Hiking trails near Turtle Lake (Tbilisi) - Photos And Route Map
Welcome to another hiking / trekking post in Tbilisi. This time in a company of three we made a route from Turtle Lake - Round Garden (Eristavi street). As warm weather is more approaching, I'm more into outdoor activities. So - last week we took our bikes and headed to Lisi lake.Speaking of hiking near Turtle lake - this was already third time this year (first two were made on January) - so it actually doesn't matter what are the weather conditions, right?This time I did record this route using MapMyRide app and made plenty of photos (Lately I'm really into macros)This was a 6.3 km route in Tbilisi, Georgia near Turle lake. The route has a total ascent of 209.46 m and has a…
Spring Is In The Air - Colourful Photos From Tbilisi Dezerter Bazaar
On the lovely date of March 8 which in Georgia and many other countries is celebrated as International Women's Day I headed to Tbilisi Dezerter Bazaar to capture impressions of that day.
I was hoping to capture smiling man with flowers in hand but instead I did photographed a lot of vegetables, fruits and yes flowers as well.
As well I managed to capture both happy and unhappy sales persons in action.
Take a look
Narcissus for Sale at Tbilisi Dezerter Bazaar
Radishes and sorrels for sale at market
At least I believe those are some sorels, but maybe they are beet leaves?
Colored paprika
Pineapples and bananas at market
Cherry Tomatoes
At Tbilisi Dezerter Bazaar…
Enabled Cache For Drupal Views Gives A Better Performace
The other day talking with my dad on Facebook, he asked me, why my blog is so slow today - it's so slow that he cannot open my site at all. I straight went to my Linode VPS to investigate server logs. Nothing unusual did find there. I used http://tools.pingdom.com/fpt/ to test speed of my site and it actually was really slow.
Since my blog is heavily based on Drupal views, and I had not before enabled cache neither for CSS or JS (I'm still not aggregating CSS and JS) I decided to give a try and to enable cache for all of my views.
The result? Pretty fast right now.
Actually I did a lot of up keeping my disabling and uninstalling unused modules. There is still much left to do - my…
How To Make Fresh Egg Pasta Noodles Using Macaroni machine
Welcome to my third attempt of being a food bloger, today I will demonstrate how one (perhaps you) can make a home-made noodles by using a macaroni machine.
I believe just like in my previous food blog posts I will learn some new English culinary language.
Ingredients you will need: flour, eggs, salt and a macaroni machine.
We bought our macaroni machine here in Georgia some years ago already, if you don't have one, take your chances and browse on amazon.com
[amazon:B0009U5OSO:full]
Lets dig in:
Ingredients for fresh Egg Pasta - Flour, Eggs and salt
Add Flour to a bowl (make a small cavity to put eggs in)
Add egg to a flour
Add eggs to a flour
Knead your pasta…
Cycling Near Lisi Lake In Tbilisi (Route Map + Photos)
Welcome to another cycling in Tbilisi post series. Today I will write about our latest cycling route near the Lisi lake, will provide you with a cycling map and plenty of photos I managed to capture here.
During this cycling route, we discovered a few and very interesting places in Tbilisi I had previously barely heard but never had visited them before. Places like Tbilisi Hippodrome and Tbilisi Dog Shelter.
It all started with a call to a friend with a mini-van. Damn, we are like typical tourists, why should you wheel if you can call a friend and ask to drive you up in the hill (Lisi lake is located in mountainous suburbs of Tbilisi). See Organized tours in Georgia,…
Tbilisi Dog Shelter Near Lisi Lake
The other day, while cycling near Lisi Lake in Tbilisi, we discovered a few interesting places. I have already written a blog post about Tbilisi Hippodrome, which we stumbled upon by accident.By accident, we also discovered a Tbilisi dog shelter. While cycling from Tbilisi Hippodrome back to Lisi Lake, my eyes caught an interesting scene—in the middle of nowhere, people were doing some exercises. So we decided to approach, and the closer we got, the louder a dog started barking. And there it was—A Tbilisi Dog Shelter.I first heard about this organization at the last Christmas Charity Fair held at Sheraton Hotel. I even subscribed to a volunteer list by providing my email, but I never…
Tbilisi Hippodrome Near Lisi Lake (Jockey Club)
After a longer break of my cycling advetures, on a lovely Saturday morning we took our bikes and headed to Lisi Lake.
