Things to do in Kutaisi — and what is actually worth your time

Kutaisi is often treated as an airport with a city attached. That is unfair, but it does explain why most visitors give it one night and leave. Here is what actually deserves the time. In the city. Bagrati Cathedral sits on the hill above the centre and is worth the climb as much for the view over the Rioni as for the building. The Colchis Fountain in the main square, with its gilded copies of Bronze Age figures, is the photograph everyone takes. The green market is the most honest hour you can spend here — churchkhela, cheese, spices, and stallholders who will make you try things. The old town along the river takes an easy afternoon on foot. Just outside. Gelati Monastery is the one unmissable sight in the region: a UNESCO site with twelfth-century mosaics that survive better than they have any right to. Motsameta, a few minutes further, is smaller, dramatically sited above a river gorge, and usually quieter. Both are a short drive from the centre. Half a day each. Prometheus Cave and Sataplia — caves with dinosaur footprints at the latter — are the standard family trip. Martvili Canyon, with its boat ride through the gorge, and Okatse Canyon, with its cliff walkway, are the two that fill photo feeds. Tskaltubo's abandoned Soviet sanatoriums are the strangest thing near Kutaisi and the most memorable, if empty grandeur is your kind of thing. A full day. Svaneti begins four hours away and is a trip in itself rather than an excursion. Almost none of the above is on a convenient bus route, which is why most people driving Georgia use Kutaisi as a base rather than a stop.