Touring Georgia Outside Tbilisi (Part III of III): Uplistsikhe

Uplisstsikhe is not ADA compliant. Maybe that's why it was abandoned by all but the tourist horde.

The third stop on the day's roadtrip was not far from Gori. It was Uplistsikhe, an ancient cave city carved into the stone hills around Gori. I would call it "Stone Mountain," but that's a different Georgia with a different purpose.

And here is the cave city, carved in stone, from an ancient era.

That's the lowland along the river, in the park with the cave city.  This is real, true, city of stone:

It's a long climb up there to the City of Rock. Back in 600 B.C. or so when people first started living here, they did not have elevators. Even the escalator would not be invented for another 2500 years or so and, even if they did, they didn't have the electricity to keep in running.

So climb we must do.

 

And we reach our first cave home.

And we meet our first cave dog:

Yes, even the cave city, carved in stone, with a steep climb up, has the Georgian dogs laying about.

How high about is he (or she) (don't know his or her pronouns)?

Only about half way up.

And we reach our first gaggle of tourists:

Lots of tour buses in the parking lot.  Lots of tourists in the archaeological park.

And dogs:

This is the front door to someone's private residence back in the day:

Shall we have a look inside?

Minimalist design, I see.

The ancient people of Uplistsikhe must have been practicing Georgian Orthodox.  Here's the church to prove it:

At this point, I've climbed high enough to start looking down on the lower rungs of Uplistsikhe.

 

It's not quite time to visit the Georgian Orthodox church high atop the rocks.

Let's look at more cave and stone dwellings.  This one has a touch of the Flintstone house to it:

Outside was this sign, which I found confusing.

The "no martinis" sign at the bottom right corner I understand.  The rocks are at varying angles and can be slick and steep.  So no drinking martinis when climbing on the rock.  The "no dogs" warning was being ignored.  By the dogs.  No smoking.  No hammering the rocks, I understand.  But, looking at the top row, second one in from the right, why is falling off the rocks OK?  I would think that would be something you would want to ban.  And sliding down the stairs on your butt?  Yeah, it's fun, but, again, why would that be encouraged while dogs and martinis are banned?

No dogs or martinis in this house:

Just us tourists.

That Georgian Orthodox church seems to be beckoning.

 

But there are more rock houses to explore:

Not a dog or a martini in sight.

I am actually surprised at the number of tourists who've climbed this close to the summit, walking up rocks, the stairs not being found at this point in the climb.  And I wasn't even close to being on old end of the spectrum among the tourist guests here in the City of Stone.

Let's head to the church:

It's small.  But it is the old "modern: structure up high in a city of caves.

The interior was simple.  Of course, compared to how the cave homes are furnished in this neighborhood, this is Palace of Versailles opulence and extravagance.

That's St. George.  Slaying a dragon.  First time in Georgia I've seen St. George doing what we know him best for doing:  slaying dragons.

One problem with continuing climb ever upward in the cave city, is that just when I think I'm about to reach the summit, I see even more cave houses, up higher.  And I think an accursed thought:  I've climbed this high -- might as well keep climbing.

At this point, I must have reached the upscale part of Uplistsikhe.

A gated community.

Let's have a look inside:

Looks a little fancier, but, still, minimalist.

I'm soon at the point where it the highest tourists are allowed to climb.

I guess this photo spot was taken.

And once you've reached the top, there is nowhere to go but down.  I am overjoyed that first the time all day, the sun had come out.  It's not just that outdoor pictures look so much better lit by natural sunlight, it's just that I would not want to climb (or walk down) steeply angled wet rocks.  The climb was tough enough when the rocks were bone dry.

Once I reached the bottom, I took a wrong turn and saw a sign marked "tunnel."  Against my better judgment, I decided to check out the tunnel:

Stairs!  As if I had not climbed enough at Uplistsikhe.

Touring Georgia Outside Tbilisi (Part I of III): Mtskheta

Svetitskhoveli Cathedral with a street dog posing in the front

Today was the day to see Georgia outside Tbilisi. Tbilisi tourists -- and they are legion -- who want to see the areas outside of the city typically head either east, to the Kakheti wine country, or the west, for a three-stop tour of Mtskheta, Gori, and Uplistsikhe. How many wineries in the world do you have to see before you've seen them all? I know wine tours are great fun if you want to drink wine all day with someone non-drinking doing all the driving. But I pointed my tour guide to the west.

The first stop of this multi-stop (and multi-post) tour was the town of Mtskheta, with two churches to see there. The first is in the lowlands, near the Kura River that eventually flows through the middle of Tbilisi.

This is the lowlands destination: Svetitskhoveli Cathedral. Carpets for sale! There always are carpets for sale at all the tourist hot spots in the Caucasus countries.

The cathedral is well-fortified.

Time to enter through the exterior walls:

And into the cathedral itself:

Let's have a look inside:

Like all great Christian church architecture, the design is meant to lift the eyes upwards. That means, practically speaking, the photos are in "portrait" and not "landscape" setting.

This is the walled-off altar area, with an enormous portrait of Christ:

The wall that separates the tourist zone for the sanctuary is, itself a beautiful sight:

 

Very nice. And it is a UNESCO World Heritage site, as it dates back to the fifth or sixth century A.D. and the early years of the Georgian Orthodox church. But only so many photographs looked decent given the dark lighting and the rule against flash photography.

Time to head to the next stop on the day's journey: 

Ascending the hill in Mtskheta to the second stop: the Jvari Monastery.

Like the Svetitskhoveli Cathedral, this too is a UNESCO World Heritage site.

And like the Svetitskhoveli Cathedral, it too comes with sleeping doggos. 

This is the view down on the town of Mtskheta. Zoom in and you can see the large Svetitskhoveli Cathedral on the right side of the picture.

Going into the Jvari Monastery:

This has a little more natural light than the Svetitskhoveli Cathedral:

So it's not just the candle power lighting these non-flash photos.

This shade of blue is quite common in Orthodox Christian archietecture, for those of us who are not Orthodox.

It signifies heaven. I am guessing the use of this shade of blue in Orthodox Christianity explains its use on the Greek flag, but that could be a coincident. Which I doubt since the Greek flag also features an Orthodox cross.

The monastery, not surprisingly, was much smaller than the cathedral. Much less time to explore.

But impressively old, as was the cathedral.

The interior is nice, but, of course, it is the physical setting on a bluff high above the Kura River looking down on the town of Mtskheta that makes the Jvari worth a visit.

Time to get back to the car for the next stop on the day's journey: the City of Gori.