Trip To Tbilisi Temqa

Hello everyone. I hope you are all doing well. Today, I would like to share with you an interesting experience that I had during my first year in Tbilisi.

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Have you ever made a plan to go somewhere just by looking at a map? If not, then believe me. A similar kind of thing happened in my life and, at the end, it became a deep memory that I won't ever forget. It was a cool journey within the city and we had an amazing time exploring an unknown place. This idea of visiting this place originated in our mind as we were looking at Tbilisi in Google maps. We came across a water reservoir in the map and, as we zoomed in, we could read a name: Tbilisis Sgva, which means Tbilisi sea in English. It is being mentioned as a large artificial lake which is about 8 kilometres length. It also serves as an important water reservoir for the city. We were a bit interested to find something known as an inland sea in the city where we lived. We planned to explore this place and waited for the weekend to arrive.

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It was a warm day in spring when me and some of my friends decided to travel to the Tbilisi sea. We enquired about this place to few of our seniors in the university but none seemed to know about it. At last, one of our senior told us that we had to take a bus from a metro station called Girmagle, but she had forgotten the bus number. We all gathered at the metro station near my home at 10 in the morning and not even one of us would carry a thing with us. We boarded in a metro train and got down at the Girmagle metro station after 30 minutes. We climbed up to the surface of the road where we saw a bus station. There were a plenty of buses arriving at the station but we didn't really know which one we had to board in. We started to ask every bus that stopped by. We even tried to read the boards that were written in Georgian to know if any vehicle was going to Tbilisi sea. We then asked a passenger who was waiting for his bus at the bus stop. He told us that a bus numbered 61 was going to Tbilisi sea. We were really happy as we came to know our bus number.

We waited for almost an hour but no bus appeared. We got fed up standing and we began to enquire the marshruthkas or minivans about Tbilisi Sea. Finally, a marshruthka driver said that his vehicle was going in that route and he asked us to board the vehicle. We were really happy to have found a means to get there. The drive was a bit long and it took almost 45 minutes for us to reach our destination. The mashruthka driver stopped at a place and asked us to get down. He pointed at a long stair case in front of us and asked us to climb up. The mashruthka left and we started to climb. It was a tiring walk uphill, as we climbed more than 100 steps. At last, we finished climbing and found ourselves on a main road. Right in front of us was this amazing water reservoir called the Tbilisi Sea. We succeeded in finding a new place in Tbilisi. It was actually a big lake in which people can swim and have some fun during the summer. We crossed the road and we were now on the bank of Tbilisi Sea.

We walked on a road that took us close to the water surface. Due to the wind, there were small waves found in the lake. As it was spring season, the water level was high and the guard didn't allow us to step into the water. We were just able to admire its beauty from a distance.

However, we revisited this lovely water resource in summer and we had some amazing fun in Tbilisi sea. We were able to play in the water. However, the water was really cold inspite of the hot sun. The Tbilisi people didn't have to travel far to take a sun bath, as they can just travel to Tbilisi Sea for it. As this part of the city is located at an higher altitude, the place is a bit warmer. We sat in a bench on the bank of Tbilisi Sea and we admired the beauty of this lovely natural relief. After some time, we thought of leaving the place as we had nothing more to do.

As we were climbing back to the surface of the road, we could see a beautiful art piece standing on the top of the hill. We immediately thought that it was our time to do some more exploration. We began to climb up the hill vertically to reach our destination. All we could see from the ground was several rock pillars standing on the top of the hill. There were some workers who were working on the road and as we began to climb up the hill, they started to scold us as we were doing some nonsense work. We did not mind them anyways, as we couldn't understand what they were saying.

It was quite easy in the beginning but, as we were about half way uphill, the path began to get steeper. The path became slippery and everytime we kept our foot on the soil it began to fall below. Doing some hard work, we successfully reached the top. From this point the Tbilisi sea was looking really awesome. The bluish water and its surrounding greenery was a scenic beauty.

