national botanical garden of georgia

It was OK. Nothing was labelled, apart from the first tree at the entrance, so if you are going for the botanics you will be disappointed. A nice waterfall and paddling opportunity at the end of the park, but that's about it

As a park its pleasant if a little overgrown in parts, but to be honest I think as a botanical garden it lets itself down. Maybe I visited at the wrong time of year but there were very few displays and those that there were were either not well labelled in georgian or english or not labelled at all.Nice but if you miss it dont lose any sleep.

What makes Tbilisi beautiful can also be attributed to the parks and gardens designed and maintained all over the city.The first time I went to this National Botanical Garden of Georgia was in July 2010. Again, I visited it in October 2012. This garden adds color to the city filled with gray structures. This more than a hundred hectare garden at the centre of Tbilisi boasts of many species (around 4,500 taxonomic groups) as shown in my uploaded photos. A portion of this garden also hosts library structure and a modern business centre allegedly owned by a philanthropist who maintains the cost of maintaining the garden.It lies in the Tsavkisis-Tskali Gorge on the southern foothills of the Sololaki Range and its central entrance is located at the foothills of the historic Narikala Fortress. There is an arched bridge over the waterfalls which added to the attraction.

We visited the Botanical Gardens mostly because there was a geocache planted there. The area was quite beautiful and the walk was nice. There are some hills and valleys and waterfalls to see. You can also walk up the hill to the top where Mother Armenia stands...wear good walking shoes if you decide to do that. I think we missed some of the features of the Botanical Gardens like the greenhouse, but it was still a lovely walk for only 1 lari each.

TBILISI BOTANICAL GARDENThe botanical garden of Tbilisi is verdant with trees and bushes and non-tropical, temperate zone flowers and plants and conifers galore, but it is in dire need of money and funding. The greenhouse {Orangerie}, believe it or not, with some beautiful flowers in bloom according to the plants differing life cycles, is regretfully closed all day Saturday and Sunday.Out in the open, there are very few plaques indicating which tree is from where and what species it belongs to, as most botanical gardens usually display, in Latin names. I found only a few such plaques over several hours.The entrance to the garden, in addition, is not marked with signs well, and there are no maps for sale [or for free from] at the ticket window, nor even a mini hand held small xerox copy to help you navigate through the mostly unmarked large expanse and maze of hills and paths.The subtropical botanical garden in Batumi on the Black Sea, however, is much better and also tended to with more care and money, most of it from Ivanishvili, who donated money to the Batumi Botanical Garden long before he was elected Prime Minister. Perhaps in his new job as presiding over his party’s new Parliamentary majority, some funding from the government could be applied to this botanical garden.The Tbilisi Botanical Garden could be just as nice as the Batumi Botanical Garden if it started to position adequate signage, plaques, and making the green houses open on weekends when most people have time to visit. In addition, the provision of a desperately needed toilet would be a blessing, and perhaps a café for visitors to chat and relax and stay a bit longer, helping the gardens expenses with the money they spend on coffees and teas and cakes and buying books about the garden.All of my foreign friends who visit Tbilisi are alarmed and shocked that this garden is very third world in appearance and maintenance, yet the presidential palace is on the grand scale of Versailles for Louis the 14th, in France, long ago when kings ruled Europe and despots ruled Central Asia.There is a large modern glass building on the expansive botanical garden acreage which sticks out among all the derelict edifices and broken down clunker cars abandoned here, somewhat in appearance like the high tech police stations all over Georgia, which have improved transparency in exercises of democracy among police networks, some agree, but nobody seems to know what this similar building implanted in the legendary Tbilisi botanical garden was built for. The function of this building has not been evident to the public for many years. I decided to ask a burly and rude undercover security man with a cheap Nokia mobile phone who stands guard, what is this building for?? When my Georgian friend asked him what part of the botanical garden was he protecting, and also, could we go inside as garden guests, he growled that it was closed and off limits and that it is a “herbarium”, looking into my eyes as if the word herbarium has no meaning. It is the very same building that all tourists ask, “WHAT IS THAT?!” as they stand atop Tbilisi heights at the end of their cable car lift to the zenith of Kartlis Deda and Narikala Fortress, to ponder the giant metal sculpture of the patroness saint of Georgia, with sword in her one hand and cup of wine in the other, protecting all the families of Georgia since almost time immemorial. Few people can comprehend why this misplaced and mysterious reflective glass building is the most striking structure in the entire botanical garden, yet off limits to the public, and with no apparent function and no signage as to its purpose.