Hey there, Travellers,

It's time to invoke the "c word" again — chaos. Anyone planning to travel over the next couple of weeks should be prepared for potential travel chaos, as storms, strikes, and government shutdowns could well change your plans.

In Europe, flights to, from, over, and around France will feel the impact of air traffic control strikes from October 7th - 10th. Meanwhile, in the USA, an ongoing government shutdown could result in delays at TSA checkpoints and even lead to cancellations.

And here in the UK and Ireland? Let's just say I'm currently listening to the wind and rain batter my windows thanks to the first named storm of the season. Dublin Airport has been cancelling flights all day, while airports in the UK are poised to follow suit.

On the plus side, if we can't go anywhere right now, it's the perfect excuse to make plans for the future. Let us know where you're off to next in the comments!

Happy travels and safe landings,

This one’s long overdue. Honestly, it’s only taken me so long because it’s nearly impossible to know where to start. Like any good romcom, there have been a few (mostly entertaining) bumps in the road during my relationship with Georgia. So, I’ll just start at the usual place: the beginning.

This love story begins like most life-changing romances: with a good meal.

Back in 2018, I visited Stockholm for the first time. I have a friend there (hi, Noora!) who insisted that we must go out to her local Georgian restaurant for dinner. “Sure,” I said. “Never had Georgian food before.” Little did I know that it’d begin a years-long obsession that I’m yet to find a cure for.

I have no memory of what I ate that night beyond khachapuri. But that’s all it took. Turns out a simple cheese bread can unlock doors, change worldviews, and shape the way you live forever. Okay, I’m maybe going a little over the top here, but what can I say? I’m in love!

From that point on, I took every chance I could for an hour or two in the company of a cheese-filled dopamine boost and the heady delights of an orange wine. The butterflies in my stomach (or was it hunger?), the wonder of discovering something new and different every time… Like the early days of any romance, I was always left wanting more.

From then on, I’d carve out time to savour even the smallest taste of Georgia whenever I could — and sometimes, I even felt like it was seeking me out, too. From Scotland to Estonia, Lithuania to Türkiye, we began seeing the world together. Georgia loves to travel too, it seems. 

A year after first tasting that stringy liquid gold encased in its soft, bready vessel, I finally decided it was time to take our relationship to the next level. I needed to experience the real deal, so when Jack’s sent me a £38 return trip from London to Kutaisi (I was a just member back then!), I couldn’t say no. 

But unfortunately, that trip wasn’t to be. As talk of Coronavirus spread around the world, the idea of travelling solo to a completely new country where I’d have zero language skills wasn’t appealing. Instead, I still made the trek to London, where I would have caught that flight, and consoled myself with some khachapuri there before hunkering down at home for a year and a half.

Fast forward a couple of years, and it was time to try again. In 2022, I discovered that I was not the only one among my group of friends who had been harbouring a fascination with the Caucasian country. And after a couple of years mostly stuck at home, we were ready for adventure.

By that time, I had begun working at Jack’s, so I knew all the hacks for finding cheap flights. Since that convenient London-to-Kutaisi route hadn’t made it out the other side of the pandemic, I had to get creative. With nothing but small backpack bags stuffed to the brim, we budget airline-hopped from Edinburgh to Katowice, and then over to Kutaisi. Anything to reach my beloved Georgia!

After a late landing and a long immigration queue, we finally emerged from the airport and dashed to catch our 3.5-hour coach to Tbilisi. It’s important to note at this point that, due to the slight delay in arriving, we hadn’t managed to pick up a Georgian SIM in the airport, and none of our phones supported an eSIM.

After about 50 minutes on the bus, we ground to a halt just before entering the highway. And good job, too, because ahead of us there had been a landslide. Every car on the motorway was stuck with no escape.

Thankfully, we were able to get off the road and into a local town to wait until the road was cleared. Cue hours of expensive communications with our Airbnb host using roaming data, shockingly rustic railway station loos, knocking on the window of a 24-hour pharmacy for water (and chocolate), and playing in the snow.

After a restless night aboard the coach with 40-odd others, it became clear that the driver had no idea when we’d be able to move again. Thankfully, the one passenger who spoke both Georgian and English knew of a 6am commuter train, headed to Khashuri, which would perfectly circumnavigate the closure. So off we went.

Tickets acquired, we made our way towards the beaten-up, single-carriage Soviet relic on the platform. It was still dark, there was no indication that this train would take us where we wanted to go, and we couldn’t speak the language. As I grabbed the handles by the door to pull myself up into the unlit train, my husband jokingly (but somewhat prophetically) went full horror movie and whispered the words, “Welcome to the abattoir.”

That’s when the stench of raw meat hit me like a ton of bricks.

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Plus, one Traveller in our Facebook community needs your help!

So, dear readers, have any of you been to Panama? Share your top tips for making the most of 10 days in the country, so we can make sure Yvonne has an amazing trip!

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All the important (or silly, or strange) travel news from across web this week.

• Follow in Jane Goodall's steps with a visit to Tanzania's Gombe National Park
  
  
• Passengers have been left stranded after Icelandic budget airline PLAY went into administration this week, only 6 years after the country's last low-cost carrier, Wow Air, faced the same fate.
  
  
• Let the world's most iconic train routes inspire your future travels.
  
  
• Here's how Jet2 and that song became this year's inescapable summer meme.
  
  
• And finally, plane diversions can happen for many reasons, but passengers eating their passports has to be one of the weirdest we've ever heard.