Tbilisi parks: where to walk and how to get there

You can walk almost anywhere in Tbilisi, but the city's parks differ wildly in character. In the centre it's the Rike embankment and the Botanical Garden with its waterfall; in Vake, staircases and a cable car up to Turtle Lake; on the western edge, Lisi Lake with a three-kilometre loop around the water. Below is a rundown of the main Tbilisi parks: what admission costs, how long a walk takes and how to get there.

Rike Park: where a walk through the centre begins

Rike lies on the left bank of the Kura, between the Bridge of Peace and Metekhi Bridge. A flat green strip along the water, fountains, chess tables, a big lawn where tourists and locals sit side by side in the evenings. The park itself is small — you can cover the whole of it in 15–20 minutes.

Rike's main function is to be a starting point. The cable car to Narikala fortress leaves from here: 2.5 GEL one way, paid with a Metromoney transport card; the card itself costs 2 GEL and will come in handy later on the metro, on buses and on the city's second cable car. The ride up takes under two minutes, the cabin passing directly over the Kura and the old rooftops. The cable car runs roughly from 11:00 to 23:00.

The only real difficulty here is the queue. On a Saturday evening it eats about thirty minutes at the lower station, so I try to go up before noon and walk back down through Narikala and Sololaki: the descent takes the same twenty minutes, but with no waiting.

The Botanical Garden: a forest fifteen minutes from the Old Town

The Botanical Garden fills the gorge of the Tsavkisistsqali river below the Sololaki ridge, 128 hectares in all. It doesn't feel like flowerbeds with labels — it feels like actual forest: paved and dirt paths, serious elevation change, a stone bridge over a waterfall. In summer it's several degrees cooler there than on Meidan, and you notice it the moment you're through the gate.

Admission is 4 GEL for adults, 1 GEL for students, 50 tetri for a child's ticket, free for preschoolers. A family ticket costs 6 GEL. The garden is open daily, in the warm season roughly from 9:00 to 19:30; in winter it closes earlier, so there's little point arriving after four in December.

One important detail: which entrance. The lower gates are on Botanikuri Street, a ten-minute walk from the sulphur baths. The upper ones are next to Narikala, where the cable car drops you. My first time I rode the cable car up, went in from the top, walked down to the waterfall and then spent an hour and a half crawling back uphill in the July heat. Now I do it the other way round: in at the bottom, up gradually, and out through the upper gates right by the fortress, with nothing left but the walk down into the centre.

There's almost no food inside. There are drinking fountains, but don't count on a café on the grounds — bring water and a snack with you. Allow 2–3 hours for the full loop; an hour is enough for the short circuit to the waterfall.

Worth a mention next door is Legvtakhevi, the Fig Gorge right in Abanotubani. A free passage between the cliffs to a small waterfall, about ten minutes from the sulphur baths. Not a park in the full sense, but a logical stop on the way to the Botanical Garden.

Mtatsminda: a park on the mountain, the funicular and the new cable car

The upper funicular station sits at around 727 metres, and it offers the best viewpoint in the city. Up top there's an amusement park, a Ferris wheel, the TV tower, and the Pantheon at the intermediate station. By day you can see the Kura cutting the city in two; in the evening the whole thing burns with lights all the way out to Gldani.

Prices here are a muddle, and this is one case where it's better to read the board at the ticket office. The funicular is paid for with a separate park card costing 2 GEL — Metromoney doesn't work. The ride itself costs around 10 GEL one way; the fare has been raised several times in recent years. Rides at the top run another 3–10 GEL each, while entry to the park grounds is free.

In October 2024 a second route to the top opened: a cable car from 52 Rustaveli Avenue, by the Academy of Sciences building. The fare here is dual: 12 GEL for tourists and 3 GEL for Georgian citizens, children under six ride free. The trip takes four minutes, and it usually runs from 12:00 to 21:00. The logical combination is up on the funicular and down on the cable car — that way you ride each line once.

It's always colder up there than down below, and the wind is a different animal. In May I went up in a T-shirt and came back down forty minutes later, even though I'd planned to watch the sunset.

An ordinary road leads up the mountain too, and the park has a car park. If you drive, the funicular queue stops being your problem. The switchbacks are narrow but the asphalt is fine. It's worth checking on parking in Tbilisi in general before you set out: the centre has paid zones, while Mtatsminda is usually easier.

Vake Park and Turtle Lake

Vake Park begins at Vake Heroes' Square at the end of Chavchavadze Avenue: a broad staircase, a fountain, shaded alleys, and then the slope climbing away. This is a park for locals, not for guided tours. People run here in the morning, sit with coffee in the afternoon and walk their dogs in the evening.

From 74 Chavchavadze Avenue the city's second cable car runs up to Turtle Lake. It costs 1 GEL on Metromoney and is almost unknown to tourists: old eight-seater cabins, about six minutes up, running from 8:00 to 22:00. Cabins are sometimes sent off not on a timetable but once enough people have gathered, so on one weekday I sat on a bench by the station for a good fifteen minutes. You can walk up too, but the slope is steep and in summer that's hard work.

A paved path runs right around Turtle Lake; the full loop at an easy pace takes 20–25 minutes. There's a beach, pedal boats, cafés with terraces. Twenty minutes' walk from the lake stands the open-air Ethnographic Museum, where real houses from different regions of Georgia have been brought together, from Svan towers to Kakhetian farmsteads. Admission for a foreign adult is around 20–25 GEL, roughly 10 for children, with a lower rate for Georgian citizens. The museum opens late, closer to midday.

