Batumi in a Day: From Medea’s Gaze to Dancing Fountains

The morning haze on Europe Square hadn’t yet burned off when our guide collected us from the hotel. Standing beneath Davit Khmaladze’s bronze Medea—her hand forever clutching the Golden Fleece—I felt the city’s mix of myth and modern life click into focus. As we wound through Old Batumi’s pastel façades, the narrow lanes smelled of fresh khachapuri and salty sea breeze.

Piazza Square chimed eleven; cafés spilled swing-band jazz onto cobblestones. A few blocks later, Poseidon’s gilded trident gleamed outside the Drama Theater, as if the sea god himself were rehearsing. The historic quarter funneled us toward the harbor, where cargo cranes creaked like metallic gulls.

At the Alphabet Tower—its double-helix lattice spelling Georgian letters skyward—I craned my neck and spotted the slow embrace of Ali & Nino, Tamara Kvesitadze’s moving sculpture. Their silent rotation felt like a love story told in clockwork.

Optional detour? Absolutely. The cable car glided over red-tiled roofs to Anuria Mountain, 250 m above the shoreline. Up there the Black Sea shimmered cobalt, and the Caucasus ridge hid behind a veil of clouds. It’s the kind of view that compresses time; ancient legend and modern skyline share one heartbeat.

Back in town, the Nobel Brothers Technological Museum surprised me with kerosene lamps and stories of industrial empires, while the Adjara Archaeological Museum displayed delicate Colchian gold—the sparkle Medea herself might have envied.

Spiritual Batumi revealed itself next: the neo-Gothic Holy Mother Nativity Cathedral’s spires nearly pierced the rain clouds; St. Nicholas Church chimed vespers; the nearby mosque broadcast the call to prayer; and the synagogue’s blue dome glowed softly. Four faiths within four blocks—an atlas of tolerance drawn in stone.

 

We ended along the palm-lined boulevard where fountains danced to pop music under raspberry-pink lights. Children shrieked, fountains leapt, and for a moment I wasn’t a visitor but a note in Batumi’s nightly symphony. I walked back to the hotel with damp shoes, a happy fatigue, and the sense I’d walked into a legend still writing itself.