Places to visit in Georgia _ Telavi

The introduction

In this article I want to tell you about one of the oldest cities in Georgia called Telaviand its main tourist attraction, which is the Palace of the King Erekle II.

About Telavi

Telavi is a very old city, which is known in the written sources of the 2nd century,however, there have been houses and people living there from the Bronze ages. It’s located in the East Georgia in Kakheti region and it’s the capital of Telavi municipality. It’s the main city in Kakheti region, to be told.

How to get there

Getting to Telavi from the capital of Georgia _ Tbilisi takes some time. It’s 2 hours drive from Tbilisi, so that it’s a little bit far, however, the road is not bad and you won’t have any problems driving there.

You can also get to Telavi by microbuses, which go toward Telavi from Samgori bus stop, which is located around Samgori metro station and it costs about 6 Laris to get to Telavi. There are also taxis going from nearby Isani metro station and they take 4 persons for 40 Laris in all. And now that there has been a new road towards Telavi opened on Gombori pass, you can see beautiful landscapes while going to Telavi and there's especially great views in autumn, when the colourful leaves are falling all over the places.

What you can see there?

There are some beautiful and must-see places in Telavi and it has become even more popular to visit it since some things have been renovated some years ago. It’s usually a place of destination on school excursions and I have been to Telavi many times from our school and I have visited it on my own, too.

The first and the main thing to see in Telavi is the King Erekle II Palace with his statue in front of the Palace. This place is especially beautiful if you visit it in the winter during snow, because then everything is covered in white and it’s just wonderful being there. The fortress has this amazing look, which makes it seem very strong.

There’s an “Old Tree” just nearby the Erekle II Palace, which is nine hundred years old and it’s very wide. People would usually go there and stand around the tree to see how many people could stand around it and that was like a measuring method. It’s a plane tree and just because it’s very large and old, they call it the “Old Tree” or the “Large Tree”. This plane tree is like a symbol of Telavi. It’s 40 metres high and 12 metres around. However, it’s slowly dying and the people are doing everything they can to keep it alive, but it’s the nature and, I guess, it will die soon.

There’s also Tsinandali, which is a village located in the entrance of the city and there’s a very beautiful garden there with the Alexandre Chavchavadze House Museum.

One of the greatest churches and the second highest one is Alaverdi located in Telavi and you should definitely visit it. And on the road to Alaverdi you will see the Alazani river, which is pretty pure and fast, too, and if it’s summer time when you visit Telavi, you can also get down to the river embankment and swim in there like the locals do.

While in Telavi you should also visit the Telavi cultural center building in the center of the city, where they usually have concerts and theatre and there’s usually some performances heldthere and then you can just walk through the streets of the city with the paved sidewalks, which makes you feel like in the medieval ages and sit in the park on a bench  beside the cultural center and watch the city.

The King Erekle II Palace

It’s surprising how this palace is not all destroyed by all the enemy invasions and battles, which have been held there. You will see a very well kept fortress around the Palace, which they call it also “Batonis Tsikhe”, which means “The Master’s Fortress” in English. “Batoni” is a kind of a master in Georgian and it’s known, that the Georgian people called the King Erekle II “Batoni” and that’s why the fortress is called “Batonis Tsikhe”. It was the Kings’ residence palace in the 17th and 18th centuries. You will see the 5 metre walls of the fortress around the palace and there are also the bath and a tunnel and two churches inside the fortress.

The palace itself is not that grand or something as you might expect. It’s a modest place of living with the usual living things of the King Erekle II exhibited inside, because those centuries in Georgia were not rich ages and people didn’t have much back in those times. The palace is a one-storey building in Persian style, and almost everything built in those centuries in Georgia is in Persian style because of the Persian neighbourhood in those times.

Well, it’s not just the palace that you might see in the fortress. There’s a building just beside it with art gallery and there you can see many paintings of Georgian artists such as Elene Akhvlediani as well as other foreign painters’ paintings.

