Day 3 : Tbilisi and midnight train FROM Georgia (to Armenia)

Well, maybe not midnight (it left bang on time at 20:20) but the Armenian border formalities, done with minimal fuss in our cabin, were there or thereabouts.

On Thursday, we pootled around town, seeing the more touristy areas than so far, with a fantastical clock-tower and statuary

 

And visited the Treasury at the National Museum 

(sadly the Soviet Occupation exhibition wasn't detailed in English too well, though pictures can tell a story well enough).

At the station, we met an American who's teaching English on a govt-funded project in a little village seven hours east of Tbilisi. Duncan asked him his home state. "Georgia" he said, adding (as if to dare us to think up a pun) "Some people over here get a kick out of hearing that."  (A few comparisons then (answers at the bottom) : which Georgia is bigger, has the higher population, has the larger GDP (OK, that one's a bit easy)).

And so onto the train to "EPEBAH" (Yerevan in Cyrillic, we'd luckily noted as it wasn't marked anywhere else!) and our "luxury" compartment.

No drama at the border, though there is always that little panicky voice in your head as your passport disappears with an unknown uniformed gent!

Answers : Georgia State : 59,435 sq miles, Georgia : 26,911 sq miles;
Georgia State : 9,992,167, Georgia : 4,484,000;
Georgia State : $35,979, Georgia : $6,000.