Tbilisi - in Avlabari part 1

Avlabari is the old Armenian quarter of Tbilisi. its name means "out of the walls" because it is located north of the Mtkvari river outside the old town. During the last decades the Armenian population decreased and the houses got bit by bit abandoned. During the last years larger housing areas were demolished to build the presidential palace and the the Sameba cathedral. Many houses in Avlabari are still in a bad shape. For example just walk from the Avlabari metro station to the Sameba Cathedral without using the Meskhishvili Street. The contrast between the cathedral and the surrounding streets is hard.

The song for the post is Hundreds - Our Past.

We start the exploration at the beautiful peace bridge. It seems that crossing it is a must have for freshly married couples. Every day there were many wedding parties shooting photos.

The bridge.

Looking from the bridge to the Metekhi church.

The walls below Avlabari.
 

The unfinished Music Theater and Exhibition Center,
the presidential palace and the Samebi cathedral.

A closeup.

"Under the bridge" ;-).

The wonderful Rike park.

Taking these stairs allow some nice views like this one.

Left is the Metekhi church, in the middle is the Narikala
fortress and the aerial tramway over the old town.

View to the skyscrapers around the Rustaveli avenue.
 

Look into the exhibition center.

Opposed to the entrance of the exhibition center is this spring.

 

The whole wall along the Baratishvili Rise is like a wide
spring with bryophytes - like a small nice oasis in the
concrete jungle.

In the middle of the wall are small stairs up to Avlabari.
The following image is very typical for Tbilisi: No matter how bad the streets and houses are, big and expensive cars are all around. Having a good car is obviously important for the people to show the status.

The car in the middle is an Infiniti. I have never seen Infiniti cars in
Germany but in Georgian they have a large market share.'

Typical street. One can see that the houses where a
bit larger than the houses in the Chughureti
neighborhood (see the previous post).

A big contrast: the presidential palace and the old houses.

The palace to the left and the Sameba cathedral.

Only about 100 m away from the palace you find houses like this one.

It is a bit shocking that people need to live in such houses. The Caucasus is plagued with earthquakes. To face the bitter reality - it is very probable that the people living here will be badly injured or even killed by the next earthquake.

The main attraction in Avlabari is the Sameba cathedral. This new church was build according to the architecture of old Georgian churches. It is together with the Svetitskhoveli cathedral in Mskheta the main church of the Georgian Orthodox Church. I don't have pictures from inside the cathedral because there was a church service and I respect that it is then not allowed to take pictures.

Inside the Sameba: the western wall with the entrance.

The clock tower.

The cathedral.

View from the cathedral.

The main door of the cathedral. It was closed.
A side door is used as normal entry.

The south side of the cathedral.

Some other chapels in the south east of the complex.

From the cathedral I went to the Sheraton hotel (which is currently the home of the German embassy) and then to the cliff over the Mtkvari.

In the K. Eristani street right below the cathedral.

 

View from the cliff to the old town.

A closeup of the cliff and the old part of Avlabari.

Another closeup - the Narikala fortress.

 

Below the point where I shot the photos is an abandoned
industrial hall with lots of these chimney-like structures
that have nice mosaics. If somebody know what this is please tell me.

Walking in Tbilisi - From the central train station via Chugureti to Avlabari

Tbilisi is a city with many contrasts. There are nice parks, clean streets and renovated houses but also kilometer long streets with ruins. For me it is important to see all sides of a place and of a country and therefore go there where tourists normally don't go.

You will now see some "ill streets" so Moonrock - Ill Street is the perfect soundtrack for this post.

I took the metro to the central train station to find out if there are some suitable connections. The building itself is a shopping mall with lots of large electronics stores. Even the entrance to the platforms hidden by doors without windows. So trains are no longer important in the station. The platforms and stairs are in a horrible state. The reason is that the railway tracks will soon be removed from the city. In future the trains will pass Tbilisi using this new track at the north.

There are many unused coaches and locomotives.

The train station.

This is the stair to the platform of track 2/3.

 

This is the local train to the airport.
It runs twice a day, at 8:00 and 17:20 which is is not very sensible
since most international flights start and arrive deep in the night.

I had a few hours until a meeting in the old town and used it therefore to walk there. This way I crossed the Chugureti district. This consists mostly of houses with only 2 floors. Especially in the northern part many of them are in a bad shape:

A typical street.

This is not an exception. Many houses here look like this.

Note the "pedestrian-friendly" construction of the downspouts.

One could now argue that it would be nice if they would be renovated. But one has to face the reality: more than one third (some say even a half) of the Georgians live in Tbilisi and therefore there is pressure to build apartment buildings. The existing houses are in this sense a waste of land. They are also not that beautiful that they are worth it to keep them. Personally, I would agree if they would be replaced by new apartment buildings.

In the southern part of  Chugureti the houses are a bit nicer with more decorations:

 In the Kiev street.

At the crossing Tsinamdzgvrishvili / Mazniashvili street

The few renovated houses look nice.
I noticed that especially the renovated houses are unused -
maybe they are simply too expensive to rent.

Down at the Mtkvari river the inner city looks like this:

The public service hall.

The Narikala fortress.

Just crossing the street and entering the inner city would have been too easy ;-). I therefore walked up to the presidential palace.

A nice small park close to the Baratshvili statue.

The statue and the view to the Mtatsminda hill.

