Blog Archive: February 2016
Hotel Guerrini Review in Venice, Italy
| Hotel reviews | 31 seen
We booked hotel Guerrini in Venice for New Years night (2016), because of it's location - Located just off the characteristic Venetian street of Lista di Spagna and 400 m from Santa Lucia Railway Station, Hotel Guerrini offers free Wi-Fi and simple air-conditioned rooms.
Now the biggest surprise was to learn out, that heating in our room didn't worked (seems it didn't worked for all the hotel), so called simple air conditioner also didn't helped much (it constantly showed +17C). Bathroom (for the price paid) was a parody (small, narrow)... I could complain of this place a lot, but probably that's just the way how they treat tourists in city center, right? Ask high price and give a bad service.
Queen size bed at Hotel Guerrini
No extra blankets or whatsoever, when I called to the reception desk and complained about freezing atmosphere in room, I was told they are going to fix this soon (in fact after some hour they did turned on heating, but turned it of after 2 AM, when we just returned from Marks Square, so, yes a pleasant surprise - to return to cold room in New Years night.
Inside yard at…
Replacing Roof - Part 3: Removing the old roofing (Losing Chimney)
| Home Remodeling | 10 seen
Now, when you are familiar with part 1 and part 2, it's time to tell the third part on home remodeling series replacing roofing.
Today's roof replacing adventures were about the most dangerous so far (with happy ending). It all started in quiet August morning, when I get up earlier, to remove old roofing, so we can continue our works on leveling beams and dragging over crosswind sheet latter that day. I was waiting help (brother and dad) to arrive around a noon, so I had a plenty of time to excel my demolisher skills.
Today we faced unpleasant discovery, we had to remove atop of the chimney so the roof would be in one straight level (more on that bellow)
Wooden boards around chimney
The floor / ceiling was already rotted (due to leaky roof), I created a simple construction to somehow strengthen this area, so I have an access to remove old wooden shingles. Some days ago I tried to clean this space, read more: Loft cleaning - Preparation works for replacing that leaky roof
Hole in the roof
I started to remove old wooden shingles from…
Replacing Roof - Part 2: Beam Leveling & Crosswind sheet
| Home Remodeling | 6 seen
It was second day morning when we re-started works on roof replacing. If you haven't already red, read Part 1: Removing Old Roof.
The idea was simple - if we are going to replace roofing, we will follow latest trends, and one of them involves using a crosswind sheet, which protects both against wind and humidity, I bought some super expensive crosswind sheet for about EUR 200 to cover in total about 180m2.
Since we were replacing roofing by parts today we had to drag a crosswind beam over leveled beams and add lathing.
Measuring crosswind sheet
Yup, the surrounding views are amazing
Leveled beams
As you can see, its just one fourth of total work done yet (not speaking of actually covering a new roofing)
Beams and laths covered with sheet to protect against rain
For some reason, that Summer was pretty rainy
Lathing stretching over roof edge
We will use a chain saw to saw them in right distance from the edges.
Crosswind sheet and new lathing
Old and New: Roof replacement works
So that''s how looked second day…
How Valentine's day was celebrated in Tbilisi
| | 62 seen
We were of to Tbilisi streets looking for Valentine's day photography, when I concluded - Valentine's day, thus not popular in Republic of Georgia, makes some good for local economy - first of all for local flower markets, second for cafes, bars, pubs and restaurants.
We made a dozen of photos today, experimented with black and white, panorama and other photography techniques. Tbilisi didn't seemed too busy on celebrating Valentine's day, but we found some interesting scenes in Old Town and local flower market.
This is how we saw Valentine's day was celebrated in Tbilisi, 2016, Piece of Life after all.
Happy Valentine's day in shop windows
Where is she?
Children playground near flower market in Tbilisi
Multi color roses
There is no age for love
For my only one
Love is like a nectar
Do Not Scold Me, My Darling
Valentine's day cakes in Tbilisi
Colors of life
Happy Valentine's day
As on first date
Postcards from Rabati Fortress
| | 9 seen
I first visited Rabati Fortress in Akhaltsikhe, Republic of Georgia, in Summer of 2014, during a two day rafting drive on river Mtkavri, next time we booked a lovely hotel inside fortress complex at the start of 2015, during our stay here I created a lot of pictures and crafted an article about Rabati fortress Castle featuring 48 pictures. (You think its a lot? I have an article from Keukenhof's tulip garden in the Netherlands with 136 images).
At the end of 2015 we visited this site for the third time, I was armored with a DSRL camera, tripod and knowledge of taking HDR pictures.
Rabati fortress complex in Georgia
The above image gained some popularity on Flickr, and after all ended as my Photo of the month - December, 2015
Rabati fortress complex
Rabati fortress complex
Samikitno / Machakhela Restaurant review (Meidan square, Tbilisi)
| Restaurant reviews | 170 seen
Samiktno / Machakhela is a restaurant chain located in Tbilisi, Republic of Georga. One of it's prominent restaurants is located at Meidan Square, just in the heart of Tbilisi Old Town offering breathtaking views towards Metekehi church (in front of which is located Vahtang Gorgasali statue).
