Tskaltubo, Georgia (wiki) was a popular Soviet spa resort with 22 sanatoriums capable to simultaneously host several thousand people. The main attraction was radioactive radon springs able, as stated, to cure diseases of the musculoskeletal system, heart, skin, as well as infertility. (Whether radon water is really healing or Tskaltubo was an all-Union center of placebo, let specialists figure it out.) After the collapse of the USSR in 1991, the flow of visitors dropped to almost zero, some sanatoriums were occupied by refugees from Abkhazia. As a result, most buildings fell into complete decline. I recently visited one of them. What happens to a building after 30 years of desolation, see below.
Tskaltubo, Georgia on the Google.Maps
The locals call this sanatorium Filiali (built in 1939), although it is marked as Sanatorium Savane Hotel on the Google maps. It has three floors and its facade's length is more than 100 meters. There are no doors in the building so anyone can enter but locals said the police can potentially fine a visitor if they notice one from the street.
This is what the central foyer looks like nowadays:
For half a century, this hall welcomed happy Soviet miners and milkmaids with diseases of the musculoskeletal system. Now there are destruction and desolation there.
On the central staircase, as you can see, rockfall regularly occurs. I even hesitated whether to go upstairs but the desire to inspect the building properly convinced me to continue on my way.
The same staircase, a view from the second floor:
Stairs turned into trash.
In some places, the plaster still hangs but I was choosing corridors where it had fallen off - it's safer. I also put on a thick hood - some kind of protection.
The ceiling's plaster on the floor - I was luck it rained last days so there was no dust (possibly harmful to health).
Unlike the abandoned bathhouse number 5, there is absolutely no "positive energy" in this sanatorium. A huge gloomy building without a single person, I did not even find traces of stray dogs, and there are many of them in Tskaltubo. Finding a den of people who like to get stoned away from judgmental glances is not always pleasant for a lone stranger but the absence of such creates the feeling that even the most desperate ones avoid the building.
I didn't feel a fairy tale in this building, as in the bathhouse #5. On the contrary, I thought that it did not take long to go crazy in such corridors.
In one of dark rooms, for a second, I saw a hanger with a dress on it. The vision frightened me although I knew that it was just a figment of my imagination. I wanted to leave these corridors as soon as possible. But the desire to inspect the building properly compelled me to keep on exploring.
A balcony on the second floor. Breathing the fresh air, seeing the sky was a relief.
The third floor was even worse:
I realized that the higher floor, the closer to the roof, the closer to rain and dripping water so the more plants in rooms and corridors.
Trees and ferns are present on the third floor:
Blackberries and moss:
I didn't see every room - too many and I thought it was enough, it was time to leave.
There was another level I didn't visit, the underground.
I took an image with a flash and left the building - the very idea of visiting underground made me shudder. Thank you, no.
Having left the building, I breathed a sigh of relief. I found a puddle and, using a stick, started cleaning my shoe soles from stuck plaster.
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I took these images with a Nikkor 24mm on a full-frame DSLR Nikon D750 on January 9, 2023 in Tskaltubo, Georgia
