Today we will cross the border from Azerbaijan into Georgia. We have made our way to the Lagodekhi-Balakan border crossing and have our passports ready! It’s not busy and it’s an easy exit out of Azerbaijan and entry to Georgia.
On the other side we take a taxi of just under an hour to Sighnaghi. The taxi man is clearly a seasoned driver as he drives at breakneck speed, avoiding cows on the road and overtaking lorrys and cars on blind corners. To say my nerves are gone is an understatement and we don’t have seatbelts on 😱. Thankfully we get to our destination in one piece!! Oh did I mention he also stopped about 5 minutes into our journey to get a puncture repaired… car jacked up and sorted while we were still sitting in the back seat!!!
We are staying a couple of nights in Sighnaghi which is in the Kakheti wine region. 70% of all Georgian wines come from here so I know what we’ll be doing a fair bit of while we’re here!! We settle into our beautiful self contained apartment at Lia’s which is in a great location for town and head off to explore and get some lunch. We go to Nikala restaurant and order our first Khachapuri (cheese bread) and Khinkali – big soup dumplings. Delicious but an insane amount of cheese!
And of course our first taste of some Georgian wine…. Sure you’d have to!
The weather is a bit dull today and there’s some rain so we head back to get settled into our place. Once the rain showers are gone, the view from the terrace at Lia’s is gorgeous.
The sun has come out in the afternoon so we head out and check out the town.
Sighnaghi is known as the City of Love as you can easily get married here (I think it’s a bit of a Gretna Green situation!). It has a population of 1,500 so it really is tiny. It’s busy as we walk around as it gets a lot of tour buses coming through. We walk through the main square, up a hill (lots of hills!) and check out one of the watch towers along the walls.
There are a lot of nice spots to admire the walls, the watchtowers and churches.
This is definitely the town to do some wine tasting so on Lias recommendation we go to Kerovani winery and taste their wines which are presented to us by a 16 year old wannabe Sommelier! We try white, rose, red and the traditional amber that is famous to this region.
It’s a family run winery and as we’re leaving the owner (mammy) takes us into a locked room to show us where the wine is made.
Georgian wine is apparently 8,000 years old and along with the Armenians, Georgia claims to be the original producer of wine. Everything goes into the wine including pips, stalks and skins and its place in a Qvevri (a giant clay pot). She shows us some empty pots and one that is covered in sand and currently fermenting.
Next morning we take a walk to Bodbe monastery. There’s a great view back towards town as we walk along the narrow road.
The monastery is beautiful. It is still a working convent although there’s not a nun in sight. It is where St Nino (like Nina) who brought Christianity to Georgia is buried. Georgia was the 2nd country in the world to become Christian, after Armenia, because of her.
She is buried inside this church and we see her tomb in a small room off to the side but no photos are allowed.
There is a shop though so I buy an icon of this very important saint.
We walk around the gardens which are stunning and it’s such a beautiful sunny morning.
Back in town, we sit down for a rest and a light lunch as we are having a special meal tonight. We eat at Restaurant Avantaje and order Badrijani – fried eggplant rolls with walnut paste. The flavour is a bit strong for me but we also have some beans and bread which are delicious.
Rested and ready for more adventure, we set off to walk the Sighnaghi walls. There are 4.5km of 18th-century defensive walls with 23 towers and they are the second longest walls in Georgia after Tbilisi. We can’t walk all of it as some is damaged/closed off but we walk as much as we can.
The walls lead to a main gate where plenty of tourists have appeared.
Tonight we are tasting wine and eating at Pheasant’s Tears, which is one of the most famous wineries in the region.
We taste 4 wines, similar to last night – Rkatsiteli is the most popular grape around here and we taste it in a number of different wines. Our favourite is the Seperavi, a deep red known as Black wine so we order a bottle of that to enjoy with our dinner. For our meal we have seasonal greens (which are served mushed together which is quite unique), corn/cheesy bread and our mains are stewed pork and stewed beef dishes. The food is very tasty but the meat has the most fat I’ve ever been served!
Next morning we take a bus to Tbilisi – more of that in Part II.
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