Gori, Georgia

Gori, Georgia - darkometer rating : 3 - A town north-west of Georgia 's capital Tbilisi , and famous as the birthplace of Josef Stalin . A dedicated museum celebrates the city's (in)famous son with panache. The place also hit western headlines in the summer of 2008 during the short but violent war with Russia over South Ossetia , when Gori was briefly occupied by Russian forces. The scars of the bombings during this war can no longer be seen in Gori (everything was repaired quickly). But the local war museum has a small section about this war. > What there is to see > Location > Access and costs > Time required > Combinations with other dark destinations > Combinations with non-dark destinations > Photos What there is to see: Gori would quite probably not be on any tourists' map if it wasn't for the town's (in)famous Stalin Museum. The smaller local war museum is also worth a look. - Stalin Museum - Gori war museum Other than that there's really not much to see in this rather drab provincial town. It is however remarkable that even the main boulevard in the centre which is named after Stalin is also labelled thus in English, not just Georgian ... and: no Russian! How much politics there can be in a simple street sign … (cf. under Georgia in general). You may have heard about the famous tall bronze statue of Stalin in Gori's main square (Stalin Square) in front of the town hall, which was one of the last few ones that was left standing after de-Stalinization in the USSR following the man's death in 1953, and also after Georgia gained independence, when it was even defended by the people of Gori. But unfortunately (?) it is no longer there today. It was torn down one day in June 2010 in the middle of the night. It was reported that a new monument related to the 2008 war should take its place (www.bbc.co.uk/news/10412097).