New Athos. Cave in Abkhazia: address, opening hours, photo

One of the amazing wonders that the nature of Abkhazia is so generous with is the world-famous New Athos Cave. This colossal karst cavity rivals in size the most famous dungeons in the world. This route with magnificent stalactite palaces and lakes under a stone sky will remain in your memory for a lifetime.

The New Athos Cave is a unique system, which in its beauty, diversity, extent, tourist attendance and mystery is not inferior to the Carlsbad Cave in the USA, or the Postojna Cave in Slovenia. At the same time, the New Athos cave is not the largest cave in Abkhazia. The huge karst cavity is a complex system of labyrinths. For millions of years, the cave hid its secrets in the depths of the mountain. The discoverer of the cave, a 16-year-old resident of New Athos, artist Givi Smyr, was the first to risk descending into the hole in 1961 and told speleologists about his discovery. Since 1975, the cave has been open to tourists. Since 2001, the discoverer Givi Smyr has been the director of the New Athos caves complex.

The Metropolitan in the New Athos Cave - an amazing railway transport facility - was opened on July 4, 1975 to transport tourists to the cave inside the Apsara (Iverskaya) Mountain. By the end of 1975, the contact-battery electric train “Tourist” was built in two copies at the Riga Carriage Works, at that time the main Soviet manufacturer of multi-unit rolling stock. It was a specially designed, unique, fundamentally new rolling stock with a contact-battery power system, specifically designed for the New Athos cave. The line has a length of 1291 m and 3 passenger stations. The train passes them in 3 minutes at a speed of up to 30 km/h. The regular passenger flow is 0.7 million people per season, that is, up to 2 thousand people per day. In 2014, the New Athos Railway acquired a new modern electric train. The total capacity of the electric train is up to 120 people.

The total length of the route inside the cave is about 2 km, it passes through 8 halls, the walls and ceilings of which are richly decorated with sinter formations: stalactites, stalagmites and stalagnates. The air temperature in the cave is always constant - +11 degrees. (We recommend bringing a sweater or light jacket, as well as shoes with non-slip soles). Mini-metro trains to the depths of the cave depart approximately every 20 minutes as excursion groups form.

Halls of the New Athos Cave

Each cave room is unique and beautifully illuminated.

Hall of the Mahajirs. The largest hall of the cave is named in honor of the memory of the Mukhajirs - Abkhazians, who were forcibly resettled to Turkey and the countries of the Middle East. Among the piles of dark stones of the cave rises the White Mountain. Near the mountain there are white columns of nascent stalagmites, a little further there is a dark depression with yellow fangs of limestone blocks. Sometimes you can see a cold, muddy lake here. The calcite floor of the side gallery is torn in places, and through the holes you can see the second bottom, along which a transparent stream runs almost silently.

Hall "Nartaa". The hall is covered with clay layers. At the lowest point of the hall, at 36 m above sea level, there is a “living” lake of the cave - colonies of crustaceans live in it. In the cracks of the clay floor there is a beetle that has no eyes. On the southern wall of the hall you can see fancy figures made of stones. Near the Nartaa hall there is a Corallite Gallery, the walls of which are covered with corallites - snow-white balls stuck to each other in hundreds of thousands.

Hall of Speleologists. Hall named after Givi Smyr. The Speleologists' Hall is the highest hall of the cave, its height reaches 97 m. From the round bottom of the hall, littered with boulders, sheer walls rise upward, converging at a great height into a dome. The stone vault of the hall is dotted with many tectonic cracks and oval holes. These are the mouths of karst wells opened by ancient collapses, the so-called “organ pipes” - the lower part of the karst systems through which water and air enter the cave. This room is home to bats - relatively low air humidity and moderate temperature create favorable conditions for them. In the southern part of the Speleologists' Hall there is a passage to the hall named after Givi Smyr, which is located above the other halls of the cave. The floor of the hall is covered with frozen waves of cream-colored limestone. The most important decoration of the hall is the magnificent stone jellyfish.

Hall "Ayuhaa". The length of the hall from north to south is more than 100 m. Along the dark yellow ten-meter walls of the hall, black horizontal stripes stretch along the entire length - depressions in the rock filled with clay particles. Such cracks in the limestone separate the ancient lower strata from the younger upper strata. But both of them were formed hundreds of millions of years ago. The hall is decorated with hundreds of stalagmites made of translucent orange and red calcite.

"Apkhartsa" Hall. Nature chose the Apkhartsa hall as the center of harmony of sounds. A person’s voice or a musical note, sounding under its oval dome, acquires amazing richness and depth, and is colored with rich overtones. There is music in the hall, sometimes artists of the Abkhaz State Choir give concerts, performing Abkhaz folk songs.

Apsny Hall. In front of the entrance to the hall there is a four-meter stalagmite, and in the hall itself there is an unusual cave “waterfall”. From a thirty-meter height, a huge frozen stone shaft “falls” from a hole in a high steep wall. Water flows along the smooth surface of calcite “waves”. There is always maximum air humidity in this room.

Hall "Anakopia". Finally, the cave has reserved the most stunning spectacle - a cave waterfall in the Anakopia hall, the likes of which do not exist on the earth’s surface. From a hole in a high steep wall, a huge, forever frozen stone shaft falls into the hall from a height of thirty meters. Its heavy “jet”, almost bursting into huge drops, rushes to the ground and stops, not reaching it some two meters. Real water flows along the smooth wavy surface of the calcite waterfall. The lowest hall of the New Athos cave has a length of 150 m, a width of 50 m, and a height of more than 20 m. There are two underground lakes - Anatolia and Goluboe. The mirror of the lakes lies at 36 m above sea level, their average depth is more than 25 m. Once the water level in the lakes rose, and the waters flooded most of the hall. Traces of these floods have been preserved - dark brown horizontal stripes from the surface of the lakes almost to the ceiling. Now the cave waters exit through a drainage tunnel into the Manikwara River gorge.

