16 November 2019
carve your niche
this is vardzia, a famous cave monastery in the south of georgia, and one of the top places i wanted to visit when i was researching the country. it was a bit of a mission to get to from the mountains in the north, involving a couple of buses, a taxi and a helpful armenian family, but it lived up to my expectations. it was built in the 12th century, and at it's peak there were over 6000 rooms across multiple levels, all of which could only be accessed through a secret tunnel by the river. the original idea of this secret sanctuary was to offer protection from the threat of invading mongols. it succeeded in this task, but unfortunately it wasn't able to resist mother nature quite so easily, and 100 years after construction an earthquake destroyed more than two thirds of the city, exposing the hidden caves. it was raided and destroyed again in the 16th century when the persians invaded, so it must look very different now to how it was. the only part which is somewhat maintained and 'functioning' is a church in the middle, which is surrounded by labyrinthine tunnels twisting inside the mountain.
here's the original
here's the original
i've posted 198 photos taken with my nikon d810 - here are the last few i posted - view the rest here
i've posted 80 photos taken with a shutter speed of 1/400 sec - here are the last few i posted - view the rest here
i've posted 131 photos taken with an aperture of f/8 - here are the last few i posted - view the rest here
i've posted 3 photos taken with a focal length of 21.0 mm
i've posted 15 photos taken from georgia - here are the last few i posted - view the rest here
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these are all the countries of which i've posted photos