Roof Works, Part 5 - And once more let's remove old roofing
Think roof works are cool? In fact - roofing is one of the hardest works in construction and if you have decided by your own to replace your old roofing - think again! Anyway - let me show - how once again (See: Replacing Roof - Part 1: Removing old roofing) we removed old wooden shingles from our rural house back in Summer of 2015. This time I hired two workers to help me out with demolishing works and ...things moved quickly. We were able to completely remove old roofing from the second roof plane and collect the construction waste and transport to nearby meadow (to later burn it). Since the construction waste consisted just from the old wooden shingles…
Actual Price Index at Tbilisi Market - March 2016
Yup, another hipster style article about actual prices for consumer goods at local Tbilisi market (Bazroba).It has been a while since I decided to measure how lari/dolar exchange rates influence actual prices, if you, just like me are an expat living in Georgia - you most probably have faced the consequences of weak lari against US dollar. Thus - I don't believe that foreign currency should affect local economy. National currency of Georgia is lari and lari we are spending in markets, metro or marshurtkas - even for rent we are paying in lari (well, adjusted to current exchange rates to US dollar)Back at the October 1st 2016 GEL/USD/EUR exchange rates were…
New Life for Agmashenebeli avenue, Tbilisi
A major and very much needed reconstruction works recently (February 2016) have begun on one of the major Tbilisi streets - David Agmanashebeli avenue. Funded by Tbilisi Development Fund (which is pretty much financed from city budget + private investor capital) promises a completely renovated street by the Autumn 2016.It was mid February and we decided to explore how construction works were held on this street. Another reason I find these construction works very exciting - a few years ago we lived in this neighborhood on Rome street, back then we could only fantasy that one day city will take care of this city part as well and some day it will look here like in these Postcards from…
Chops by the River - Restaurant & Grill
Chops by the River restaurant and grill is now among my favorite Tskenti restaurants, and allow me to say among Tbilisi restaurants as well. Located in village of Tskneti this restaurant offers single priced grill menus and very pleasant atmosphere.I have heard of this place by some friend before, but the circumstances that made us actually to visit this restaurant was a little bit strange. As an active outdoor lovers we were off to hiking trip from Tskenti to Turtle lake, unfortunately this route is not anymore accessible, because of landslides near Tskenti. Read more: Failed attempt to complete Tskneti - Turtle lake hiking routeAfter hiking some 2km in the nowhere…
Drupal IMCE very slow on uploading images - here is how to fix
It has been about a year, since I noticed IMCE upload is damn slow when uploading images for my photo stories or just any other articles. For a very long time I was convinced that it's some cdn or JavaScript incompatibility (because sometimes, just sometimes IMCE upload worked just fine)
It was until today, when it started to take more than one minute to properly load that modal window of IMCE upload.
IMCE upload window
I quickly realized, IMCE folder was using about 1GB of memory (default upload folder -/sites/default/files) which stored more than 7,000 images - each time IMCE had to do a check up on all those files. I decided to look on IMCE settings,…
Postcards from Modena, Italy
Modena is a little charming town in the middle of Italy. Known as the birthplace of Worlds famous Ferrari car.We spent a few days in vicinity of Modena (during our recent trip to Italy), enjoyed a colorful facades of houses, narrow streets, a lot of prosciutto and of course great Italian coffee.Back at the time - I was tired of photography and made just a few random shots here:Colored residential buildings and window shutters in ModenaAn ancient town, and seat of an archbishop, it is now known as "the capital of engines", since the factories of the famous Italian sports car makers Ferrari, De Tomaso, Lamborghini, Pagani and Maserati are…
Juliet's House in Verona, Italy
As testified by the coat of arms on the internal arch-way of the court-yard, this house belonged to the “Dal Cappello” or “Cappelletti”. The building, dating back to the 13th and renovated in the last century, features the balcony where Romeo promised his beloved Juliet eternal love in Shakespeare’s famous tragedy.I had a chance to visit World famous Juliet's balcony on January 2nd, 2016 - it was a very rainy and cold day In VeronaJuliet's Balcony in VeronaWell - balcony as balcony right? But:Young couples are still very moved by the right of this house and unmarried people touch Juliet’s statue (a kind of good-luck ritual) in the hope of finding the love of their life. How many hopes and…
Let's Encrypt to fix HTTPS Certificate incompatibility with Windows XP and Google Chrome
It was about a month ago - when I successfully installed secure https pages for my blog, I opted for using free certificate provided by Let's Encrypt certificate authority. I first heard Let's Encrypt certificate authority from KeyCDN.