The helictite grotto is distinguished by the amazing beauty of rare sinter forms. The wall is covered in sparkling white calcite, backed by orange, lilac, greenish and yellow stalagmites. The patterned floor consists of many small trays with thin walls. The main wealth of the grotto is helictites or eccentric stalactites. It is still unclear why these mysterious cave creatures grow in defiance of gravity upwards, sideways, in an unimaginable zigzag, but not downwards. The ceiling of the grotto is covered with thousands of small helictites of various colors - from dark red to light pink. Some reach more than 10 cm in length. Excursions in the grotto are not conducted, since the presence of a person changes the temperature and humidity of the air, which can lead to their death.

Cost of a ticket to the New Athos Cave in 2019

New Athos is a popular seaside resort, which is located northwest of Sukhumi (21 km). This is a very picturesque place in Abkhazia. The hills on which the city is located are covered with orange, lemon, olive and tangerine groves.

Cypress alleys stretch throughout the resort; in the coastal area, laurels and palm trees, bananas and magnolias, eucalyptus and oleanders delight the eye. There are also ponds surrounded by weeping willows. The mountain slopes are covered with deciduous trees - beech, hornbeam, oak and others. But most of all tourists are interested in the caves in New Athos.

From the history of the city

In the 4th century, the Abkhazians built a fortress called Anakopia. After the unification of Georgia in the 11th century, Anakopia became one of the largest coastal centers. However, in the XIV-XVII centuries, during the feudal fragmentation of Georgia, Anakopia lost its economic and political significance.

The revival of the city took place in 1874, when monks arrived here from Holy Mount Athos (Greece). The tsarist government allowed them to establish a monastery in Abkhazia. After this, at the foot of the Iverskaya Mountain they built the New Athos Monastery, which later became one of the largest religious buildings in the Caucasus. And the settlement that formed around it with residential buildings, churches, cells, parks and gardens was called New Athos. The modern resort town, as we know it, appeared at the beginning of the 20th century on the site of a former monastic settlement.

New Athos Cave

The ancient photo, which you can see below, holds many secrets; it is one of the largest in the republic. It is located under the slope of Iverskaya Mountain. This is a huge karst cavity. Its volume is one million cubic meters. The cave is located near the monastery of the same name. Its length is about 1900 meters, the maximum depth exceeds 180 meters.

History of discovery

Since ancient times, the attention of local residents has been attracted by a huge well on the slope of Mount Iverskaya. They called the well with steep walls a “bottomless pit.” For a long time, there were no brave souls who would dare to go down there.

Local resident Givi Smyr was the first to decide on the dangerous descent. However, without special equipment he was unable to reach the bottom. An expedition was created in 1961 to explore the “bottomless pit”. Having overcome obstacles on their way, the assault four consisting of Arsen Okrodzhanashvili, Zurab Tintilozov, Givi Smyr and Boris Gergedav descended to the bottom.

A huge layer of clay that covered the floor and seemed to indicate the end of the abyss. In any case, this is how the other caves of New Athos ended. Suddenly, in one of the small holes, the researchers felt a strong draft of air, and the brave men squeezed forward one by one. The darkness swallowed up the light of the lanterns. This indicated grandiose underground volumes previously unseen in these places. This is how a cave was discovered in New Athos (Abkhazia).

The first expedition was followed by the following. Speleologists compiled a map of the cave, collected a huge amount of scientific material, and made a film. Years of intense and often dangerous work were required in order for another unique attraction to appear on the Black Sea coast, created by nature and people.

The cave became accessible to tourists coming to New Athos in 1975. Today there are nine halls open, and every day you can visit six of them as part of an excursion group. Another two can only be seen once a week. One room is currently closed to the public, as it is reserved for research and work of scientists.

underground road

Nowadays, thousands of tourists visit New Athos every year. The cave is definitely included in their excursion route. Acquaintance with the mysterious failure begins with a special transport system, which was launched before the opening of the cave to the public.

The assembled group is invited to occupy the carriages of a narrow gauge railway, which will take them through the halls and make an intermediate stop in the Abkhazia hall. The road is fully electrified, the rails are under constant voltage (300 V). After the train arrives at the station, you must allow tourists to exit from the opposite side, and then you will be allowed to enter the carriage.

The doors of the cars of this underground transport are opened manually. The length of the road is about two kilometers. The total route of the underground excursion is 1.4 kilometers. The metro takes visitors to a depth of 160 meters.

Excursion

The duration of the excursion is one and a half hours. The group is necessarily accompanied by a guide who talks about the history of the opening of the cave and, of course, separately about each of the halls.

The caves of New Athos (photos, even the best quality, are not able to convey their grandeur and power) are distinguished by a constant, rather low temperature (+11 degrees), so you need to take warm clothes with you. The cave is damp in places, so you will need comfortable shoes with non-slip soles.

Halls

The cave in New Athos (Abkhazia), as we have already mentioned, has eight halls accessible to the public. Almost all of them have names (old and new). In the very first hall where tourists find themselves (“Anakopia”), there is a small blue lake “Anatolia”.

Speleologists' Hall

The largest room in the cave. Previously, it was called the hall of the Muhajirs. It is named after the speleologists of the Vakhushti Institute and the first researchers who worked in the depths of the mountain for a long time.

