasn’t (because it doesn’t close), and after finding another entrance it was definitely open thank goodness! It was such a unique thing to see. The Western Wall is the last remnant of the Holy Temple in Jerusalem. It is incredibly sacred and important to Jewish people and was so interesting to see in person. By far one of the most unique parts of my day was standing in front of the Western Wall, watching both Jews and Christians pray, and hearing the Muslim call to prayer. Jerusalem has it’s political difficulties but it was cool in that moment to see all three religions at once.

After the Western Wall I walked around the Jewish Quarter and made my way to quite the unique spot - the Alabama Heart of Dixie store located in the heart of the Old City! It was started by an Alabama alum and is currently run by his brother who I met and was really great. The store sells tons of Alabama merchandise in Hebrew and was honestly just hilarious to see in the center of Jerusalem. I bought lots of gifts and really enjoyed talking about Alabama Football with someone from Jerusalem!

This was my last stop in the Old City as I then made my way to Ben Yehuda Street, one of the main streets in town. I walked up it for a bit until I got to Jaffa Street which I walked for a bit as well. I ended up at Marzipan Bakery where I tried the rugulah and it was amazing! Shoutout again to my friend Jennifer for the amazing recommendations for my time in Israel! Marzipan Bakery was definitely one of them. My last stop in Jerusalem was then Mahane Yehuda Market. It was amazing! There were so many stalls and I really enjoyed walking through, especially as it wasn’t too large to see everything.

I then made my way back to the Central Bus Station where I took bus 480 back into Tel Aviv! There was a little more traffic on the way back as it was rush hour, but the ride still took about an hour. When I arrived back at Tel Aviv 2000 terminal I retrieved my luggage from the locker and then took the train back to the airport. It was a good thing I was unintentionally almost four hours early because the airport turned into a bit of an ordeal. I had to go through special security screening (likely because of my passport and its growing wealth of weird stamps if I had to guess), and this would have been fine if it didn’t take over twenty times as long to go through as regular security. I had to take every single electronic item out of my bags (every USB cord, hair straightener, adapters, everything) and the people in charge made this an incredibly slow process.

Once I finally cleared security my passport, of course, wouldn’t work with their biometric systems so I had to wait in another long line. Increasingly fading due to sleep deprivation this was not ideal as I also hadn’t eaten a full meal since breakfast. After over an hour of lines (though there were almost no people in front of me, just inefficiency) I finally made it through and to the boarding gates. I had a great grilled chicken and hummus sandwich (I made sure I tried something at least a little local instead of the Pizza Hut) and then headed to my gate. I was working on emails when the two guys next to me got into a pretty scary screaming match in Russian. I immediately got up and moved away but it went from silence to screaming in like two seconds which was just bizarre. I couldn’t understand them, obviously, but I thought they were about to actually fight and eventually the police showed up. I have no idea what it was about but it was quite the ordeal.

For unrelated reasons the flight was delayed for an hour which was annoying due to how late it was already scheduled to arrive. I slept the whole flight as I had now reached the point of exhaustion where this is actually possible which doesn’t happen too often. When I landed in Tbilisi, Georgia, immigration and customs were a breeze and I was greeted by Tigran, the owner of the hotel where I was staying, Du Vin Rouge! He was so kind to pick me up and I definitely appreciate it. I really enjoyed talking with him on the drive into the city - he’s from Armenia but actually lived in NYC for four years which was cool!

By the time I finally got to my room and went to sleep it was past 4:00am. I don’t have a ton of time in Tbilisi tomorrow so I’m going to have to wake up relatively early, unfortunately, but at least I didn’t have a problem getting to sleep. It was a great (but busy) day and I thoroughly enjoyed all of my time in Israel and am looking forward to exploring Georgia tomorrow!

62 countries down, 134 to go.

Read about my first day in Israel here.

To learn more about Dave Tel Aviv click here.

To learn more about Du Vin Rouge click here.

Country #62 - Israel Day 1

The Walking

I had to wake up painfully early this morning (around 4:00am) but it was definitely worth it - I was flying to Israel! I had to take another expensive taxi back to the Larnaca airport which was a pretty nice medium sized airport. My plane was a tiny bit delayed but nothing too bad. The flight was so short at about forty minutes and it was so cool to fly in right over Tel Aviv and be able to see the city!

Before I go any further I want to give special thanks to my good friend Jennifer for all of her recommendations for both Tel Aviv and Jerusalem - they were fantastic and made the trip amazing! Literally, she recommended everything that I did it was so incredibly helpful and made my life so much easier for two days.