It was super easy and fast to create SSL certificates for my Linode powered Nginx box. Unfortunately - just a few days later I noticed a deadly screen - Your connection is not private
Your connection is not private Google Chrome screen
I was using Windows XP machine with Google Chrome. I panicked, stressed - then I opened my blog on my default laptop (Windows 8) - everything was fine - green bar was visible, not any problems with connection. I went back…
Guest House Hapi in Jūrmala
If there is a reason I will remember Hapi guest house in Jūrmala, then probably its green walls and super unprofessional staff attitude will be among top of them. Hapi guesthouse in JūrmalaWe stayed here for one night back in August 2015 and ... I can not even express my disappointment in words how unprofessional and meanwhile expensive this so called guest house was. We paid about EUR 40 for stay in this place... EUR 40 is not much, I agree - but you can stay for the same price in much more reputable Jūrmala hotels, yes that's right - hotels are not expensive in Jūrmala. Take for example hotel Dzintars (were I stayed a few months prior to stay at this guest house.)Thus we had a…
Lawn Mowing - The Never Ending Story Continues
Our roof works were still in the middle, and I noticed that grass have grown again. It was just recently when I trimmed backyard territory, but this time I decided it's time to completely trim all our land (about 0.57 hectares).I asked to our worker, could he handle this task in one day. He agreed, so in the next day - I took a day off from any home remodeling works, instead did some work for customers and photographed how grass is falling. Our veggie gardenSome time ago we planted some plants in wooden boxes (to save water) - and now our cabbages ripens. See: Our First Veggie Garden: Planting Plants in BoxesTrimmer guy in actionTrimming around our small fish pondLandscape…
Failed attempt to complete Tskneti - Turtle lake hiking route
About a year ago I discovered very cool hiking route in Tbilisi, heading from Turtle lake to Tskneti town. The total distance for this route was about 7 km and it offered very spectacular landscape views.I have completed this route several times - last time together with my dad in May, 2015.At the start of February I decided to offer this route as a possible photo / hike route for Georgia Expat Photographer club members, but before that I decided to check is it safe there (because of Tbilisi Floods 2015, I have heard that in Tskenti area there are landfalls. And just another reason - since I felt my photographer skills have improved a lot lately, I decided it would be a…
Cafe Laboratory Review in Tbilisi
Cafe Laboratory is located at the top floor at the high end shopping and business center Merani on Rustaveli avenue, Tbilisi. I was doing some photography in Vere neighborhood, when I received a call and invitation from my beloved one, she insisted we should meet at this place, enjoy some cup of tea/coffee, also she knew I'm with camera so most probably something good for my Tbilisi restaurant review series might happenSo I walked Rustaveli avenue to the Merani shopping center, got to the top floor - and there she was already. Story can be told now.Stylish interior This cafeteria/restaurant features stylish interior, another great feature is an outdoor large terrace…
Restaurant Greppia in Verona
It was a very cold, grey and rainy day in Verona, when on the way finding Juliet's Balcony I realized it would be great to find some local restaurant, order some meal and what's important to warm up.I noticed a few signboards with direction arrows located around streets of Verona, when I decided to take the bait and actually followed those arrows. (A smart marketing from Greppia restaurant)Greppia restaurant in VeronaWe were not the only tourists following arrows, there was a queue in front of the restaurant entrance when we finally arrived. Luckily we got our table served fast.Italian mineral waterI believe it's common to every mineral water producing nation, to serve their national…
Rainy day in Verona
It was a damn cold, rainy and very grey day when we arrived to Verona, Italy. I was looking to photograph some nice looking pictures but found it very difficult to make any decent exposure today at all. Calendar told us it is January 2nd, 2016. We had made a long Italy trip and arrived here from Venice (where celebrated New Years eve). Our goal was to reach Juliet's balcony... We had not a single clue where actually in city it is located. Temperature was around zero (Celsius) - to keep us warm a little bit, we made a shopping in Verona. Square in VeronaThe weather was against us today. I installed a tripod at one of the street corners in Verona, but rain a freezing…