Turned out that just a few hundred meters away from Lisi Lake there is located a place called 'Tbilisi Hippodrom LTD' - At start I was kinda suspicious, because only one for me known Hippodrome in Tbilisi (now we should call it a former hippodrome) is located along the Vake-Saburtalo road.
I'm not an expert in this field - if owner of this place wanted to call it a hippodrome - fine with me.
I managed to take 18 pictures of this place:
Construction works at Tbilisi Hippodrome
Horse stables at Tbilisi hippodrome
Girl with a horse at Tbilisi hippodrome
Tbilisi…
Lagidze Water near Sameba
Welcome to another post in Tbilisi restaurant series. Today I will speak about cafe Lagidze Water located at Sameba Cathedral complex. I had heard previously about Lagidze Water, but I didn't know much about it, just something that it was pretty popular drink during Soviet times (and probably Tsarist Russia times as well)My knowledge was short like it's some syrup mix with water - well I'm not found of syrup waters but seems that in Georgia it's pretty much popular drink. According to WikipediaLagidze water is a popular Georgian soft drink based on soda and a variety of natural syrups. It has been traditionally mixed in a glass from a soda fountain, but it is…
Sameba - Holy Trinity Cathedral of Tbilisi
Holy Trinity Cathedral of Tbilisi, commonly known as Sameba (Trinity in Georgian) probably is among the most known Tbilisi tourist attraction sites and of course it's the main cathedral of Georgian Orthodox Church.For me it's always been interesting to look at Sameba from two points of view - it's third highest Orthodox cathedral in the world and it symbolizes Georgian national and spiritual revival.Holy Trinity Cathedral of Tbilisi (Sameba)Constructed between 1995 and 2004, it is the third-tallest Eastern Orthodox cathedral in the world and one of the largest religious buildings in the world by total area. Sameba is a synthesis of…
Building A Travel Map - Drupal Way (Gmap + Views + Selective Filters)
In this article, I'll show how I built a travel map using Drupal and a few extra modules.
For a starter, you can see a live preview by visiting my Travel Map.
In this map, I have listed all places I have visited since October 2013 (When I started my blog). I have used a few filters to allow limiting results on the map, for example, users can filter by Country, Region, and Theme (Category).
To make it work better and more intuitive I have used a small but neat Drupal module - Views Selective Filters.
Drupal travel map
Location and Gmap module
First things first, you will need to download and enable the Location and Gmap modules. With help of these modules, we…
'Maspindzelo' Tbilisi Restaurant Review
Welcome to another series of Tbilisi restaurants, in this post I will speak about a restaurant 'Maspindzelo' located close to Tbilisi Sulphur baths. I first visited this restaurant just back in last summer, my visit here this time here was just a second time. Actually we were heading to another restaurant - a newly opened Accent restaurant, but we had a wrong coordinates of it's address an as it turned out we were staying next to 'Maspindelo' - Since I was a pretty hungry - I insisted - let's have a meal here, and lets find that other restaurant some other day.Entrance doors at Maspindzelo RestaurantNadugiI first pre ordered a typical Georgian food - Nadugi - it's a cottage cheese…
Beit Rachel Synagogue In Tbilisi
Beit Rachel synagogue is located in Tbilisi Old Town on Leselidze street 28. I first discovered it a few years ago, when accidentally visited an alternative restaurant located just opposite to it.
Beit Rachel synagogue is actually located just a few blocks away from Tbilisi Main Synagogue.
Though this synagogue is located in the heart of Tbilisi Old Town, it's pretty well hidden from public, to find it you must enter a yard.
Sign before entering a yard
Inside a yard
Beit Rachel synagogue wall
Entrance gates at Beit Rachel synagogue
Unfortunately gates were closed and I hadn't chance to enter inside Beit Rachel synagogue to make some more photos.
