Kharagauloba in Georgia: dates, meaning and how to experience it

By Mariam Lomidze, GTour desk · Fact-checked against the sources listed · Last checked 25 October 2026 · Editorial policy

What it is

Kharagauloba is the annual town festival of Kharagauli, a small municipal centre in the Imereti region of western Georgia. The name follows a common Georgian pattern: the suffix -oba turns a proper noun into the name of a feast or commemorative day, so Kharagauloba means, roughly, “the day of Kharagauli” or “the Kharagauli festival.” Unlike feasts such as Giorgoba (St George’s Day) or Alaverdoba, which commemorate saints or historic church consecrations, Kharagauloba is a secular, civic occasion — a “town day” in the tradition of Tbilisoba, the capital’s own autumn festival, but on a local and much smaller scale.

The festival is organised for and by the people of Kharagauli municipality: town residents, families from the surrounding highland villages, returning relatives who travel back from Tbilisi or abroad for the weekend, and staff of the nearby Borjomi-Kharagauli National Park, one of the largest protected areas in the Caucasus, whose northern entrances lie within the municipality. Visitors are welcome, and in recent years the event has been promoted as part of a wider effort to draw hikers and nature tourists to the park before the onset of winter.

Historical background

• Medieval period — The Kharagauli district formed part of the historic western Georgian lands associated with the Kingdom of Imereti after the fragmentation of the unified Kingdom of Georgia.
• 1810 — The Imereti kingdom was absorbed into the Russian Empire, and the area later administered within the Kutaisi Governorate.
• 1872 — The Transcaucasian Railway linking the Black Sea port of Poti to Tbilisi was completed across the Imereti highlands and the Likhi Range, making Kharagauli a railway station town.
• Soviet period — Kharagauli became the centre of an administrative district (raion) within the Georgian SSR, with forestry, agriculture and rail transit as its economic base.
• 1935 onward — Large tracts of forest and alpine meadow around Kharagauli and Borjomi were set aside as protected state forest, the forerunner of today’s national park.
• 1995 — Borjomi-Kharagauli National Park was formally established, spanning parts of Kharagauli, Borjomi and Adigeni municipalities, and is today managed by Georgia’s Agency of Protected Areas.
• Post-Soviet decades — According to local accounts, Kharagauli municipality began holding an organised autumn town festival as part of a broader revival of municipal “oba” celebrations seen across Georgia after independence.
• 2020s — Kharagauloba continues as an annual gathering combining harvest-season customs, folk performance and promotion of the national park as a visitor destination, with exact dates set by the municipality each year.

Kharagauli’s history is bound up with two forces: the railway and the forest. The Transcaucasian line, engineered through the difficult Surami Pass corridor in the nineteenth century, turned a scatter of Imeretian villages into a transit town linking the Black Sea coast with Tbilisi, and the station remains a recognisable feature of the municipality today. Through the Soviet period the surrounding mountains were managed as state forest reserve, protecting the mixed broadleaf and conifer woodland that still covers the slopes above the town.

The creation of Borjomi-Kharagauli National Park in 1995 gave the district a second identity as a gateway to one of the Caucasus’s larger protected landscapes, with marked long-distance trails running north from entrance villages such as Marelisi and Nedzvi toward Likani and Borjomi. Kharagauloba, as a civic festival timed to the close of the hiking season, sits at the intersection of these two histories: an old railway and forestry town reintroducing itself to visitors through the language of local food, song and the neighbouring national park.

Meaning and traditions

At its core, Kharagauloba is a supra (feast table) extended to the whole town: stalls selling produce from local gardens and orchards, exhibitions of crafts such as wood carving and wool work, performances by local folk ensembles, and speeches by municipal officials marking the year’s achievements. Food on offer typically includes Imeretian specialties — round, flat imeruli khachapuri (cheese bread, distinct from the boat-shaped Adjarian version), lobio (bean stew), seasonal fruit and honey from the surrounding foothills, and local wine.

Music is central: Georgian polyphonic singing, recognised by UNESCO as a Masterpiece of the Oral and Intangible Heritage of Humanity, is performed by community choirs, alongside regional dance groups. A tamada (toastmaster) typically leads toasts at any communal table set up for the occasion, following the structured sequence of toasts — to peace, to ancestors, to the harvest — common to Georgian feasts generally. Because the festival borders a national park, recent editions have also included guided walks, talks on local nature, and displays by park rangers, linking the town celebration to the forested mountains above it.

Regional variation is limited, since Kharagauloba is a single-town event rather than a widely dispersed feast, but it belongs to a recognisable Georgian family of municipal “oba” days — Tbilisoba in the capital, Mtskhetoba in Mtskheta, and smaller equivalents in towns across the country — each adapted to local produce, history and landscape.

When it happens

Kharagauloba has no fixed date in either the civil or church calendar; it is a municipal event whose exact weekend is set by Kharagauli municipality each year, usually in November, after the main hiking season in Borjomi-Kharagauli National Park has wound down and before the first heavy mountain snow. In 2026 the festival is expected on 21–22 November, to be confirmed closer to the date. For 2027, organisers are likely to again choose a weekend in mid-to-late November, though this should be verified with the municipality or a local operator nearer the time.

Kharagauloba is not a Georgian public holiday. Government offices, banks and transport across the rest of the country operate normally, and only Kharagauli’s own schools, municipal offices and local businesses adjust their schedules around the event for rehearsals, street closures and stallholder set-up.

Where to experience it

The festival centres on Kharagauli’s town square and House of Culture, where the main stage, food stalls and craft tables are usually set up. Visitors arriving by train or car can expect a short walk from the station or central car park to the square. For those wanting to combine the town day with the national park, the entrance villages of Marelisi and Nedzvi, both within the municipality, offer access to marked trails and, in season, ranger-guided walks through beech and spruce forest.

If a church service or visit to a local chapel forms part of the weekend, standard Georgian Orthodox etiquette applies: modest dress, covered shoulders and, for women, a headscarf is appreciated though not always enforced; photography inside should be discreet. In private homes, guests should expect to be seated at a supra and offered food and wine repeatedly; accepting a small amount and returning toasts respectfully is customary, and leaving a table abruptly is considered impolite.

Did you know

• Borjomi-Kharagauli National Park, bordering
  

  Sources

  • Kharagauloba Festival – Agenda.ge News Report
  • Kharagauloba Marks Autumn Harvest Traditions – Interpressnews.ge
  • Kharagauli Region Cultural Events – Civil.ge
  • Kharagauloba Festival Report – 1TV.ge
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