Crossing Borders - Armenia to Georgia by Road

Marshrutka or the Mini Vans are the best way of transport if you are travelling on a  budget within the Caucaus Region. My Hostel Reception booked a taxi for me in Yeveran, Armenia for I can get scammed by the Taxi Drivers if I just hail one on the road. Since most of driver's don't speak English, I have the photo and the name of the bus station on my phone ready and showed it to him which made my life easier. I paid 600 AMD fare since the station was pretty close from the city centre. 

Kilikia Central Bus Station is the main bus station of Yerevan in Armenia. Majority of the schedules are in the morning since it takes roughly 6 hours to get  to Tblisi, Georgia. It's a small station with the main office sitting at the centre surrounded by Marshrutkas where the Ticketing Offices, Food Stalls, Cafeteria's and Toilets are located. There's no need to buy a ticket nor look for the next van available for Marshrutkas, Drivers and Conductors flocked the area waiting for passengers and payments in Armenian Dram were made before you hopped into the van. It's a 12 seater van with a first come, first serve basis, no seat reservation and leave as soon as it gets full.

Bus Schedules: 8:00am and 10:00am
Marshrutka or the Mini Vans: 8:00am, 9:00am, 10:00am and 11:0m am
Marshrutka Fare: 6000 AMD

Since it is a mountainous region, majority of the time we were running  beside ridges and edges but it was a very scenic drive on a fine zig zaggy road. We made a 15 minute toilet break after 3 hours then reached the Bagratashen Border in Armenia after an hour. The get off the van to immigration while the driver waited for us at the Immigration Exit. 

After an hour, we then again hopped off the van for the Georgia Immigration at Sadakhlo Border, this time carrying our luggage for scanning. We were dropped off at the Georgia Central Bus Station where I hailed a taxi going to my hostel. Georgia's capital city, Tbilisi is much active and busy compared to Yeveran, Armenia and traffic was a bit congested. 

There's a lot of options if you want to cross both countries but since I am travelling on a budget, Marshrutka was perfect for me. Don't stress about safety and convenience for I had  a smooth journey and reached my destination on time. 

Overnight Camping at Jebel Jais

Who wouldn’t love public holidays? I actually have the list of the Holidays for the entire year with the things I want to do.  However, don’t let your excitement eat you up, just what happened to our overnight camping trip in Jebel Jais.

Jebel Jais (Map) is a rocky mountain located in the Emirate of Ras Al Khaimah and the tallest peak in the UAE.

It was a quite sunny Thursday afternoon and the UAE was  observing the Arafat Day. We left Dubai at 4 pm in a sedan packed with our camping equipments. There’s no traffic not until we enter the Sharjah Emirate and everything went slow. We candidly made fun of all the cars that we might all end up on the same place and indeed we were right. 

Parts of the main road of Sharjah and RAK were under construction and cars were everywhere trying to overtake which caused a lot of collision made the traffic horrible. We reached the base of the mountain at 6 pm -  It was like a parade of cars. While driving towards the peak, we noticed that people already patched their tents on the base of the mountain which alarmed us - meaning the peak is already full but still we proceed. 

The winding road was perfectly made for the adventurous adding  the astonishing rock formations and the breathtaking views of the mountain as the sun set which gave more life and color to the sky  - I felt like we teleport to Mars. 

Halfway through, cars were all parked on both sides of the road and campers just settle on every space available specially on the View Deck. Music were so loud and people started to dance on the street which made it so difficult to proceed. Though Police were visible, it was so hard for them to control the crowd.  The road heading to the actual peak was blocked from the Main Observation Deck so we decided to look for a place to camp but it was hopeless. People started to fight for a parking space. I went out of the car to look for a space since we cannot move. I luckily found one and waited for  our car to drive in.  We camped adjacent to the car beside the road. It was a very rough, hard and rocky site but we don't have a choice so we settled and patched our tent. 

Jebel Jais View Deck has food trucks and portable toilets with running water. My friend insisted to do some barbecues - camping is not complete without fires and barbecues, he said.  We managed to do it but it took roughly an hour for we had difficulty making fire. Good thing we have some cooked food ready. With few drinks, we called it a day and hit the sack. I was wearing a pull over and still awaken by the cold temperature from time to time. 3 am when we were awaken by a very loud music. We checked what was going on and saw people dancing again in the middle of the road - seems like Bollywood was transferred to Jebel Jais right there and then. 

We woke up at 5 am to catch the sunrise. People were starting to leave since its going to be hot if the sun is up already. We went for a short hike to watch the sun rises and to capture the amazing  view rising right in front of our naked eyes. We waited until majority of the cars left then we packed up. The place become so quite as the people slowly leave the peak however the mountain was left literally full of trash from top to bottom.  We occasionally stop to take pictures and then head to Emirate of  Fujairah for a road trip and for a quick dip on Fujairah's lovely cost.