This is one of the rare places in Georgia where you can get combos
We are proud, that we were among the first to bring to Georgian market so-called ”combos”. That is, combined portion dishes which are intended for one person and differ from the practice of delivering dishes to traditional Georgian feast, where food is shared by all members of the table. I would like to say, that the above-mentioned combos are very popular not only among local population, but among those numerous guests who come to our country.
I have been heading here for dozens of times, in today's photo article I'll share some pictures I did here in frames of Piece of Life photo shooting: Tbilisi - Winter Fairyland
Menu at this restaurant
Written in three languages - Georgian, English and Russian. This time we opted for some…
Postcards from Venice, Italy
| | 9 seen
We went to Venice on New Year's Eve (2015/2016), for me as a beginner photographer it was a great challenge to photograph here. I prepared well (brought tripod and practiced a lot previously) but I made a huge mistake this night, I messed up with the clock (Flying from country to country is a mess with time, so I have stopped to look in watch when traveling), so we went out for a New Years fireworks one hour earlier. This extra hour resulted in a very cold and unpleasant weather and in aftermath we just got sick.
Venice in fact didn't seemed very tourist friendly place, when we arrived here from Florence, the huge surprise we learnt was with getting actually a parking space in the city on water. After some hour or even more waiting in a queue we finally parked our rental car at one of the multi storey car parks, and went to our hotel deeper in the city. Hotel room was cold and ... yeah, not the best travel experience here, but back to the postcards - I promised I will send a postcard from Venice to my grandmother, in fact I didn't sent, so I will most probably print best ones from our Italy trip…
Postcards from Florence, Italy
| | 6 seen
Florence is a destination to head for if you are looking for renaissance art.
Florence is famous for its history: a centre of medieval European trade and finance and one of the wealthiest cities of the time, it is considered the birthplace of the Renaissance, and has been called "the Athens of the Middle Ages"
In today's Piece of Life photo series - Postcards from Florence, taken at the end of 2015
View towards Florence
If you are new to Florence and might wonder where are the best points to photography the city, get to the Michelangelo Square, from this place all Florence is on your palm. I installed a tripod here and played a bit with camera here - above image is final HDR I rendered using Photomatix.
Panoramic view towards Florence
Some magic with photo stitching and in result - lovely panoramic view of Florence.
Next we headed by our rental car straight into the heart a city, parked our car near a cathedral and went in a few hour wandering tour around Florence
Mime in the streets of Florence
…
Sergos Duqani restaurant in Akhaltsikhe
| Restaurant reviews | 23 seen
Sergos Duqani is a lovely restaurant in Akhaltsikhe, serving traditional Georgian cuisine. Located just in the footsteps of Rabati Fortress complex.
We first discovered and met lovely owners of this place, when stayed in hotel in Rabati (Hotel Rabath & Gino Wellness) and were looking for some local place to have dinner. Frankly speaking sashlik served here is among the best I have ever tried in Georgia (and price for them are ridiculously low - about 6 lari per skewer.)
Segos Duqani restaurant in Akhaltsikhe, Georgia
Menu items at Sergo Duqani restaurant
Inside interior
Turkish coffee
Soup Ostri
Sashlik on grill
Sashlik on plate
How to Prepare Traditional Dolma (Grape Leaves Roll)
| Food blogger | 11 seen
Hello everyone and welcome to another post from my experiments being a food blogger. OK, for following recipe I wasn't actually preparing that tasty dolma, instead I experiment with new food photography technique.
About food photography: Today I decided to experiment with 100mm lens and used long exposures (obliviously from a tripod). Find more tutorials on Digital Photography School
About Dolma (Grape leaves roll) - Dolma is a family of stuffed vegetable dishes common in the Middle East and surrounding regions including the Balkans, the Caucasus, Russia and Central Asia. Common vegetables to stuff include tomato, pepper, onion, zucchini, eggplant, and garlic. The stuffing may or may not include meat. Meat dolmas are generally served warm, often with egg-lemon or garlic yogurt sauce; meatless ones are generally served cold. Stuffed vegetables are also common in Italian cuisine, where they are named ripieni ("stuffed").
Today we are going to prepare traditional dolma with meat stuffing. Most…
DrupalGap Native App - Part 2: Creating And Linking Custom Views Listing Page
| Drupal Development | 6 seen
I was working on my blog's native Drupal app, and decided to share my discoveries on how to create additional custom Views Json listing page and how to link it in your apps menu.
For the content on this page I decided to list all articles from my blog whose location are set to Georgia, and give it name - Georgia Travel Guide. Georgia and Drupal is special for me, so this was just logically the most "urgent" task I wanted to achieve next while building my native Drupal app.
