Tbilisi

Tbilisi is Georgia's capital and largest city, home to about 1.3 million people on both banks of the Mtkvari river. It grew around the hot sulphur springs that gave it its name, from the Georgian word tbili, meaning warm. For travellers it works on two levels: a historic core of churches, bathhouses and wooden balconies that you can walk in a day, and a modern city of wine bars, design hotels, galleries and clubs. Most trips around Georgia begin and end here, and it is the main hub for flights, trains and marshrutkas.

The centre spreads out from Freedom Square. To the south and east lie Old Tbilisi, Narikala and the baths; to the north-west runs Rustaveli Avenue with its theatres, museums and Parliament. Across the river, Avlabari is crowned by Sameba Cathedral. Further out, Vake and Vera are leafy residential districts, while Marjanishvili and Chugureti have Fabrika and a cluster of new cafes. The city sits between 380 and 770 metres, so expect steep streets and good viewpoints, with cable cars and a funicular to ease the climbs.

King Vakhtang Gorgasali is credited with founding Tbilisi in the 5th century, and his son Dachi moved the capital here from Mtskheta in the 6th. Persian, Arab, Mongol and Ottoman armies all held it at times, and Arab emirs ruled it for almost four centuries until David the Builder took it back in 1122. Agha Mohammad Khan's Persian army burned it in 1795. Under Russian rule from 1801 it became Tiflis, the administrative centre of the Caucasus, and it was the capital of Soviet Georgia until independence in 1991.