I’d made my way to the capital of Georgia, Tbilisi. Today I was doing a day trip from Tbilisi to Davit Gareja. I had it on my list of possible things to do and a whole day trip with a local travel agency was £20.
At half past eight in the morning I walked from my guesthouse into the city centre to the travel agency to meet the minibus that would take me to Davit Gareja. For a Friday there wasn’t much traffic about at that time in the morning.
The tour to Davit Gareja was good. Going on a tour means that you’re in a clean, comfortable, air conditioned, Mercedes minivan with no smoking allowed, so you’re travelling in comfort. By Georgian standards, and compared with the local minibus I’d endured to travel from Kutaisi to Tbilisi the day before, it was super luxury!
Davit Gareja is a monastery complex built into the cliffs which was founded in the 6th century by St David, an Assyrian monk.
It was as well I went on a tour because the complex is large; there are lots of different paths that lead you round the back of the cliff where there are more caves that monks inhabited. I’d have never found my way round on my own. I’d have had difficulty managing the trails on my own too. Apparently we took the difficult way up and the easy way down. I wouldn’t say the way down was that easy, but I would concede it was easier than the way up.
We started out by going in to the front of the complex. This had been the main building of the monastery and there were several caves that had been built into the rock face, visible from the monastery, although there was quite a lot of excavation work going on here.
The guide was speaking in Russian and English, but his command of English wasn’t brilliant, so those of us who didn’t speak Russian only got half the story of what we were looking at. But the guide helped me on the trail a lot and took some nice photos for me too. Getting the help I needed on the trail was more important than getting lots of information about the complex. When I said I was from England, he said these trails were difficult for English people; Georgian people were used to them. And I come from a place where we have no hills. We’re below sea level where I live. So it doesn’t prepare me particularly well for mountains!
Thankfully it was too cold for snakes. Apparently there are a lot of poisonous snakes there in the summer. If I’d known that in advance I might not have booked the tour. I’m frightened of snakes and the thought of poisonous ones in the wild that can appear out of nowhere while you’re walking along the hiking trails is particularly alarming. So it was a relief it was too cold for them. It certainly wasn’t too cold for me though. It was early October and I was plenty warm enough in shorts and a sleeveless top. And I feel the cold.
When we went on the other side of the cliff, we could see Azerbaijan. There were a lot of white posts and they marked the border, which is heavily disputed in this area. I could see a building in the distance; that must have been the border post.
The other side of the cliff was also where they had the painted caves that were around 1200 years old. These monastic cells were beautifully decorated with well-preserved frescoes. There were several paths around this side of the cliff, leading to different caves on different levels. It wasn’t really necessary to go along every path and view all of the caves, so the guide took us to a few of them with the best preserved frescoes and then we headed back over to the other side of the cliff.
There were plenty of lookout towers throughout the complex and you could hike up to any you wanted to. There were rough trails winding around both sides of the entire cliff and you could go on any of them, so you could access any of the lookout towers for great views of the surrounding countryside.
This area of Georgia is desert and it actually looked a lot like the Badlands in North America. Lots of different coloured rocks, layered up in the hillsides. I got chatting to an Austrian lady that day and also a lad from Syria helped me on the trail going down. He asked how old I was and said I was doing really well on the trail when a lot of the younger lasses on the tour hadn’t done the walk at all. He held my hand going down some of the trickier spots, although I think I was helping him as much as he was helping me because he was slipping and sliding on the loose rock. I think that was more to do with his shoes than anything. There were steps in places and it wasn’t too bad going down. Having said that, I did have my walking boots on, I wouldn’t have wanted to attempt the trails in any other footwear. We did meet a woman who had blisters and couldn’t get her shoes on, so she was doing the trail in flip flops! Madness!
But all in all, it was quite a good day. After our hike we had a bit of a break and ate lunch. We called at a supermarket on the way to Davit Gareja because there were no café facilities there, so that we could buy a few snacks to keep us going, but one enterprising young man was operating a mobile tea and coffee shop out of the boot of his Beetle! I thought he only had coffee, but he had several varieties of tea as well. It was nice to have a cup of green tea after my walk.
We stopped at a place that did free wine tasting on the way back. This did become quite a regular occurrence during my time in Georgia. They gave you a full glass of every wine you wanted to taste, after the first one I only had small amounts of the other two. It was really cheap £1.50 for a litre. It was drinkable and I did regret not buying any, although it certainly wasn’t stunning wine. But then, what could I expect for £1.50?
I was planning to stay in the city centre for a while after the tour before going back to my guesthouse, but after the long journey back to Tbilisi, our 5 o’clock finish turned out to be nearer to 7 o’clock and I was tired out. The travel agency certainly gave me my money’s worth. So I just grabbed a bagel and headed back to the guesthouse ready for my early start the next day.
I travelled to Georgia during the first half of October 2016.
I went on a day trip to Davit Gareja from Tbilisi with Holidays in Georgia travel agency located at 8 Kote Apkhazi Street, in Tbilisi city centre.
Davit Gareja is approximately a 2 hour drive from Tbilisi. There are no facilities at the monastery complex (apart from the Coffee Beetle!) Bring supplies.
I flew to Georgia on a Wizz Air flight to Kutaisi from Budapest, Hungary. This was a cheaper alternative to flying to the capital, Tbilisi.
I flew to Budapest from Manchester Airport with Jet2.
Read about my time in the city of Tbilisi.
The Hilltops of Tbilisi
Traditional Sulphur Bath Experience
Everyone should take a trip to the Caucasus Mountains if they visit Georgia. Read about my journey there.
Into the Caucasus Mountains
If you ever are in Georgia – take care! Read about my encounter with the Georgian police when I was unlucky enough to be the victim of a pickpocket.
Reporting a Theft – A Cautionary Tale