Mziuri: shade, water and a skate park

Mziuri lies in the ravine of the Vere river along Chavchavadze, between Vake and the centre. The park was built in 1982 on the initiative of the writer Nodar Dumbadze as a "city for children", and sculptures of his characters still stand at the entrance.

On the night of 14 June 2015, after a heavy downpour, a landslide came down in the Vere gorge: about a million cubic metres of earth blocked the riverbed, the water broke through the dam and swept down the gorge. Twenty-one people died, the zoo by Heroes' Square was destroyed, and Mziuri park was almost entirely washed away. Restoration was only finished in spring 2020.

Today it's one of the most comfortable places in the city for a slow walk: a pond with large carp, an amphitheatre, picnic tables, drinking fountains, skate and parkour areas, a dog run. Its main advantage is shade. At 35 degrees in July that's the deciding argument, because walking the open embankments at that hour is physically impossible.

Dedaena: the evening park by the Dry Bridge

Dedaena stretches along the Kura on the right bank, between Baratashvili Bridge and the House of Justice, right up against the flea market on the Dry Bridge. By day it's empty; by around seven the park fills up: skate park, bars around the edges, music off a speaker, groups on the grass.

In atmosphere it's the most "urban" park in Tbilisi, closer to the Berlin format than to a post-Soviet square with flowerbeds. Most often I come in here not even to walk but to cut through to the flea market, though in the evening I usually end up staying. Don't come here for nature. Come here for a cross-section of what an ordinary Tbilisi evening looks like.

Mushtaidi: an old park with a children's railway

Mushtaidi in Didube is one of the oldest parks in the city, laid out on the site of a private garden the authorities bought in 1853. The main thing here is the children's railway, opened in 1935: a 1.2 km narrow-gauge line with three stations, the train running past the fairground rides, departures announced across the whole park.

The park is noticeably plainer and older than the others, and some of the rides are Soviet in spirit. With children under ten it works beautifully; without children there isn't much to see.

Lisi Lake: three kilometres around the water

Lisi is an artificial lake on the western edge of the city, roughly 800 by 550 metres. A paved path 3 km long runs around it, split into pedestrian and cycling halves, with benches and lamps. You can rent a bike right by the water.

I usually walk the loop anticlockwise: the far, almost empty stretch of shore comes at the start, and the cafés and the busy section are left for the end, when you already feel like sitting down. In summer there's a beach, changing cabins and pedal boats, but in July and August you won't find a free spot on the shore after midday. May and October are noticeably more pleasant here.

Open fires are banned and the fine runs up to 500 GEL, so leave the barbecue at home. You can get here on bus No. 29 from Station Square, or ride the metro to Delisi and take a taxi from there: on foot from the metro you'd face a steep couple of kilometres uphill. There's a car park at the main entrance, and on weekend afternoons it's full.

Out of town: where to go if you want more greenery

The Tbilisi Sea, a large reservoir to the north-east, is 20–25 minutes' drive from the centre. You can swim there, but reckon with the wind: it kicks up waves, and the open shore can feel unwelcoming. North of the city, Tbilisi National Park begins, with forest trails where you can walk for an hour without meeting a soul — a convenient entry point is described in the guide to the Sabaduri forest.

Public transport does reach these places, but awkwardly and with changes. If you plan to walk somewhere other than the centre, a car settles the question: renting with MY.DRIVE, with a final price and no surcharges at pickup, spares you the sums over "what a taxi there and back would come to". The drive to the Tbilisi Sea is easy; for the national park the last few kilometres are gravel, but passable in an ordinary sedan in dry weather. Practical details on pickup and paperwork are in the Tbilisi rental guide; and if you're building your day around drives out of town, see also the one-day routes from the city.

Which Tbilisi park to choose for a walk with children

Three places work best for children. Mziuri — shade, a pond, playgrounds and flat paths for a pushchair. Mushtaidi — the railway and the rides. Mtatsminda — the Ferris wheel and the amusement park up top, though it's noticeably more expensive there and crowded at weekends. The Botanical Garden is hard going with small children because of the elevation change, although school-age kids usually like the waterfall.

What to keep in mind before you go

• Metromoney covers most of the routes. One card for 2 GEL works on the metro, on buses and on both of the older cable cars. The exceptions are the funicular and the new Mtatsminda cable car, which use the park's own card.
• Dual pricing is real. On the Rustaveli cable car and at the Ethnographic Museum, foreigners pay noticeably more than locals; it's standard practice, and arguing at the ticket office gets you nowhere.
• In summer, walk before 11 and after 18. From midday to five in July and August being out in the sun is unpleasant; only the Botanical Garden, Mziuri and Turtle Lake save the day.
• Shoes matter. In the Botanical Garden and on the Vake slopes the paths are stony and sloped in places — flip-flops don't earn their keep.
• Parking in the centre is tight. Finding a space by Rike and around the Old Town is hard; at Lisi, Mziuri and on Mtatsminda it's easier.

Summary table

The short version

If you're short on time in Tbilisi, take the combination of Rike plus cable car plus Botanical Garden: that's half a day and almost the whole city landscape at once — and it slots neatly into the one-day route. If you want to walk without crowds, head for Lisi or Turtle Lake, where the people walking are mostly Tbilisians themselves. With children, Mziuri and Mushtaidi are the safest bets. Fares on the city's lifts are revised regularly, so before a trip up Mtatsminda budget a little more than the old guidebooks say.