It’s good that our team chose Bakuriani for our retreat starting on Wednesday, seeing as the other Georgian ski resort (and all places beyond it including Kazbegi) had been cut off due to heavy snow for the last three days.
Mind you, the journey to Bakuriani was hellish, too. It was snowing a little in Tbilisi – as we left, the snow got heavier and heavier. The wind blew and blew and blew…..at Gori we were told the roads were closed, but really, sometimes the Georgian police can be more forceful (though the Zugdidi doctor who was tortured by the chief of police there a few weeks ago might disagree). In our situation they should just have made us go back. It was white-out conditions for a good 50 km or so, with at times the traffic stuck completely. We motored on and on; once beyond Khashuri and in forest roads the wind was much less forceful and we could drive, albeit in thick snow. Journey took about 6 hours. Some people’s husbands, back in Tbilisi, were very distressed to hear where we were……
Now in the hotel, where all my colleagues complain about the heat in their rooms. Not a problem for me, seeing the amount of ice on the inside walls of my room (on steel girders between badly fitted windows – I can see the countryside through the gaps). Shame; it’s a beautiful room otherwise, and the bathroom is lovely and warm. Changed the room after a night, and the new room was fine temperature-wise. The bed was so hard that the top of my shoulders and my behind had contact with the mattress, everything else had to support itself somehow, but who's quibbling.
Everything was Chinese made (and helpfully thus labelled), with sometimes matching quality. Oh dear, the reputation of things Chinese. It makes me wonder about the building quality (quite apart from the ill-fitting windows) in an earthquake zone.
But generally the Prima Hotel, at 87 Agmashenebeli, opposite the hotel Eurika, was a nice hotel, people spoke English, and everything we needed was laid on...
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