"Narta"

Previously it was called clay. In it you can see a lake, clouded by clay rocks, in which small crustaceans live, and around it live unusual trimus beetles that have no eyes.

"Ayukha" (formerly "Moscow")

This low and narrow hall, according to scientists, was once a river bed. Its massive vaults are painted in various shades of gray.

"Akhertsa" ("Iveria")

And here tourists are amazed by the acoustics. Every sound here becomes surprisingly melodic. Sometimes the Abkhazian choir performs here.

Apsny Hall

The former Tbilisi hall fascinates with its beauty. The extraordinary view of a stone waterfall, which seems to fall from a height, makes a huge impression. This is the highest hall. The height of its ceilings reaches one hundred meters. This room does not sparkle with special cave decorations, but it is truly beautiful. This is noted by everyone who visited New Athos. The cave here resembles a full of grandeur, a calm and powerful giant who plunged into a thousand-year sleep. The colors of this room are dim and simple - brown clay and gray rough limestone.

Helict Hall

When you enter this hall, you feel as if you are in another dimension. Helactites - formations growing from the ceiling, in some incredible way suddenly curl upward or throw out countless thread-like shoots in different directions. Scientists are still studying the nature of their growth.

To appreciate the beauty of this underground kingdom, you need to come to New Athos. The cave, each of the halls of which is beautiful in its own way, can only be truly appreciated upon personal inspection.

The design of the halls is undoubtedly of great importance for perception. Music plays here, stalagmites and stalactites are illuminated in different colors. A visit to the cave leaves the most vivid impressions. There is a souvenir pavilion on site, where you can buy fragments of crystals, stalagmites, stalactites, a disc with a film about the cave, and beautiful postcards as souvenirs of the excursion.

How to get there?

Getting to New Athos is quite easy. Minibuses run regularly from nearby cities - direct and going towards Gudauta and Psou. Buses run from the central square of Pitsunda and Sukhumi railway station. The road is excellent - in 20 minutes you will find yourself in New Athos. Tourists need to get off at the “Rakushka” stop and focus on the New Athos Monastery, visible from any point.

New Athos (caves): opening hours

In the summer (May - October) the cave awaits guests every day, from 9.00 to 18.00. During the autumn-winter period, excursions are held on Wednesdays and weekends.

New Athos (caves): reviews from tourists

The vast majority of people who visited the caves claim that they will remember this excursion for the rest of their lives. Everything here is amazing: from the unusual metro to the majestic cave halls. The intricately intertwined stone formations, intelligently illuminated, amaze the imagination.

Many people note that the guide’s interesting story, accompanied by music, makes an amazing impression. Tourists advise everyone going on an excursion to take a powerful camera with them. There is not enough light in the caves, but the views here are simply fabulous.

Travel and nature lovers have probably asked themselves the question: “Where is the New Athos Cave?” This unique natural complex attracts a large number of tourists every year. Why the New Athos photo of which we present is of interest will be discussed in the article. And also about the history of its opening by a 16-year-old teenager, what halls it is divided into, and about the metro operating in it.

Description of the cave

Anakopia abyss - this was the original name of the New Athos cave in Abkhazia. It is a huge karst cavity, which has a volume of more than 1 million m3. This is one of the largest caves in the Gudauta region of the Republic of Abkhazia. The cave is located under a slope named after the icon of the Mother of God of the same name. Not far from it is the temple of Simon the Canaanite and the New Athos Monastery.

The New Athos Cave includes nine halls, in six of which excursions are held every day, and in one scientific research work is carried out. The halls were renamed twice; today they have the following names:

• "Anakopia" (Abkhazia). This was the name of the capital of the Abkhazian kingdom in ancient times.
• “Ayukhaa”, which means “Gorge” in Abkhazian.
• “Apsny” - “Land of the Soul”, the ancient self-name of Abkhazia.
• “Apkhyartsa” is a two-string violin.
• "Helictite Grotto". Helictites are writhing calcites in the form of rods.
• "Sukhum." Another name is the hall of Givi Smyr, the discoverer of caves.
• "Corallite Gallery". Corallites are the skeletons of coral polyps.
• Hall of the “Mahajirs”, devout Muslims who made the hijra.
• “Nartaa” is an epic of the North Caucasian peoples, telling about the life of the heroes, the Nart brothers.

Brief history of the discovery

The history of the New Athos Cave tells that since ancient times, on the northern slope of the Anakopia Mountain, at a height of 220 meters, there was an abyss, which was popularly called the Bottomless. For several thousand years, local people did not try to go down into this natural well. This was done only in 1961 by 16-year-old teenager Givi Smyr. He later became a professional speleologist (cave explorer), as well as a sculptor and artist.

Using an ordinary rope, he penetrated to a depth of 35 meters. However, he failed to get to the very bottom of the abyss without the appropriate equipment. Later he told speleologists about his discovery. In mid-July of the same year, a group of scientists went on a reconnaissance expedition and descended to a depth of about 140 meters, finding themselves in a huge dungeon. The descent time was eight hours.

This is how the New Athos cave was discovered. First, the “Anakopia” (“Abkhazia”) hall was opened, and later all the other halls. After extensive research, undertaken during numerous expeditions, and then improvement, the cave was opened to tourists in 1975.