In all, you might expect to pay somewhere about 5 Laris or something for the entrance to the fortress and buildings inside. The Palace was closed for some time last year due to the renovations inside, however, now it’s open and everyone can visit it.

The King Erekle II statue

There’s the King Erekle II statue situated just in front of the Batonis Tsikhe, which children usually love. There’s a round thing beside it, where you can climb up and look down at the Erekle II street. It’s built with stones and it’s pretty high.

Tsinandali and Alexandre Chavchavadze House Museum

Tsinandali is a village, which people visiting Telavi usually visit until they get into the city of Telavi. There’s a beautiful palace of poet Alexandre Chavchavadze. It’s a 19th century castle, which is decided in somewhat in Russian empire style, however, the  first palace was decided in European style, which was then set on fire and people renovated it trying to  give it its first look. around the palace you will see a wonderful garden built for the guests of thepalace and it’s just amazing walking there and relax. There are fountains and decorative bushes and some large trees, one of them with a large hole into it and it’s said, that when they played hide and seek girls liked to hide in that hole. There’s a small maze inside the garden too.

The main thing in Tsinandali Alexandre Chavchavadze House Museum is its old winery cellar. It was built in the 19th century by Alexandre Chavchavadze and they used to prepare wine in there. Since then, the cellar has become a place of wine collection and nowadays there are approximately 17 000 wine bottles in that wine collection. One of the popular and well-known wine produced in Kakheti region is called “Tsinandali”.

The entrance to the park only costs 2 Laris, while the entrance to the park and the museum is 5 Laris. If you wish to also sample the Tsinandali wine, you should add 2 laris to the usual ticket, however, if you want to visit the museum and the park and sample 5 different wines and Chacha, too, you should pay 25 Laris for that. You should also know, that the working hours are from 10 in the morning till 7 in the evening.

There’s also a guesthouse hotel if you wish to stay inTsinandali and it’s located right into the gardens, so that you will feel like being in the middle ages resting in a room with all the conditions answering your requests.

Alaverdi Monastery Complex

Alaverdi was the highest of the churches in Georgia until the Sameba Cathedral was built in 2004 in Tbilisi. The monastery itself was placed there in the 6th century, when the Assurian Fathers came into Georgia.

Nowadays, there’s a pretty large charge situated in the middle of the monastery. It’s the 11-th century church, where the services are held. The church has a St. George’s name.

The Alaverdi Monastery is a little bit far from the city of Telavi, which is about 20 minutes drive. It is a beautiful place, because it’s not just a church there, but it also has a fortress around it and there’s a pavement around the fortress with some vines inside. There’s a wine cellar in the monastery, too. The Monastery has just recently been renovated and you can see the old frescos on the walls inside the church.

Alaverdi Monastery is a beautiful complex with amazing views of the snowy Caucasus Mountains.

Nadikvari park

I don’t think, that there’s anyone who doesn’t know about Nadikvari park in Telavi. It’s the main park there, which is pretty large and people love going there and hanging out. There you might find many different things to entertain, for example, there are some carrousels and fast food things and the ice cream machines, gaming machines, etc.

The stories about Telavi and Gurjaani

It’s a well-known fact that residents of Telavi and Gurjaani hate each other. Gurjaani is another city in Kakheti region and while Telavi is the historical center of Kakheti region, Gurjaani is the geographical center and Gurjaani always wondered, why it was not considered as a center of Kakheti region.

There are many stories about Telavi and Gurjaani and many jokes about them and some of them are even true. It’s said, that when Gurjaanian has to go through Telavi, he takes a deep breath and holds until he goes into the city of Telavi and when he passes it then he breathes again, so that he won’t breathe the Telavian air.

There’s another joke, that when people are hunting a Gurjaanian bird, it flews all the way to Telavi and just on the boarder it turns around and says “kill me now, I’m not going to cross the boarder to Telavi”.

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