Another day of sight seeing

Sunday morning arrived with cold, rainy weather (yet again!) but our group of local hosts have been determined to brave the weather and show us the sights of K'ut'aisi. Today we headed a little way out of town to a karst cave system. Karst is a type of topography that is formed by soft rock that is dissolved by water. Texas' own Natural Bridge Cavern is a karst type of cave. Well, here near K'ut'aisi is one called Prometheus Cave and since it does not rain inside a cave we headed out to visit. It's a really good example of a karst type cave. You can easily see the different features that were made by flowing water but the cave also has good examples of many other types of features like stalactites and stalagmites, curtains, and organ pipes. It is beautifully lit in rainbow colors and there is classical music playing softly in the background. When the weather is not bad the trip through the caves ends with a boat ride on the underground river that formed the cave. 

Stalactites hang 'tite' from the ceiling.

An organ pipe formation.

After we left Prometheus Cave we headed back toward K'ut'aisi to go visit the Motsemeta Monastery. This particular monastery is famous because it houses the relics of two special saints in the Georgian Orthodox Church. St. David and St. Constantine were two priest who refused to leave Christianity and convert to Islam when the Turks invaded. They were tortured and then drowned in the river. The story goes that the river turned red with their blood until their bodies were removed and returned to the monastery. Today there is a small tunnel under the case that holds their bones. It is said that if you make a wish and crawl through the tunnel 3 times, without touching the sides, your wish will come true.

The river where the priests were drowned

Bottom, center - by the stairs - is the little tunnel

The frescoes are just so beautiful!

Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday I will be teaching a US Government lesson to the English classes for some of the teachers. For the younger grades my lesson will be about the symbols of the US, like the flag, the Liberty Bell, and those sorts of things. I will post more tomorrow.