Gyumri is the 2nd largest city in Armenia. The enormous plaza and town hall, in fact most of the city, had to be rebuilt after a devastating earthquake levelled much of the city in 1988, kill up to 50,000 people.

The founding date of the original city, Kumayri dates back to an incredible 8th century BCE. As empires rose and conquered the region, its name changed with each successive invader, and finally renamed Gyumri after the fall of the Soviets.

From the city plaza, up market shops and restaurants line pedestrian streets, as the local populace stroll by. You could be mistaken you’d stumbled into a Western modern city, if there were the reminders you were still in Armenia with the ever constant broken pavements, potholes, and oddly unkempt parks.

To be honest there’s not a lot to do here, unless you like shopping. In a way it feels like this is Armenians Melbourne. The days consisted of wandering the pedestrian strips, stopping for coffee, and deciding where to eat (shout out to the amazing Herbs and Honey Tea Shop).

The famous brandy in Armenia is called ArArAt, and there was a store just for them across the road from my hotel. I tried to get a tour of their distillery in Yerevan, but it was always booked out, so here I figured I’d buy a bottle. To be honest, it’s not great, and this was a 7 year aged bottle too. I used it as a nightcap each night, and was mildly disappointed with each sip.

I was staying in an old hotel just off the plaza, a hotel that clearly once had a stateliness to it. I’m pretty sure I’m the only person staying here. I haven’t seen another guest, and I heard a woman wailing on the first night. Maybe it’s haunted. I did see a lot of shadows moving from under the door at night… shadows of guests I haven’t seen.

One very out of place sound kept roaring over head throughout the day. Fighter jets flew would scream through the sky over the city. No one paid any attention, I was the only one looking over head as the plane flew out of sight, wondering what was going on.

The jet is most likely Russian. Not far from Gyumri a Russian military base that’s still very active, originally created by the Soviets to fend off an invasion by Turkey. Hearing and seeing the jets felt so ominous, more so than any place I’d ever visited.

Next stop was to Tbilisi, capital of Georgia, I booked a bus ticket from Vanadzor, a city an hour away that was on the Yerevan to Tbilisi route. All the bus timetables I could find had the bus stop at Vanadzor, 12pm in front of the Holy Mother if God church. But I had a terrible feeling about this.

Arriving out front the church, it was pretty obvious this was a standard pickup point when leaving town, watching several mini vans arrive and drop off people. But still, I continued to have a bad feeling about this.

12pm, no sign of the bus, and rain starts begin lightly.

12:20pm no bus, rains getting heavier, umbrella is unsheathed. There’s a WhatsApp number on the email, I send them a message if the bus is late, maybe due to the rain.

12:30pm, no bus, no reply. Time for a new plan. Go back to Gyumri for the night and ask the concierge to help? I’d lose a night in Tbilisi that I’ve already paid for. Or, see if I can get a Yandex to the border and sort my own way to Tbilisi.

12:45pm, I am alone and it’s raining. Fuck it, decision time. I book a 1.5 hour ride to Bagratashen, the border town on the Armenian side. The plan is to cross over to Georgia by foot and expected a throng of eager taxis on the other side.

At the border there’s no taxis. There is however a private taxi organiser, he’d groomed himself to look like Jabba the Hutt. He offers an absurd charge, three times the price of what it should be. I try to haggle this arsehole down, we get down to twice as much it should cost. I try to go lower, he’s not having any of it, this gross mockery of a human knows I don’t have a choice.

I took the overpriced taxi. After clearing a very lax and unconcerned customs (I pointed to the scanner to scan my bags, but the officer just shrugged and pointed to the exit), the quickly the landscape began to change and I was in Georgia, on the way to Tbilisi…