Hall "Anakopia"

The first halls of the cave are the largest, at some points the ceiling height reaches from 40 to 60 meters. The “Anakopia” hall is also one of the deepest; it is from here that tourists begin to get acquainted with the New Athos Cave. The length of the hall is 150 meters and the height is 40 meters. The bottom is covered with blocks of various shapes and rocks and massive pieces of plastic clay, which owe their appearance to the processes of destruction of limestone and water flowing from the surface of the earth into the cave.

Two shades dominate here - the colors of rough gray limestone and brown clay. However, even among these gloomy colors there are emerald and aquamarine colors pleasing to the eye. These are two underground lakes illuminated by bright spotlights. The lake in the southern part of the hall is called Anatolia, its depth is 25 meters. The water temperature in it does not change all year round, frozen at +11 C°. The water in the lake is fresh, but there are no fish here; its only inhabitants are crustaceans.

The second lake is called Goluboye, it actually has no shores and looks like an abyss filled with beautiful blue water. Previously, the entire Anakopia Hall was flooded with water from time to time. To prevent this phenomenon, a drainage system was created through which excess water flows into the Manikwara River.

Hall "Ayuhaa"

As mentioned above, the name of this hall translated means “Gorge”. It is here that the dry part of the cave begins, which scientists consider the dead part of the water system, since water no longer flows here. “Ayuhaa” is located below the other halls, its arches are shaped like an arc, and on the walls there are various recesses and projections, formed due to the flow of the river that was here many years ago.

The relative humidity here is 60%. There is no longer a waterfall or a river in the hall; they left traces only in the form of grooves, furrows, and crevices. There are numerous stalagmites here. These are calcareous growths at the bottom of the cave, which appeared as a result of drops of water falling from the vaults. There are also stalactites on the ceiling; they stretch down towards the stalagmites. It takes nature several millennia to create them. They are orange and reddish in color and vary in shape and height.

Apsny Hall

The “Apsny” hall in the New Athos cave is the smallest, it is rich in stalactites. Thousands of these amazing works of nature in various colors hang from the ceiling. A 20-meter stone waterfall rushed down from a large ceiling hole, which in size and beauty is not inferior to similar creations located in other caves around the world.

One episode of the Soviet feature film “The Adventures of Tom Sawyer” was filmed in this hall. There are many stalactites in the hall, which resemble unusual curtains and drapes, separating you from the outer space of the cave. There is also a huge stalagmite, reaching more than four meters in height, called “Patriarch”. Above it is a stalactite pavilion, which is nicknamed the Royal Tent.

Apkhartsa Hall

Clay blocks and deposits of plastic rocks are scattered at the bottom of the hall. In different places there are lonely stalagmites that have an unusual amber hue. Their color depends on the manganese salts that are present in the drip-drip formations.

The ceiling in the Apkhartsa hall, like in the others, is arched. It has numerous depressions, called “organ pipes” by speleologists. The largest of them come to the surface of the earth, forming small cracks that are difficult to notice with the naked eye. It is thanks to these cracks that moisture and oxygen penetrate into the cave, allowing it to “breathe” and become moisturized.

Almost all the halls of the New Athos Cave have very good acoustics, but in Apkhyartsa it is distinguished by special sound effects. It is for this reason that the artists of the Abkhaz choir organize concerts for tourists here. Surprisingly, the human voice and melodies of musical instruments, reflecting from the arches and walls of the cave, acquire a new, unusually beautiful sound.

"Helictite Grotto"

The grotto is filled with a variety of rare forms that amaze with their beauty. The walls are covered with white calcite and sparkle due to quartz particles embedded in them. Yellow, orange, green and lilac stalagmites play with bright colors against a light background. The floor is decorated with many small baths with thin walls.

The main feature of the Helictite Grotto is helictites, eccentric stalactites, which for inexplicable reasons, despite gravity, grow upward, sideways, zigzag, but not downward.

On the vaults of the grotto there are thousands of small helictites, which have a rich color palette - from dark red to soft pink. Some reach 10 cm in length. Excursions are not conducted here due to the fact that human presence increases air humidity and temperature, which can lead to the death of this unique system.

Hall "Mahajirs"

The Hall of the Mukhajirs is 260 meters long, its width ranges from 26 to 70 meters, the height of the vaults reaches 50 meters. Everywhere, chaotically located boulders and blocks of rock divide the hall into several parts. In the center is the White Mountain. This is a large calcite deposit that is between 5 and 15 meters high and about 40 meters in diameter.

Water, which is saturated with calcium, enters this formation from a hole located directly above it. The spring is active for about seven months a year and, according to speleologists, the White Mountain grows by one millimeter every year, which is considered good growth. From the Majahir hall, the longest cave bridge, 120 meters long, goes straight to the Nartaa hall.

Hall "Nartaa"

There is a third underground lake in this hall, but due to the low water level, tourists cannot see it. Only during heavy rainfall, when water from the surface of the earth penetrates here, can everyone see the lake, called Siphonnoye.

This lake, like Anatolia and Goluboe, located in the Anakopia hall, is the lowest point of the cave system - it is 36 meters above sea level, and the depth of the New Athos cave is 160 meters.

All lakes communicate with each other using underwater channels, and are also interconnected with the Mtsyrtskha River, located outside the cave, thereby forming a single water system.

The Nartaa Hall is covered with voluminous clay layers and various stone figures created by nature. Next to it is the Corallite Cave, in which all the walls are covered with corallites - many thousands of snow-white spherical formations fastened to each other.

Opening hours and metro of the New Athos Cave in Abkhazia

There is a functioning subway in the cave, which is the only one of its kind. It was opened in 1975 and is intended to provide excursions into the Iverskaya Mountain. The metro line has a length of 1291 meters and three passenger stations. The train can pass them within three minutes at an average speed of just over 30 km per hour. During the season, the train carries about 2 thousand people in one day, that is, on average about 700 thousand people per season. The capacity of the carriages is 120 people.