Info table about Tbilisi…
11 Katkha Tbilisi Restaurant Review (Near Dinamo Stadium) (2015)
Welcome to another great Tbilisi Restaurant review - today I will speak about 11 KatkhaUpdate 2023: This place has been closed for a while already. There are at least two other 11 Katkha restaurants in Tbilisi, one is in Saburtalo, second is on Baratishvili street (close to Freedom square), read my latest review here: 11 Katkha Tbilisi Restaurant on Nikoloz Baratashvili street11 Katkha is a restaurant located in Tbilisi, Georgia, serving traditional Georgian cuisine. I believe there are two locations of this restaurant in Tbilisi. Today I will speak about the one located near Dinamo Stadium (Arena).This place is lovely in the summertime when you can order and enjoy your meal in the…
My February Savings Report - GEL Loses Another 16.5% Against USD; -17% Against EUR
Welcome to my third savings report, today I will look at historical exchange rates of GEL/USD and EUR and compare those with at the end of January (2015) with February 24.
I started to save some chunk of money back in September 2014, since my "investments" was too small to buy some bonds, stocks or mutual funds, I decided to open a Savings account here in Georgia (I'm currently living here) in local commercial banks.
I started low - by depositing some 300 GEL (what back then equaled to to $169.68 or EUR 131.81). I did deposit some 300 GEL for the next 4 months, then I noticed - GEL/USD exchange rates have gone mad (GEL was loosing it's value against USD). I had a feeling…
How Amazon Associates Receives Their Checks in Republic of Georgia - Part 4 - Bank Commission Fees
Welcome to fourth and final part of my blog series on how Amazon Associates receives and redeems their checks in Republic of Georgia (South Caucasus).
How participants of Amazon Associates program are getting paid in the Republic of Georgia by a bank check is a blog series I originally made at the end of 2014 / start of 2015 while struggling to redeem my first bank check issued by Amazon,
Although it's still technically possible to withdraw bank checks in Georgia, at the end of 2016, I flew to the US and opened a bank account there, see: How To Open A Bank Account in the U.S., As A Non-resident Non - citizen, Wells Fargo Bank
For complete series of my adventures while living in…
How Amazon Associates Receives Their Checks in Republic of Georgia - Part 3 - Waiting 40 Working Days
Welcome to the already third part of my blog series on how Amazon Associates receives checks and get them redeemed in Republic of Georgia.
How participants of Amazon Associates program are getting paid in the Republic of Georgia by a bank check is a blog series I originally made at the end of 2014 / start of 2015 while struggling to redeem my first bank check issued by Amazon,
Although it's still technically possible to withdraw bank checks in Georgia, at the end of 2016, I flew to the US and opened a bank account there, see: How To Open A Bank Account in the U.S., As A Non-resident Non - citizen, Wells Fargo Bank
For complete series of my adventures while living in Georgia…
Building A Simple Drupal Booking Engine From Scratch
Originally this post was planned to be a part of building a Drupal website from scratch series post, I did in late 2013. For some reason this post was left unpublished, so today I decided to review it one more time and make it public.
In this article, I'll show how to create simple, but powerful booking engine for fictional tourism company's webpage using Drupal.
Part 1 - Modules
Download References module
Node Reference URL Widget
Extract modules to sites/all/modules
Enable modules
Part 2 - Content type
I'll use a custom content type - to serve bookings.Go to admin/structure/types/add and create a new content type: Bookings
Next let's add some fields to our…
Ananuri Castle Complex On The Aragvi River, Georgia
Ananuri is a castle complex on the Aragvi River in Georgia, about 45 miles (72 kilometers) from Tbilisi. Located on the Georgian military road heading to Gudauri and Kazbegi and later to Russia via Upper Lars. Due to its close proximity to the nation's capital, Ananuri is a popular tourist spot. Ananuri castle complex in GeorgiaAnanuri was a castle and seat of the eristavis (Dukes) of Aragvi, a feudal dynasty which ruled the area from the 13th century. The castle was the scene of numerous battles. In 1739, Ananuri was attacked by forces from a rival duchy, commanded by Shanshe of Ksani …