When I landed and went through passport control I learned that Israel no longer gives passport stamps - I had heard this but now saw it for myself. I had brought both of my passports just in case but it ended up being a non-issue. For those that don’t know having an Israel stamp causes major issues with entry into a few countries so that’s why I was extra cautious. You do get a little slip of paper that you can keep both upon entry and exit so at least there was something! Entry into the country was almost surprisingly easy (just considering where I was) and I then made my way to the train to take into the city. It is significantly cheaper than taking a taxi and was really quick and easy.

The train stations are all along the east side of the city and my hotel was on the west side, so I just chose the closest station and then had to take a taxi. I used the Gett Taxi app while I was there as it is really common and very similar to Uber (except it is obviously for taxis only). My first trip went poorly as the driver never even showed up but from then on out it was smooth sailing. I took about a $10 taxi to my hotel, Dave Tel Aviv.

Dave Tel Aviv is located in the heart of the city and is a brand new hotel! Literally, there was fresh paint and construction being finished. It was so nice, though, and a very quirky little boutique hotel! The staff were so helpful throughout my stay, including helping to store my bags for the day as I had arrived so early that my room was not yet ready. After checking in and leaving my bags I then headed out for the day!

My first stop was to walk along Dizengoff street from near my hotel to my lunch spot. It was a really nice walk along one of the major streets in town. I walked through the Dizengoff shopping center just to see it along the way, and really enjoyed my first taste of the city. I took the street to Sarona Market where I was going to eat lunch! Sarona market was incredible. There were tons of outdoor shops and restaurants in a beautiful set up (it had a bit of an Italian feel), but my favorite part was the indoor market.

There were so many cool restaurant spots! I walked around basically drooling for a while before finally deciding to eat at Meat Bar Burger. And trust me, it was a hard decision. I could literally eat in just Sarona Market for months and still want to go back - literally, everything sounded so good! My burger was incredible - perfect flavor, tasty fries, and awesome sauce. It was a great decision but not kidding I would go back to Tel Aviv just for Sarona Market.

After Sarona Market, I walked along Rothschild Boulevard which was beautiful. The center of the street is bike and walking paths and the street is lined with trees. It was a really nice walk to my next stop, Rothschild Allenby Market. I was obviously too full to eat again but I just wanted to see this market, and it was another cool one! It was really new and filled with tons of great spots. From there I then made my way to Shuk Hacarmel Market (also known as Carmel Market). It was crazy but in a good way! There were so many people, stalls, and stuff everywhere. It was so fun to just walk through everything and I really enjoyed watching the craziness and seeing everything that was for sale.

After finishing walking through Shuk Hacarmel I made my way to some cute streets in town, known collectively as Neve Tzedek. My favorite was Shabazi Street which had tons of cool shops and I stopped to get some tasty gelato and rest for a bit before continuing my walking heavy day. My next stop was Jaffa Old City, and on the way, I had my first sight of the water! Tel Aviv sits along the Mediterranean Sea and it was stunning. My entire view for the rest of the day involved walking along the water it and I definitely wasn’t complaining.

The walk to Jaffa was a long one but totally worth it. It was such a unique part of the city and had a completely different feel. It was obviously more touristy but it was interesting as well! I didn’t spend a ton of time there but was glad that I went, especially as the views out over the city and the water were amazing. You could see everything from Jaffa! After taking another quick rest I started my long walk back. In hindsight, I probably shouldn’t have walked the entire hour back to my hotel for my feets’ sake but the walk along the water was just too pretty to care. I enjoyed the entire walk along the coastline. That is actually the only major downside to Tel Aviv that I saw - the lack of easy public transportation. There are busses and they are working on a light rail but it’s not there quite yet!

When I arrived back at Dave Tel Aviv I checked into my awesome room! It was perfect and very cozy as well. And then I made a huge mistake - I laid down. And fell asleep. For five hours. It wasn’t ideal, but after having walked over eleven miles on no real sleep it seemed pretty inevitable. I then was awake from about 10:00pm until 5:00am which I realize is the opposite of ideal, but there wasn’t too much that I could do. Luckily I fell back asleep for a few more hours before my day visiting Jerusalem tomorrow!

I had an incredible day in Tel Aviv and definitely recommend it! It’s a big city for sure but with a lot of great food, markets, history, and a beautiful coastline. I wish I had more time to see even more of the city but it was a great first visit!

62 countries down, 134 to go.

Read about my second day in Israel here.

To learn more about Dave Tel Aviv click here.

Country #61 - Cyprus

The Flights

I took a rather roundabout way to get to Cyprus but hey, it worked! The trip all the way to London was on a single family American Airlines pass so of course, it came with a few challenges. I flew out of Dallas for Huntsville as a standby passenger - it took a few tries but I finally got on a flight that landed that night. My brother, Edward, drove down from Nashville to pick me up and we went to my Grandma’s house near Huntsville to surprise her! It was so great (she was definitely surprised) and made the trip to Nashville totally worth it! I then spent the next day in Nashville with Edward and my one of my closest friends, Kat. It was a great day and loved having the day to spend with them.

