When a tourist comes to relax in Abkhazia, then in any of its city you can find a lot of private travel agencies that offer to buy excursions from them. They are located in Gagra and in Pitsunde. All of them offer the same excursion tours and the most popular destination there is a new Athos. Tourists there are attracted by the neophon monastery and the famous cave. The monastery is located on Mount and from afar look great.
But the tourist should not buy the first excursion, so as not to regret the spent money. First of all, you should learn from the employee a travel agency on which bus will be an excursion. Because in Abkhazia there are a lot of so-called Ekarusov, which is very many years. In addition, they do not have an air conditioner, the windows do not open in the cabin very dirty. Therefore, a prerequisite for the acquisition of a tour to New Athos should be the provision of a new minibus for movement. The excursion usually begins in the morning and is not very difficult to take a supply of water and windbreak if the tourist goes to Athos from Gagra, for example. Before the new Athos, go about an hour and all excursions begin with the monastery. But you should not think that you will pass to his entrance. All the bus stops in one place, and to the monastery it is necessary to rise to the mountain of a paving near a kilometer. Here as well as the water taken with me. After all, every ten meters of ways to the monastery are sitting by local merchants and offer to buy tangerine juice from them, and not the cheapest. And you should also consider that I want to drink even more after him. And now the rise is completed and the tourist sees the famous New Aviation Monastery.
But this is not the handsome man who is visible from afar. The tourist appears the building, half of which in the scaffolding, and most of the monastery is generally closed from prying eyes. Entering the inside does not feel any coolness, inside is very hot and stuffy. On the walls of the monastery there is mold and losing paint. Many, of course, put candles there, pray.
But there are a lot of frustrated people, especially when they find out that this allegedly an ancient monastery is only about 100 years old. And many people do not leave the question, but whether it was worth it for the sake of such a spectacle so much to go uphill. So, I feel free to say that attending the monastery is absolutely not necessary. He is beautiful from afar. The second place where tourists are leading - this is a cave. There are more than one hundred people at once and put on a train, which takes directly into the cave. Here, as you need to take a windbreaker. After all, the temperature in the cave is about 10 degrees. The cave consists of nine rooms of different sizes. As soon as you enter in, I do not leave the feeling that you got on the film's set of the film "The Lord of the Rings", so everything seems like. The cave, of course, is gorgeous and only for her, it was worth going to this excursion. Stalactites are prohibited there, but the cave administration does not prohibit it. They can be purchased there inside the cave. After leaving it, the temperature difference begins again and the windbreaker should be removed. Tourist comes there to see the monastery and cave. But for a guide, this is not the most important thing and it is lucky the entire bus with tourists to dine in the "best" cafe in the new Athos. Do not give in to this and demand to give you free time and the freedom of choice where you eat. Because the best cafe is far from others and completely accidentally belongs to the relative of the guide. And even if you don't like something in them, then there will be no choice and will have to eat there. And many cafes in the new Athos are far from ideal. This also applies to menus and maintenance. But after such a mandatory meal, the excursion group is given free time and you can take a walk in the city. There you can see and take a picture about a small waterfall. Walk in the park
or eat ice cream. What else I want to say - all this can be done independently. It is worth only to take a bus to New Athon. And there already do what you yourself want and have in those cafes that you select. In addition, it will be significantly cheaper and more comfortable. And to solve you.