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We were now at the top of the hill and we had to walk through a narrow path to reach the entrance of this beautiful place, called Tbilisis Temqa. We only came to know the name of this place after several days. The road to Temqa was at some distance from the place we started climbing. We then understood why the workers started to scold us. It was too late anyways. We went into the Temqa, where there were some inscriptions in Georgian that laid on the floor. Behind it were standing tall pillars that were several metres in height. The pillars had different images of Jesus Christ engraved in them. Each one was depicting a different story according to my guess. Moving through the pillars, we were able to reach the back side of the Temqa where there was a church. The church was closed and we have never seen it open during any subsequent visit to Temqa. We took some lovely pictures there.

On one side of the church was a big compound wall below which was a small road that lead to directly the church. But immediately next to the road was the slope of the mountain below which the city of Tbilisi appeared as a miniature. On the other side of the church, standing on a similar compound wall, we could admire the beautiful Tbilisi Sea. We were really happy to see such an amazing place within Tbilisi. As we moved back to the pillars, we were able to notice several stairs climbing up on both sides. We climbed up the stairs and we were on top of this amazing structure. The wind that was blowing almost carried us away. Below the stairs were a series of statues of several metres high which we assumed to be different saints. Each of the statues shows a different symbol in his hand. It was a beautiful place to visit and we didn't really know anything about this amazing place within Tbilisi till then.

We were spending some time together with friends chatting and playing, when we met a Georgian family. They appeared to be a bit unstable: sometimes they were dancing and doing all sorts of crazy things. They wanted to take a picture with us and we didn't hesitate for it. After that, the family continued in their way. We began to climb down the Temqa through the stairs without doing anything crazy. From the stairs the Temqa looked amazing and we really lost ourselves admiring the beauty of this modern artwork.

When we climbed down to the bottom of the hill it was almost evening and we wanted to return back home as we thought it would be hard to find a bus if it gets too late. We were able to see a bus stand at a distance from the bottom of the Temqa. We thought that the bus arriving there could take us to the centre of the city. The bus stand was quite far away from the bottom of the Temqa and there was a bus coming at a distance towards the bus stand. We thought that if we miss the bus then we all had to walk down to the place where the masrhruthka driver dropped us in the morning. So we thought of racing to the bus stand. On the count of three we all began to run towards the bus stand and luckily; two of us reached the bus first. We requested the driver to hold on for a minute till others arrive. The driver was a good man and he waited till all boarded the bus after which the bus departed from there. It took us through the bank of Tbilisi sea to the place where we started the journey.

There are some current plans being made by the government to shift the zoo from Heroes Square to Tbilisi Sea and developing Tbilisi Sea with some restaurants and resorts. There are also plans for developing safari inside the zoo once it is constructed. These plans are named under a single project which is called the construction of Tbilisi Recreational Zone. The project also includes a water sport center. Just like any other citizen, I'm looking forward for development in this awesome place.

We got down from the bus and entered the metro station. We took a metro back to our home and when we reached home we explained our amazing journey to our friends who had not come with us. We were all really hungry as we didn't take anything to eat with us as it was our first travel to Tbilisi Sea. We ate till our stomach gets filled and we jumped into our beds were we collapsed in not more than a minute.

After a nap we got up and we had a look at all the amazing pictures that were taken during our journey. Although the place lacks touristic infrastructure it is a good place to visit and spend some time with your friends in Tbilisi. We re-visited Tbilisi Sea and Tbilisi Temqa a number of times. Each time I visit Tbilisi Sea and the Temqa it gives me some new good memories to remember. This is a really awesome place located in the outskirts of Tbilisi and you don't need any money apart from the transportation fare to reach this lovely place of worship. The place became popular in our university, mostly among the international students and we were feeling proud being the first people to explore such a beautiful place.

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It is advisable to travel to this beautiful place during the summer months if you want to have ultimate fun rather than the winter. This experience for us was really a thrilling one as we started our journey just with a single name and finally completed the whole story by exploring and finding out two new extraordinary places to visit in Tbilisi.

Thank you for reading my experience patiently. If you have any comments or questions please feel free to post them below.

For now, till I publish my next article here! Keep smiling and cheers!