Ozurgeti

Ozurgeti is a town visitors usually do not stop in, and that is a mistake. It sits between the beaches at Ureki and the mountains at Bakhmaro, and most people drive straight through. Those who stop find a western Georgian provincial town exactly as it is: slow, green and unpressured. The town took its present shape in the 19th century, after the Russian Empire abolished the Principality of Guria and made this the district centre. The grid of streets, the central park with its plane trees and a handful of brick buildings in imperial provincial style all date from then. Worth your time: - The Guria Regional Museum — the history of the principality, an ethnographic collection and local archaeology; small, but seriously arranged - The central park, the town's social centre and busy every evening - The market — Gurian tea, hazelnuts, honey and, in September, local persimmon - The Alexandre Tsutsunava Theatre, one of the oldest provincial theatres in Georgia Gurian cooking differs from what you eat in Tbilisi: less chilli, more walnut and vegetables. Look for Gurian ghvezeli, a half-moon pie of onion and egg that is traditionally a New Year dish but is now baked all year. The town works as a base for a day or two. Shemokmedi and Likhauri are twenty minutes away, Ureki forty, and Bakhmaro is far but on the same road east.

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