Gomismta

Gomismta is Guria's "resort in the clouds". This summer mountain resort sits at about 2,100 metres on the northern slope of the Meskheti Range, above the Bzhuzhi gorge. Its main spectacle is the sky: at dawn the lowlands are often buried under an unbroken sea of clouds while the mountain floats above it, and the sunrises and sunsets here genuinely look the way they do in photographs. On a clear day you can even make out the Black Sea on the horizon.

The settlement itself is hundreds of rough wooden cottages scattered across treeless alpine meadows, ringed by spruce and fir forest. Gomismta grew as a health resort from the 1950s, and since the 2010s ecotourism has been bringing it back to life. There are no conventional hotels — only guesthouses and cottage rentals — and that simplicity is precisely the charm of the place.

The season is short: late June to mid-September, with the road snowbound much of the rest of the year. On the spot you will find mineral springs, horse riding and trekking routes — across the meadows towards Bakhmaro, and over the Meskheti ridge to Shuakhevi in Adjara. Most visitors come up as a long day trip from Ozurgeti or stay one night in a cottage — and for the sunrise over the cloud sea, the overnight is well worth it.