Lurji (Blue) Monastery
The Lurji Monastery also known as "Blue Monastery", is a 12th-century Georgian Orthodox church built in the name of Saint Andrew in the Vere neighborhood of Tbilisi, Georgia. The popular historical name lurji ("blue") is derived from its roof, adorned with glazed blue tile.I first discovered this church by accident after went photographing another church (Russian Orthodox Church of St. John the Theologian in Tbilisi) and just on site I noticed there is a smaller Georgian church just across the street in distance of few meters from Russian church.Blue monastery church in TbilisiThe church stands in the central part of Tbilisi, at the…
Russian Orthodox Church of St. John the Theologian in Tbilisi
Church of St. John the Theologian (Russian: Церковь Иоанна Богослова) is located in Vere neighborhood, Tbilisi. Tis was already second Russian Orthodox church I have visited in Tbilisi. Read more about Alexander Nevsky Russian Orthodox Church in Tbilisi, and I know for sure there is another Russian church (at least in Tbilisi). I didn't enter inside this church, just tried to make some panorama photos here.Located at the end of L. Kiacheli Street, a few meters away from the Blue Monastery (Lurji monastery). It was constructed with the order of the governor-general Golicin in 1898-1901. According to the saying, the St. John The theologian main temple (founded in the 7th…
Roof Works, Part 4 - Metal Roofing Arrives
I'm continuing one of the most epic my life experiences I agreed to do - Replacing roof for an old and very bad managed rural house. It was about one week since previous roof works were done, roof replacement works resumed on August 12, 2015. Prior to that my 30th birthday happened and I decided to leave all the home remodeling works behind and visit Tallinn. See 14 Tallinn Trip Ideas your your next travel to Estonian CapitalToday the new metal roof I ordered some 3 weeks ago was meant to arrive, prior of actually installing the new metal roof, we had a very lot to do still - leveling beams, adding cross wind sheet and lathing. We had barely removed the old shingle roofing for…
Carpe Diem Café in San Bonifacio
I have never kept in secret my love for the local restaurants and cafes where tourists barely step their foot in. We did find a few great local Italian restaurants during a week long trip in Italy and when we arrived to San Bonifacio (checked in at our hotel, see Best Western Soave Hotel, San Bonifacio ) we decided to explore our options and find some great restaurant nearby.It was alright late night on January 1st - and after some 20 minute driving around San Bonifacio it seemed we wont find any place that will be opened today. Luckily we noticed this place - meet Carpe Diem Cafe in San Bonifacio.At Carpe Diem Cafe in San Bonifacio, ItalyA very few locals had been gathered…
Best Western Soave Hotel, San Bonifacio
We booked this Best Western franchise hotel in San Bonifacio, Italy through secret deals on Hotwire, on January 1st, 2016, we chose this hotel because of it's close location to Verona and affordable price (about $60).I love using Hotwire, in most cases there are great value deals, but it was not like this time. We got a small, bad equipped room from Hotel Soave. No, I'm not complaining, our stay was pretty OK. But it was far from the expected.Hotel Soave is 200 m from San Bonifacio Railway Station and 800 m from the A4 motorway exit. It offers free parking, free internet, a fitness centre and a varied buffet breakfast.Queen size bedWe made a mistake on reservation and selected…
Barbarestan - Wine Shop and Restaurant in Tbilisi
Vintage lovers and hipsters - rejoice, I just discovered another "fashionable" not to miss place in Tbilisi - Barbarestan - wine shop and restaurant on Aghanashebeli avenue.Well this place actually didn't pop up on my radar by accident - I have heard of this place before, mostly positive reviews, but the real reasons I wanted to visit this place, on a lovely Saturday morning we couldn't decide where should we go today - so after this epic struggle - what to do next, I decided to try luck on Google - I decided to search for "breakfasts in Tbilisi" - let me assure how happy I was somebody (TripAdvisor) was created such list for me. Barbarestan ranked fourth on this list, and since it is…