The operating hours of the New Athos caves directly depend on the time of year. It looks like this:

• From January to April and October, the caves are open to visitors on Wednesday, Thursday, Saturday and Sunday, from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m.
• In May, you can visit them from the 1st to the 10th on weekdays, and from the 11th to the 31st on Wednesday, Thursday, Saturday and Sunday, also from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m.
• From June to September the cave is open all week, seven days a week, from 9 am to 7 pm.

As you can see in the photo, the New Athos Cave in Abkhazia is a beautiful and unique complex created by nature itself. The beauty of the halls themselves and the lakes located in them will not leave any tourist indifferent. Many people who have been here claim that they have never seen anything like this before. Therefore, we can safely say that while in Abkhazia, it is necessary to visit the New Athos Cave.

One of the amazing wonders that the nature of Abkhazia is so generous with is the world-famous New Athos Cave. For millions of years it hid its secrets in the depths of the Iverskaya Mountain and was discovered quite recently, just half a century ago - in 1961. And in 1975, the first “cave metro” train carrying tourists passed through an artificial tunnel leading to the cave.

The New Athos cave is a colossal karst cavity with a volume of about 1 million cubic meters, which in its size rivals the most famous dungeons in the world. Huge halls and galleries winding in bizarre meanders stretch for many hundreds of meters.

A little history

For a long time, the attention of local residents was attracted by a large failure on the slope of Iverskaya Mountain. A huge well, the steep walls of which were lost in the darkness, was called the Bottomless Pit. For a long time there were no brave souls who would dare to descend into its black mouth. The first attempt was made by a resident of New Athos, Givi Smyr. In 1961, a special expedition was organized to explore the mysterious Bottomless Pit.

Having overcome all the obstacles of the mysterious failure, the adventurers went down to the bottom. A strong draft of air was felt in one of the small holes, and the cavers one by one squeezed forward. The darkness that swallowed the light of the lanterns spoke of grandiose things. Volumes never before seen underground. This is how the secret of the Bottomless Pit was revealed and a real miracle was discovered underground - the New Athos Cave.

In total, there are 11 halls in the cave, although tourists cannot see them all - almost half of them are closed to the public. The excursion route includes the Anakopia, Speleologists, Nart, Deer, Corallite Gallery, Apkhertsa, Ayukhaa Gallery and Apsny Halls. Music concerts are held from time to time in the Moscow Hall - the acoustics here are amazing. The helictite hall is used for scientific purposes.

Cave plan:

Railway in the New Athos Cave opened on July 4, 1975. Designed to deliver tourists to the cave inside the Apsara (Iverskaya) Mountain during the holiday season (from May to November). It has a length of 1/3 km and 3 stations: “Entrance Gate”, “Apsny Hall” and “Anakopia Hall”.

The steel door closes behind the tour group - and you find yourself in the “Abkhazia” hall. The lights turn on, the voices of tourists fade away. Long seconds of silence drag on. A colossal cavity opens before you, an immense, unlike anything else, underground world: not a sound, not a movement, not a gust of wind.

It does not sparkle with festive cave decorations, but it is beautiful in its own way. Here the cave looks like a calm, full of grandeur, a mighty giant, immersed in a thousand-year sleep. The colors of the hall are simple and dull - gray rough limestone, brown clay:

All observation platforms are equipped with control panels, a few lights and microphones. Well, here is the first point of inspection, from where a view of the Lake Anacopia. The area of ​​the lake is 1,000 square meters, depth is 26 meters, water temperature is 10 degrees Celsius. By the way, before the opening of the cave and its arrangement, the level of this lake was much higher - along the border of brown and gray, that is, all the observation rooms in this room were under water. However, especially for tourists, a drainage gallery was dug “at the bottom” of this hall, which can also be seen far below.

Nearby there is a second lake, which is essentially a continuation of the first. It measures 1,250 square meters. The shores of the lake are not sand, but clay. The only natural entrance through which they initially entered the cavity can be seen here, in the ceiling of the Anakopia hall. On the surface, this exit is adjacent to the village of Eshera, in the form of a deep hole:

Sinter formation "Human Skull":

The largest hall of the New Athos cave is the Hall of Speleologists. Its length is 260 meters, height - up to 50 meters, width - up to 75 meters. All this makes this hall the third largest in Abkhazia:

It was not easy to build an excursion path here. To lay it along the bottom of the hall means to expose it to the danger of periodic flooding. To carry it with a cornice along the steep western wall means to rely on the dubious strength of limestone rocks corroded by karst processes. A third way was found. Over the harsh cave ravines, a 120-meter-long overpass soared to a height of 18 meters:

There is no water now and you can see the bottom of the underground lake:

Path towards Nart's hall:

Hall of Speleologists and a 120-meter underground overpass:

A huge stone bag is covered with powerful clay layers. At the lowest point of the hall, at 36 meters above sea level, there is the third and last “living” lake of the cave. In the water of the lake, slightly clouded by clay particles, colonies of translucent crustaceans feel comfortable, the largest of which grow up to two centimeters in length:

Grotto Deer the lower, Spartan-simple, harsh part of the New Athos cave ends:

The progress increases, and now you are surrounded on all sides by unusual colored cave stones. It seems that the cave has become lighter: the walls have moved, changed color: the gaze no longer falls into a dark void, but more and more often stops at some underground wonder. Here is a whole colony of orange stalagmites, nestled on the scree near the wall. :

This mighty underground gorge, as if cut through the thickness of the mountain by the blow of a giant sword, stretches from north to south for more than a hundred meters. Sheer ten-meter-high walls, a flat horizontal ceiling, and an uneven floor littered with boulders again create the impression of stern simplicity and severity. :

Along the dark yellow walls of the Ayuhaa hall, almost black horizontal stripes stretched along its entire length at different levels. Coming closer, it is not difficult to see that each such strip is a depression in the rock filled with clay particles. A thin metal rod will be immersed in this clay for its entire length. Such cracks in limestone separate the older, lower layers of limestone from the younger, upper layers. But both of them were formed hundreds of millions of years ago. Once upon a time there was a raging river bed here.

