Chiatura

Chiatura is a mining town squeezed into the narrow gorge of the Kvirila River, about 70 km east of Kutaisi. It grew up around some of the world's richest manganese deposits, and its Soviet apartment blocks climb the cliffs on both sides of the valley. Because the mines and many homes sit on plateaus high above the river, a network of passenger cable cars was built in the mid 20th century to carry miners and residents up and down. The old cabins ran until 2021, when the first lines of a new system opened.

Riding the new cable cars is the main reason to come, with views straight down into the gorge and across the town. Chiatura is not a polished tourist town, but its setting and industrial atmosphere are like nowhere else in Georgia. On the edge of town, Mgvimevi Monastery is built into a cliff, and the Katskhi Pillar is a short drive away, so most visitors see all three in a day.

Manganese deposits here were recorded by the geologist Hermann Abich in 1846, and in 1879 the writer Akaki Tsereteli began preparing to mine them. Large-scale mining followed, and by the early 1900s Chiatura supplied a large share of the world's manganese. Passenger cable cars were added from the late 1940s and grew into a network of 17 lines that ran on largely original equipment until 2021. A rebuilt system opened that year, with more lines since. Mining remains the town's main employer.