Ureki tide times

Ureki is a Black Sea resort town in Georgia's Guria region, 50 km northwest of Batumi, and it is known for one thing above all others: the colour of its sand. The beach at Ureki is black — the sand composed largely of magnetite, a magnetic iron oxide mineral eroded from the volcanic and metamorphic rocks of the Caucasus and concentrated by wave sorting along this section of coast. A magnet drawn through the sand picks up a visible mass of black metalite grains within seconds. The magnetic nature of the sand is measurable and real, and the Georgian sanatorium tradition, which dates from the Soviet period and remains active, treats the beach as a therapeutic resource: sunbathing on the magnetite sand and burial of the limbs in the warm sand is prescribed at several sanatoria and health hotels in the town for cardiovascular and musculoskeletal conditions. Whether the magnetic field of the sand produces the claimed effects is a clinical question outside the scope of this page; the therapeutic tradition is genuine, the infrastructure is real, and Georgian visitors arrive specifically for the treatment protocol.

The beach at Ureki extends for roughly 6 km, wide and backed by a low dune belt and then the dense subtropical vegetation of the Colchic lowland. The sand is dark enough that it absorbs solar heat more rapidly than pale beach sand — the surface can reach 40°C in direct July and August sun, which is intentional for the burial therapy but requires caution for unacclimatised visitors. The sea temperature here reaches 24 to 25°C in August, the same as elsewhere on the eastern Georgian coast.

The Black Sea at Ureki is microtidal: mean astronomical range 0.1 to 0.2 m. This is a characteristic of the entire enclosed Black Sea, which has only the narrow Turkish Straits as its connection to the Mediterranean tidal system. The tidal signal at Ureki is effectively absent as a practical influence on beach activity. What moves the water level here is meteorological: Black Sea storms and seiches (standing oscillations within the enclosed basin) can produce water-level changes of 0.5 to 1.0 m with periods of hours, entirely unrelated to astronomical tide. A seiche in the Black Sea with a period of roughly 36 hours can produce oscillations that look like a large slow tide but are driven by the resonance of the basin under wind forcing, not by the moon. Autumn and winter storms from the northwest produce the most significant surge events on the Georgian coast; summer conditions are generally calmer.

Paddlers and kayakers launch from the southern end of Ureki beach where the current is lighter and the wave exposure lower. Shore anglers fish the river mouths and the rocky points that occasionally interrupt the sandy beach, targeting mullet and sea bass. The Colchic wetlands behind the beach — a remnant of the Colchic rainforest and its associated lowland marsh system — are accessible by road from Ureki and hold significant bird populations.

Predictions on this page come from Open-Meteo Marine, a gridded global ocean model. At the 0.1 to 0.2 m astronomical range of the Georgian Black Sea coast, the model's typical accuracy of plus or minus 45 minutes on timing and 0.2 to 0.3 m on height is equal to or larger than the total tidal signal. The predictions describe the background astronomical rhythm; actual water-level conditions are driven by wind, seiche, and storm surge. The Georgian Hydrometeorology Department (under the Environment and Climate Change Department) publishes weather and sea-state bulletins for the Georgian coast.