The austere hall of Ayuhaa is not without decorations, the most attractive of which are stocky stalagmites. They are composed of translucent, orange and red calcite. There are hundreds of them here, these clean, smooth gnomes, they lined up along the walls, ran down the slopes, pressed close to the excursion path - they escort you to the Iveria music hall.

Stalagmite in the Ayuhaa Hall:

Iveria Hall and the canyon towards the Anakopia Hall:

To the right of the path - :

A few more steps - and you find yourself in a real white-stone palace - the Anakopia Hall! A sloping floor of yellowish, light gray and white cave limestone cascades in wide cascades to the east, surrounded by walls hung with calcite draperies. These amazing “curtains”, once and forever bent into smooth folds, were formed from countless droplets of water flowing down the walls. On the ceiling of the hall there grows a whole forest - only with the tops down - of a wide variety of stalactites.

Login Anakopia Hall:

But “out of competition” in the Anakopia hall is a completely unusual cave “waterfall”, which does not exist on the earth’s surface. From a hole in a high steep wall, a huge, forever frozen stone shaft falls into the hall from a height of thirty meters. Its heavy “jet”, almost bursting into huge drops, rushes to the ground and stops, not reaching it some two meters. But along the smooth, slightly wavy surface of the calcite waterfall, real water flows. It falls down from the cascade and, breaking against the stones, flows in streams from bath to bath, rushing down through cracks and cracks.

The stone extravaganza of the most beautiful hall in the New Athos cave, Anakopia, is beautiful. But this is also the “wettest” hall - the relative air humidity here is always maximum - 100 percent. The fact is that the passage of the cave is crossed in this area by a small but constant underground watercourse. Moisture seeps from cracks in the ceiling, drops down the walls, and water dust hangs in the air. The presence of water saturated with calcium carbonate created this remarkable abundance of sinter formations.

Artfully illuminated with colored lamps, the Anakopia Hall appears before you as a magnificent ceremonial hall of the underground dwelling of good mountain spirits. This treasure trove of natural beauty and bounty offers a photo opportunity for a keepsake. The excursion route ends here, but the wonders of the New Athos Cave do not end.

- an amazing miracle of Abkhazia, located in New Athos in the depths of Mount Iverskaya, known throughout the world. She was found in 1961, and until then she hid her secrets. Local residents have long been interested in a large failure on the slope of Iverskaya Mountain, the steep walls of which went into the darkness, called the Bottomless Pit. For a very long time there were no brave souls who risked falling into the black abyss New Athos cave.

The first to try to descend into the hole was Givi Smyr, a resident of New Athos. But the failure turned out to be so deep that it was simply impossible to sink to the bottom without special equipment. To study the “Bottomless Pit,” a special expedition was created in 1961, in which Givi Smyr again took part. The remaining members of the assault four were Arsen Okrodzhanashvili, Zurab Tintilozov, Boris Gergedava.

They successfully overcame all obstacles and sank to the bottom of the cave. The walls and floor of the hole were covered with a thick layer of clay. The adjacent caves looked the same. Examining them one by one, speleologists discovered in one of them a strong draft of air from a small hole. Having squeezed through it one by one and illuminated the space, it was clear that the darkness was absorbing it and the light could not illuminate the vast spaces underground. The mystery of the Bottomless Pit was revealed - this miracle turned out to be a cave complex of 9 halls -.

After this expedition others followed. A huge amount of scientific material was collected and a detailed map of the cave was compiled. In 1965, speleologists even made a film about the unique beauties New Athos cave. Several years of hard work were spent in order for another of the attractions created by nature and man to appear in Abkhazia.

In 1975, an artificial tunnel was built to New Athos cave and the first train carried tourists along the “cave meter”. The journey to the cave begins from the lobby of the administrative building, located at the foot of the Iverskaya Mountain. The main entrance to the cave is located here. It is decorated with colored stained glass windows, mosaic panels and embossed paintings. You can buy souvenirs in small stalls. On the second floor you can sit in a pleasant cafe.

At the beginning of the excursion, tourists, at the invitation of the guide, go to the station - a mini metro, which is richly decorated with marble and granite tiles. The walls are decorated with panels of bright colors on fairy-tale themes. The entrance to the metro resembles a gate to the underground kingdom of a cave. The unique electric train "Tourist", designed for 90 people, arrives and the journey begins.

By the way, the electric train was designed by the design institute of the coal industry, and it was made at the carriage building plant in Riga. Road to New Athos Cave includes 3 stations: 1 tbsp. - “Entrance gate”, 2nd level - “Abkhazia hall” and 3rd level - “Anakopia hall”. The total length of the path is approximately 2 km.

New Athos Cave can be roughly divided into 2 parts. Part 1 is a series of vertical system of passages, as well as very steep crevices, up to 150 meters deep, and this route is unattractive and quite difficult. Part 2 of the route - the halls of the horizontal passage system. This route is the most attractive and interesting.