My next flight was from Nashville to Philadelphia where I had a four-hour layover before flying to London. I had two seats side by side and attempted to sleep but was pretty unsuccessful. When I landed there was a thankfully short immigration line. Heathrow is totally hit or miss on this and thankfully today, when I was in a big hurry, it worked out well. I was in such a hurry to catch my National Express bus to London Luton (LTN) airport. I made the first bus with a few minutes to spare which gave me some definite breathing room.

The ride took about an hour, and as always it was sad not to be stopping in London. Transiting through your favorite city is never easy! Alas, I arrived at Luton and after waiting in a painfully long line got checked in for my Blue Air flight to Larnaca, Cyprus. Many people consider Luton to be the worst of the London airports but I will always hand Stansted that title, though Luton would be a close second place. It has been under construction since when I studied abroad and it looks exactly the same. There are also no self check-in kiosks (a rarity in a major airport) and no direct train access (there is a station ten minutes away that a shuttle runs to, so it’s not impossible). It’s also the airport I slept in when I studied abroad and got zero sleep so it’s definitely not my favorite place in the world.

I grabbed a quick snack, waited for my gate to be announced (I will never understand the logic behind not announcing gates for so long - it is the worst), and then finally waited to board. And it was a long wait. In the freezing cold. They scanned our boarding passes and then made us wait in a stairwell where the outside door was open and it was painfully cold for at least twenty minutes. After finally boarding the plane I completely lucked out - I had an entire row on the plane to myself! There were very few even empty seats on the plane so to somehow have an entire row when I most needed it was amazing. The flight was about four hours and I attempted to sleep the entire time.

When I arrived I had to take a taxi to my hotel, Palm Beach Hotel and Bungalows. The taxi was annoyingly expensive ($25) and was probably the first time in the EU that I’ve had to pay over $10 for transit thanks to the lack of many public transit options. It was unfortunately dark even though I landed around 5:30pm. The hotel was located on the beach, though, which was awesome even though I couldn’t see it! I had an incredibly nice room facing the water and was able to listen to the waves at least. The hotel room was really cool and the lobby was beautiful as well! I’d love to come back to the resort when I have time to spend a few days and relax and actually see the ocean.

It was a really long day but I was very glad to finally be able to go to sleep and get a few hours of rest before heading to Tel Aviv, Israel in the morning!

61 countries down, 135 to go.

To learn more about Palm Beach Hotel and Bungalows click here.

Country #60 - Spain

The Guggenheim

Today I visited Bilbao, Spain! You’re probably wondering why I chose Bilbao of every amazing place in Spain that there is to visit and the answer is pretty simple. I spent a week in Spain last year with my mom when she visited me during study abroad; we visited Barcelona, Madrid, and Valencia, all of which I loved. However, ever since I heard about the Guggenheim Museum in Bilbao it has sat at the top of my bucket list and a visit became a must. I am a huge fan of museums if you can’t tell, and especially modern art museums which the Guggenheim Bilbao is. Also, it seemed like a good idea to avoid Barcelona right now considering everything that is going on politically. So Bilbao, finally, it is!

I thankfully got a really good nights sleep before setting off for a full day in Bilbao. My first stop of the day was Catedral de Santiago. It was right near I was staying in the heart of Plaza Nueva area and was a beautiful example of gothic architecture. There was a nice audio guide that I appreciated and it was a really stunning Spanish church. From there I walked along Ria del Nervion O de Bilbao all the way to the Guggenheim. It was a beautiful walk along the water and I really enjoyed being able to see the city that way. When I arrived at the Guggenheim my jaw literally dropped. It is one of the most, if not the most, incredible buildings that I have ever seen. It is made of titanium (that’s as thin as tissue paper), stone, and glass. It is incredible and words simply cannot do it justice so please enjoy the pictures. The art outside (besides the creepy spider) was all amazing and I just so happened to walk by when the fog installation on the bridge went off which was really cool.

If I can give you any advice for visiting it would be to definitely buy your ticket ahead of time. The line outside went stretched up the long stairway entrance and down the street, but I was able to just walk right on in. Also, the ticket includes an audio guide! I took my time in the museum as it was the entire reason I was in Bilbao. And I was not disappointed. The first floor was filled with large installation pieces which I really enjoyed and will include some pictures of below. The second floor was entirely a video installation by one artist spread throughout the galleries which was really interesting. Lastly, on the third floor was the Guggenheim's permanent collection. It was a more typical gallery feel and included works by Rothko and Pollock.