In the Elene Akhvlediani Rise. The blue color was real -
the light close before the dawn was amazing

In the same street.

The presidential palace is the beginning of the Avlabari neighborhood. The houses around the palace are in a very bad shape. Even houses directly at the palace are more or less ruins.

In the Niko Lomauri street behind the presidential palace

The presidential palace from behind.

Sightseeing in Tbilisi - The Mtatsminda park, the Narikala fortress and Abanotubani

Form almost everywhere in Tbilisi you can see the large ferris wheel and the TV tower above the old town. Since my hotel is located directly at the hill, I could of course not resist to walk up there.

It was my third day in Tbilisi and I needed time to relax. Therefore Bilderbuch - OM fits perfectly to the excursion.

The weather was nice: sun with a few clouds and no wind. Here starts a track up the hill. It is a nice walk up with some banks to rest and to enjoy the view over the city.

The start below the Makashvili street.

The Georgian National Academy of Sciences
and the Radisson hotel tower.

View to the north east with the Holy Trinity Cathedral.
The nice and extraordinary building in the center of
the image is the public service hall building.

The stadium is the Boris Paichadze Dinamo Arena.
In front slightly to the left is the concert hall.
 

From left to right: the Public Service Hall, the Cathedral
and the unfinished Music theater and exhibition center.

The nature awoke and also this little friend became active.

Surprisingly the track does not lead to an entrance of the park but to the fence around the TV tower. I had to follow the fence a few meters to the west until some people in the amusement park showed me a spot where I could crawl in under the fence. (Following the fence a bit longer would lead you to a place below the ferris wheel where the fence ends. So there is no need to crawl.)

The area around the TV tower is the Mtatsminda amusement park. The TV tower itself is not accessible. If you don't like walking, you can take a funicular to go to the park. It costs only 2 Lari plus 2 Lari for the plastic card that is used in the park. You can charge the card with money and then use the different fairground facilities such as the roller coaster, bumper cars, a water slide or the ferris wheel. In March many of the facilities are closed but the ferris wheel is open the whole year and even in the night. One ride costs 2 Lari and takes about 10 minutes. It was a pleasure since one does not only have great views over the city but also towards the mountains.

In side the Mtatsminda park.
 

View from the ferris wheel towards Mtskheta.
At the left is the Saburtalo housing area.

Saburtalo in its "full beauty" (at the back). In front is the Vake park
living area. According to many Tbilisians
Vake and Saburtalo are the preferred areas for living in Tbilisi.
Vake is much more expensive than Saburtalo.

An avenue in the park.


 

One of the fairground facilities.
 

The restaurant building at the entrance of the park.
It contains also the upper station of the funicular.

View from the restaurant to the Sololaki quarter
(in front) and the old town of Tbilisi.

Once again the cathedral. In front at the right
is the former presidential palace.

To go back one can take the funicular, a taxi or one of 2 tracks. One track goes straight down passing the Mtatsminda Pantheon. Close to the pantheon is the opened middle station. The other track is about 3 km long and surrounds the Soloaki quarter. I took the long track. It is paved and goes slightly down with countless small stairs. The view over the valley is nice and thanks to the warm sun I stayed there longer.

The valley and the house of Bidzina Ivanishvili.

Closeup of the house.

This is the track. It goes down like this
for kilometers - perfect for jogging.

Once again a view to the cathedral, the presidential
palace and the exhibition center.

Two bridges of the track are a bit dangerous but no problem for crossing.

A look back up the hill.

At the bombastic house of the "real leader" of Georgia, Bidzina Ivanishvili, one can decide to go down to the old town or to stay at the hill and going to the ruins of the Narikala fortress. I chose the latter. The track tunnels the house of Ivanishvili and ends at the Kartvlis Deda monument.

The remains of the Narikala fortress.
From the platform one can enjoy the view...

The Kartvlis Deda from the side.

...over the valley with the botanical garden.

View at the liberty square and along the Rustaveli avenue.

The old town, the beautiful Bridge of Peace and
the exhibition center besides the Rike park.

Slightly different view with the public service hall.
The church at the left is the Armenian Norashen church
which is unfortunately close to collapse.

View to the Avlabari quarter that was
once populated by Armenians. The church
in front is the Georgian Metekhi church.

I like that outside the EU one is allowed to do much more.
These walls were rebuilt as they once were - without handrails
besides the stair. If you think you can go there you can go. I mean
your are responsible for your health and not the government.
Note btw. that the third bell is missing.

The Abanotubani quarter below Narikala is the oldest part of the town. There one can see buildings from the Persian times. There are for example sulfur baths, a madrasa and a mosque.

The sulfur baths with their cupolas.

One of the new buildings behind the fortress.

The canyon behind the old town.

Inside the old town.

The Jumah mosque.

The entrance of the madrasa.

The Orbeliani bath is currently under renovation.

In the bath area. The river area was filled with debris for decades.
A few years ago the debris was removed and the old walls
of the baths were restored. They did a great job!

The Samarkhakhevi river in Abanotubani.

Looking up to the Narikala.

This was an impressive excursion! It can be done without stress on a weekend day. For example start at 10 a.m., walk up an hour and lunch in the park. Then go slowly down and drink a coffee around Narikala. Instead of going down to Abanotubani you can alternatively take the aerial tramway from Narikala to the Rike park.