Kutaisi
Caves, canyons and turquoise water — the best value day trip in the country.
What you would see
Prometheus Cave
A kilometre and a half of lit limestone chambers with stalactites, a river running through and a boat ride at the end. The temperature inside is about fourteen degrees year-round, which in August is the best reason of all to go.
Martvili Canyon boat ride
An inflatable boat carries you seven hundred metres up a limestone gorge under vines and waterfalls, where the water goes an unreal green. It lasts about twenty minutes and it is the single best photograph most visitors bring home.
Okatse Canyon walkway
A steel walkway bolted to the cliff face, seven hundred and eighty metres long and a hundred and forty metres above the canyon floor, with a viewing platform that juts out into the air at the end. Not for anyone uneasy with heights.
Bagrati Cathedral
An eleventh-century cathedral on the hill above Kutaisi, blown up by an Ottoman army in 1692 and rebuilt in this century — a restoration argued about ever since, which cost it its UNESCO listing. Lit at night it is the best thing in the city.