I thoroughly enjoyed every floor as well as learning more about the building which is basically a sculpture in itself and was my favorite work of art on the day. It’s just such a cool building! I spent three hours in the museum and another hour outside taking pictures. I even walked up on the bridge next to it to get some better shots which I recommend if you visit. It was definitely worth travelling to see and I can now say that I have seen every Guggenheim museum (the others are in New York and Venice).

After the Guggenheim, I was starving but everything was, unfortunately, closed thanks to Siesta being an actual, annoying, thing. I get that it is a cultural thing but, speaking solely as a tourist, it is annoying to find things closed in the middle of the day. I found an ice cream place that was open at least. It wasn’t the ideal lunch situation but it was enough to hold me over until a large dinner later in the evening. After getting the ice cream I walked to Federico Moyúa Plaza which was filled with people and was just a cool spot in the center of the city to see. From there I walked to the Museum of Fine Arts of Bilbao. The permanent collection there is free from 6-8 so I waited ten minutes before entering and it was great!

I really enjoyed the museum because it covered all time periods, from Medieval to Modern and everything in between in sequential order. I also enjoyed my time there as it wasn’t huge but was high in quality even having works by Picasso. I spent about an hour in the museum before walking by the next door Doña Casilda de Iturrizar Park for a few minutes and then walking back across the river to Plaza Nueva for dinner. I had originally planned to take the Metro back until I realized why their streets were swarming with people - Bilbao Athletic Club (soccer team) was playing Barcelona (FCB) tonight! There were fans everywhere and I even saw an approximately ten police car long motorcade escorting the Barcelona team bus. This added to it being a Saturday meant people were everywhere! As a result, I decided to walk and people watch instead of packing into a metro. I did not see any protests due to politics the entire day and the only thing I saw on my walk were lots and lots of soccer fans and a few chants!

Plaza Nueva is basically the heart of Bilbao. It was absolutely packed. I think it is just a thing in Spain for children to run around squares at night while their parents socialize because I have seen it many times before. This one was no different other than some of the kids were wearing Halloween costumes. My favorite was definitely the little girl dressed as Iron Man; she was SO into it it was fantastic. She would try to blast everyone she saw with her hands like Iron Man does.  It was adorable.

It was a bit of a struggle to find a place to eat because ordering tapas off of the bar is a little stressful, but especially in Bilbao where English was much less common than in cities like Madrid or Barcelona. I found a sit-down restaurant on the square and only had to wait for the table for a few minutes! It was great. A French family came up and sat at the rest of my table. It wasn’t ideal because it was just a bit weird - they didn’t talk the whole time. My server told me, while they were deciding to sit down, that what they were doing was considered incredibly rude in Spain! It was weird but my food was fantastic and included some of my favorite tapas: croquetas, manchego cheese, and Iberian ham.

After dinner, I sat in Plaza Nueva for a bit and called my mom. My bus to Madrid didn’t leave until 1:00am so I had to find something to do to pass the time. I eventually found a cafe around the corner that served my favourite Spanish dessert, churros and chocolate! You dip the churros in the melted chocolate and it is as good as it sounds. I sat there for about two hours and then made my way back to my hotel to pick up my luggage and head to the bus station. I arrived about thirty minutes early and we started to board not long after. It was a four-hour ride to the Madrid airport and I slept at least two of them.

When I arrived in Madrid there was almost no one in the airport as it was 5:00am. Security was, as a result, really easy. Of course, the information boards didn’t say which gate to go to because Europe is the worst at this, but I used the American Airlines app to find out since I was flying home using a family pass. It was a long wait but I watched some TV and worked on my blog. I then had to do the new extra security screening for the first time. It’s the one that was just enacted where you have to answer questions (to the airline employees) about your travels. It was just as stupid and pointless as I thought it would be. I was asked what my occupation is and where I travelled in Spain. It was more annoying than anything else.

I got a seat on the plane even though I was low on the standby list and, excitedly, it was an exit row seat! There was nothing in front of me and I had tons of space for the entire flight. I watched two movies (The House and The Big Sick), slept for three hours, ate two meals, and worked on the blog. It was not turbulent at all and was overall a good flight back! I’m going to work in Dallas for a bit before heading out on my next trip back towards the Middle East! I had an amazing time on this trip, notably in Iceland and Spain. I highly recommend you visit both. I wish I could have done more of Spain on this trip but just know that Barcelona, Madrid, and Valencia are all also amazing Spanish cities that you should definitely visit. Spain is such a unique country (or countries, depending on what happens there) and I have loved every second I have spent there!

60 countries down, 136 to go.