Over 15 centuries ago a small group of Georgian monks he distanced himself from the rest of society to seek a place of peace and silence, far from the temptations of world life. After days of walking in the desert they found an isolated mountain, where they settled and created the first nucleus of a monastic community that has survived to this day.
On that mountain today there are over 5000 cells dug into the rock overlooking a desert valley overlooking theAzerbaijan. There are chapels, refectories, churches and all the rooms necessary for the life of the monastery, some of which still retain the frescoes of the VIII-XIII century.
You get to David Gareja after about two hours drive from Tbilisi. You go along an asphalted road for the first 45 minutes, until you go into dirt country roads that open up in the middle of a barren and dry steppe, which gradually becomes more rocky until it leaves room for strange rocky reliefs streaked with red, orange and yellow.
You get to the monastery from the lowest part, which is still inhabited today, and from there a circular path starts that climbs the mountain to the cells dug into the rock which still retain fragments of frescoes. For the complete tour it takes about a couple of hours of walking. It is important to bring sufficient supplies of water because the climb can be challenging in the hottest hours, also because it is impossible to find a tree to shelter from the sun along the path.