This is a huge karst cavity, the size of which rivals the largest dungeons in the world, such giants as the Shkocianska Cave (Yugoslavia) and the Carlsbad Cave (USA).

Its huge halls stretch for hundreds of meters. The cave has many galleries - intricately twisting ones. The landscape of the cave is unimaginable and varied: from the chaos of the gloomy lower halls to the most beautiful stalactite palaces. There are many lakes in the cave, the color of the water in them seems green.Some caves have amazing and a bush.

Open all year round. It has 9 halls. 6 halls that are available for display: the "Anakopia" hall - named after the ancient city of New Athos, the "Makhajirs" hall - named in honor of the peoples of the Caucasus, the "Nartaa" hall - the name is borrowed from the folk epic, the "Ayukhaa" hall - this is how the gorge sounds in the Abkhaz language, the “Apkhartsa” hall is an Abkhaz bowed musical instrument, the “Apsny” hall is translated from Abkhazian as “Country of the Soul”.

3 remaining, hall “named after. Givi Smyr", the "Speleologists" hall and the "Helictite" hall - natural laboratories for studying the cave, are closed to the public.

The tour passes through six of the nine halls of the cave. The total length of the route is 1.4 kilometers, with a total excursion duration of one and a half hours. The cave has a constant internal air temperature of +11 degrees. The excursion route passes sequentially through the following halls: the Anakopia hall, the Mukhajirs hall, the Nartaa hall, the Ayukhaa hall, the Apkhyartsa hall, the Apsny hall. Novo-Athos Cave is open all year round.

Halls of the New Athos Cave

New Athos Cave: Hall “Anakopia”.
The underground route begins from the Anakopia hall. In the hall you can see a hole called the “Bottomless Pit”, from the study of which the New Athos Cave was discovered. The depth of the “Bottomless Pit” is 139 meters. The Anakopia hall is very large and has the shape of a bag.
The width of the hall is 150 meters and its length is 150 meters. At the bottom of the hall there are huge boulders that were once collapsed and the bottom is covered with a thick layer of (plastic) clay. The ceiling of the hall has many voids, which are nicknamed “Organ pipes”.

In the depths of the Anakopia hall, New Athos cave lies the underground lake “Anatolia”. It has very slippery clay slopes and is riddled with watercourses. The depth of Lake Anatolia is 25 meters and it is located at a level of 36 m above the level of the Black Sea. This is the lowest point New Athos cave . The water in it has a temperature of + 12-14 degrees.

The second lake in the “Anakopia” hall is “Blue”. Its length is 50 meters and width 25 meters. Its banks are very steep and drop into the water with 20-meter plummets. These two lakes are interconnected and their depth constantly changes depending on the time of year. Along the perimeter of the walls of the “Anakopia” hall, horizontal stripes of dark brown color are visible, parallel to each other, one above the other, to the very top of the cave. These are traces of repeated flooding of the cave, partially or almost completely, during floods. In the present, a drainage tunnel has been made from the hall and the water now flows into the gorge of the Manikwara River.

In the “Anakopia” hall and in the next hall there are very few drip-drip formations - stalagmites, stalactites, stalagnates. The only sinter formation that cannot be ignored is the formation in the form of a huge human skull, located at the entrance to the next hall.

New Athos Cave: Hall of the "Makhajirs".
The hall is named in honor of the memory of the Abkhazians - Mukhajirs and other peoples of the Caucasus, forcibly resettled to Turkey and the countries of the Middle East. For the Abkhazians, Mahajirism is a terrible tragedy that has brought the people to the brink of almost complete extinction. The Hall of the Mukhajirs is the largest hall of the New Athos Cave. The grotto is comparable in size to the largest grottoes in the world's caves. The length of the grotto is 260 meters, width from 25 to 75 meters, height from 20 to 50 meters.

The “Mahajir” hall is significantly watered; water constantly flows into it, seeping deep into the massif and causing alluvial sediments. Karst processes continue in the cave to this day. In the southern initial part, the hall of "Mahajirs" differs little from the hall of "Anakopia": the same gloomy high arches, blocky heaps, gray walls. You can constantly hear the rustling of streams of water falling from above. The Hall of the Muhajirs has the first underground miracle - the White Mountain.

It is located in the middle of the hall, a massive dome-shaped calcite structure, 15 meters high, with a circumference of 40 meters. Speleologists claim that “White Mountain” grows by 1 mm per year. Behind the “White Mountain” there is a low-lying basin. The basin, completely filled with thick deposits of plastic clays, the thickness of which in some places reaches 30 meters, is located at an altitude of 47 meters above sea level. The construction of the excursion path in this place was not easy. A steel cave bridge-overpass was built over the basin at a height of 18 m; it is 120 meters long.

New Athos Cave: Nartaa Hall.

The name, so close to the Caucasian peoples, was used from a folk epic. The word Narty means warrior-heroes. According to legends, they are not characterized by cowardice and cowardice. The Nart epic begins in the 7th century BC. The length of the Nartaa hall is 110 m. The width of the hall is 25 to 35 meters, the height reaches 45 meters. The siphon lake decorates this hall, located at its end. The lake is located at the lowest point of the New Athos system.

The siphon lake is connected to the lake in the Anakopia hall, forming one water system with the river. Psyrtskha flowing on the territory of New Athos. The lake is “alive”. Due to small clay particles, the water is slightly cloudy, but despite this, a large number of translucent crustaceans feel at ease here. The largest ones grow up to 2 cm in length.