Read more: How to develop Native Drupal app using Drupalgap - Part 1: Custom Front Page Using views - Images and Date
DrupalGap app in Ripple Emulator
Creating Views JsonI have some specific fields for my content types, most probably they will differ from your setup, use with caution
- Create new view - I named it Sakartvelo (Name of Georgia in Georgian language)
- Path: sakartvelo
- Format: Json data document
- Fields: Title, Images, Nid, Post date, Total views
- Filter criteria: Location:Georgia…
How to develop Native Drupal app using Drupalgap - Part 1: Custom Front Page Using views - Images and Date
| Drupal Development | 14 seen
There was a time when I was really eager to develop native Drupal app, back then I decided to stick with Drupalgap. Now, more than a year has already passed since, and I haven't achieved my goal (s) yet.
Until recently, I decided to finish works on native Drupal app I started back in 2014. Speaking of my app - nothing fancy here, just my latest blog posts, with ability latter to extend functionality adding more native app features (geo location, for example) . As I like to call it - minimum viable product approach.
I installed DrupalGap module and all its dependencies on my site, I must admit I had some problems actually getting it alive, but they were more server related rather problems with module itself. In short I experienced problems with server permissions to upload files, so I had to install DrupalGap library manually (instead of a one click installation), and then turned out that DrupalGap is not very friendly with php 5.2. version, so I had to patch it a little bit.
Ok, when I was setup and mobile-application folder was created on my server, I straight went to explore how…
How to take and create HDR Panoramic photos
| Digital Photography School | 13 seen
In today's digital photography school tutorial series I'll show how to create HDR panoramic photos.
Make sure you check my previous tutorials on HDR photography - How To Take and Post-Process Night HDR Images , How to Capture and Post-Process Professional HDR Photos Using HDR Efex PRO
Now, regarding panorama photos, there is not always a need to create a 180 or 360 degree panoramas, sometimes you just want to fit in your frame a little bit more than a regular shot can do, then comes in panorama technique.
HDR panorama photography
Shooting modeA sturdy tripod is must have, also a DSRL camera is preferable. Check out: Top 13 Best digital SLR cameras of 2016 for beginners
Install your camera on a tripod, and shoot it portrait mode. Settings for camera - Manual mode, f11, ISO 100, bracketing 3 frames, timer 2 seconds. Rotate your tripod head after each bracketed shot for about 15-20 degrees.
I will shoot in JPEG mode
Post ProcessingYou will need to have Photomatix, Adobe Photoshop and Adobe Lightroom
Let's start with importing our scene from camera to PC. I…
Hotel Edelweiss Review in Gudauri
| Hotel reviews | 12 seen
Located in Gudauri, a 10-minute walk from the nearest ski lift, Edelweiss Hotel features an on-site restaurant serving Georgian and European cuisine and free Wi-Fi throughout the property.
We booked hotel Edelweiss for 2015 Christmas (December 23-25) and enjoyed our stay at this place a lot. Thus the price we paid for this hotel is well above average (about EUR 100 per night) we are paying for hotels in Georgia, the service offered for price was just excellent.
Alternatively check out Hotel Shamo Review in Gudauri or see TOP 10 Best Gudauri hotels.
Hotel Edelweiss in Gudauri, Georgia
As it might look like a small hotel from a distance, turns our is a 4 story building from inside. One thing I really enjoyed is the facade of this building, I wouldn't mind to built such facade for our rural house. See: Home Remodeling
Bed at Hotel Edelweiss in Gudauri
In total there are 28 hotel rooms at Edelweiss hotel.
Lux room at Hotel Edelweiss in Gudauri
The modern rooms here are equipped with a flat-screen TV with satellite channels, a refrigerator with a minibar, and a private bathroom…
The Gabriadze Theater in Tbilisi
| Tourism objects | 34 seen
Though modest in size, The Gabriadze Theater is among the world’s preeminent cultural institutions. Presenting mature puppet performances full of depth and meaning, it has gained the respect and recognition of international audiences and critics alike.
Located in the heart of Tbilisi Old Town, just right next to the Anchiskati church, this theater building offers some interesting architecture as well. Thus, I have never visited a spectacle here (though I have bough tickets for a few times, but due to my laziness never visited) - I believe the Gabriadze theater this is one of the top tourist attractions in Tbilisi.
Gabriadze theater building in Tbilisi
The Gabriadze Theater stands in the heart of Tbilisi’s historic Old Town. Among the shows in its current repertoire are: “The Autumn of My Spring”, “The Battle of Stalingrad”, “Ramona”, “Diamond of Marshal de Fant’e”.
Box office at Gabriadze theater
About Rezo GabriadzeOften referred to as “a Georgian national treasure”, Rezo Gabriadze influences the culture profoundly. His work continues to make an indelible and lasting…