Top 10 Caves 그루지야

Today, monks repeatedly asked us to leave the area. We only took photos from a distance. Based on their gestures, I suspect my wife wasn't welcome there, or perhaps visitors weren't allowed at all. They gestured that we should go to the main monastery, Lavra Monastery of Davit Gareja, but no!

We asked at the restaurant and were allowed to pitch our tent in the garden. The trout for dinner was delicious.

Not far from Gori lies the ancient cave city of Uplistsikhe. People settled on the plateau as early as the Bronze Age. The fortress city was founded in the 6th century BC and developed into a trading center on the Silk Road with approximately 5,000 inhabitants. The oldest surviving written reference dates back to the 1st century. Attempts to conquer Uplistsikhe repeatedly failed; it wasn't until the 13th century that the Mongol ruler Ögedei Khan succeeded in capturing and destroying the city (Wikipedia).

Entrance fee: €5 per person. Open from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. Campsite available at the nearby campsite or at the top of the hill before the park entrance.

I've found the sign but no sinkhole or cave. Maybe someone else can give a hint

One of the 13 Syrian Fathers (nice to have 13 here! 😅) who brought Christianity to Georgia was David. It is clear that this was not an easy or peaceful process; one of them put out the eternal fire in a Zoroastrian temple and was stoned by the governor for it. After being accused in Tbilisi, where he preached, David went to the Gareja wasteland (here) and founded this monastery (Lavra Monastery, 6th century). The idea seemed to become fashionable, and his students founded a total of twelve cave monasteries nearby. And the conditions were not easy! The water problem was solved by using extremely long gutters across the entire sandstone rock slanted towards the southwest (like gutters on a roof! Except that the "rock roof" is 50x100m - so even when it rarely rains, a lot of water accumulates!) into the cisterns. Gardens were laid out in the shade of the rocks, etc. In the 9th century, the caves were expanded and decorated with frescoes.

This is also a monastery founded by a student of Davit Garejali. A watchtower (with azure blue stones - Persian??) stands guard on the mountain ridge, visible from afar. Below it, caves have been dug into the edge of the sandstone rock. The church, with its rather damaged paintings from the 18th century (the communists had detonated a bomb inside to destroy everything, the monk said), has an enormously high interior. I didn't see any icons from the 12th century. You can only get to the monastery with a four-wheel drive jeep. Or walk from the road...

The Dodo Rka Monastery also belongs to the group of Davit Gareja monasteries. There were supposedly twelve at one time, but now there are only three. The Dodo Rka Monastery was founded (like the Lavra Monastery) in the 6th century(!) by a student of Davit Garejali. I was not allowed to take photos inside or outside (except for the two pictures), but it is still worth a visit. The smaller of the two churches dates from the 6th century (there is a [new] gravestone for Davit Garejali's grave next to it), the larger has impressive internal dimensions of 8x6m(?) floor space. Both were buried by sand and were only uncovered in recent years. Old icons cannot be seen. (But you also have to remember that the Mongols and the Persians destroyed everything in the meantime.)