In the crevices of the clay floor of the hall lives an interesting species of insect - the tritus beetle; it differs from the earthly beetle in that it has no eyes. The Nartaa hall has bizarre sinter formations - stalagmites, red in color. They are translucent, light with a natural color. Stalactites fall towards them from above. In the depths, to the right of the not very large grotto, a huge boulder is visible, shaped like a fawn. It’s amazing how nature itself carved it out of solid rock. Just below, lies a block shaped like a monkey's head.

New Athos Cave: Ayukhaa Hall.

Due to the fact that the hall is lower and narrower, it was given the name “Ayukhaa”, translated from the Abkhaz language as a gorge. Its length from north to south is more than 100 m. Punched through the thickness of the mountain, as if struck by a giant hammer, it looks very powerful. Its height is from 10 to 30 meters, width from 10 to 20 meters. The bottom of the Ayuhaa hall is completely strewn with huge blocks of products that have become loose from prolonged chemical exposure.

Most of the hall is covered with “corallites” (plaster deposits). Only this cave has gypsum. Almost along its entire length, the ceiling of the “Ayuhaa” hall has the shape of an arc. The vault in some places consists of several wings. Here you can see perfectly preserved all kinds of recesses and recesses on the walls and vault. They were formed under the influence of stormy waters - these are ceiling “punishments”. Sheer walls and a flat, uneven ceiling create the impression of stern severity and simplicity.

Along the dark yellow walls of "Ayuhaa" along the entire length of its hall, at different levels there are black horizontal stripes, traces of former floods. Each such strip is a depression in the rock filled with clay particles. By inserting a metal rod, it will easily penetrate to the entire depth. In the past, the river formed a passage for itself, washing away rocks and forming the bed of an underground river and the Nartaa hall. In the present, nothing disturbs the silence of the hall - there is no sound of a waterfall or the murmuring of streams. This is the driest part of the New Athos cave.

The austere "Ayuhaa" also has its own decorations - chunky stalagmites consisting of translucent orange and red calcite. There are hundreds of them here. They resemble sleek and very clean gnomes lining the walls. Having descended the slopes, they pressed close to the excursion path, as if escorting tourists to the Iveria hall.

New Athos Cave: the Speleologists Hall and the Hall named after. Givi Smyr."

To the northeast of the “Ayuhaa” hall there is a corridor, after which the “Speleologists” hall begins. It is the highest hall of the Athos Cave, with a ceiling height of 100 meters. The Speleologists' Hall has an almost perfect round shape, resembling a temple, which is why the hall was nicknamed the "Temple". The vault of the “Speleologists” hall is dotted with holes, of which there are many, among them there are ordinary tectonic cracks, dark holes of oval or round shape.

These holes are called “organ pipes”, through which water and air enter the cave from the surface. Hall named after Givi Smyr" is essentially a continuation of the "Speleologists" hall, the smallest and highest located hall of the New Athos cave. It is located at an altitude of 170 meters above sea level.

There is no tour of the hall; it is used as a natural underground laboratory. The climate of the cave has unique healing properties. The air in the cave is in an ionized state and there are practically no pathogenic microbes in it. There is no dust and therefore allergens. Research on the treatment of hypertension and bronchial asthma was conducted in the hall, with good results.

New Athos Cave: "Apkhartsa" Hall.

“Apkhiartsa” is a bowed two-stringed musical instrument - the eternal companion of the Abkhazian in all days. The main folk musical instrument of the Abkhaz-Adyghe people. This hall of the New Athos cave is named after him. The “Apkhiartsa” hall, with its natural shape, resembles a concert hall. The length of the Aphiartsa hall is 85 meters, the width is from 25 to 40 meters. The ceiling of the hall is arched, up to 15 meters high.

The bottom is covered with blocks and clayey deposits. A person's voice or a musical note sounding under its oval dome acquires amazing richness and depth. There is always music for visitors here; artists of the Abkhaz State Choir sometimes give concerts under the arches of the Apkhartsa hall. Single amber-colored stalagmites formed in the hall. On the ceiling of the hall there are oval-shaped recesses - “organ pipes”.

New Athos Cave: Apsny Hall.
The Abkhazians call their small country “Apsny”, which in Abkhazian means “Country of the Soul”. The “Apsny” Hall has a small hall length - 85 meters, its width is from 30 to 45 meters. The height of the hall is from 15 to 45 meters. Every centimeter of space simply delights the eye - the Apsny Hall is the most beautiful of the halls of the New Athos Cave.

It fascinates with its frozen, bizarre sinter formations, as well as its frozen calcite stone waterfall. Its height is 20 meters. Water flows over its smooth surface. In the Apsny hall, placer-drop formations - oolites (cave pearls) - were found. This is the last room that ends the tour of the cave.

New Athos cave: Helectite grotto.

Above the “Apsny” hall, about 25 meters, there is an incredibly beautiful “Helectite” hall. Another miracle of the New Athos cave - there are many complexly formed sinter helectites. These are the same stalactites, their structure and chemical composition are practically no different from ordinary ones, but their growth does not obey any laws, and so far remains a mystery.

Thin, almost like threads, they hang vertically from the ceiling. They can bend at an angle, twist, wrap around neighboring stalactites with their threads, merging with them, then breaking away again and continuing their growth. Helectites, contrary to the law of gravity, can grow upward, towards the ceiling of the cave.

Bizarre and twisted or curved helectites are rarely found in caves. Therefore, the Helectite Hall serves as a natural laboratory for scientific purposes. Due to the low ceiling, there will be no tours of this room.