This is your destination guide for Georgia.
Stone towers older than most cathedrals, villages under a 5,000-metre wall of ice, and four days on foot between them.
The reality: It's the third day of the trek. You've just come over the Chkhutnieri pass, and the Adishi Glacier is behind you, hanging off the mountain like a frozen waterfall. Below you is a green valley with a handful of stone houses and two tall towers. A woman is waving from a balcony. That's tonight's guesthouse.
Svaneti is Georgia's most remote mountain region, high in the Greater Caucasus. For centuries it was so hard to reach that it kept its own language, its own laws and its own blood feuds, which is why every family built a defence tower. Hundreds still stand. It's no longer cut off: Mestia has a paved road, an airport and craft-beer cafés.
But the mountains are the same. Come for at least four days, and walk.
Towers in every garden, and a museum full of gold.
Mestia — Svaneti's main town, a long valley village with dozens of medieval Svan towers between the houses. Families built them to hide in during feuds and invasions, and some are still privately owned.
Margiani house-museum — climb the inside ladders of a tower and see the machubi, the old family house where people and animals lived together through the winter.
Svaneti Museum — icons, gold and silver crosses and manuscripts that Svan villages hid here for centuries.
Mount Ushba — the double-peaked rock at the head of the valley, which climbers call the Matterhorn of the Caucasus. Watch it from a café in the evening.
The end of the road, under the highest peak in Georgia.
Ushguli — four small villages at about 2,100 m, at the head of the Enguri valley, around 45 km from Mestia.
Shkhara — at 5,193 m, Georgia's highest mountain, with a wall of ice along its side. Walk up the valley towards the Shkhara Glacier, a flat 4–5 hours return.
Lamaria — a small stone church on the hill above the villages, with a tower beside it.
Stay the night — most people come on a day trip from Mestia in a 4x4, about 2 hours each way. The day-trippers leave in the afternoon, and the light on Shkhara at sunset is worth staying for.
A classic trek, two lakes and a lot of glacier.
Mountain food, and salt that tastes of garlic.
Kubdari — Svaneti's meat pie, a round bread filled with chopped beef or pork, onion and spices. Order it everywhere.
Tashmijabi and elarji — mashed potato beaten with stretchy cheese until it pulls like elastic, and the same idea with cornmeal.
Svan salt — on every table: salt, garlic, blue fenugreek, coriander and chilli. Buy a bag to take home.
Guesthouse dinners — big home-cooked meals, often with homemade wine or chacha (grape brandy).
A short summer and a long, snowy winter.
Late June to mid-September — trekking season, 18–25°C in Mestia, colder higher up. Passes can hold snow until late June. August is the busiest month.
Late September and early October — quieter, with yellow birches and clear air, but cold nights, and guesthouses on the trek start to close.
January to March — ski season, with deep snow.
Spring — avalanches and mud can close roads.
Minibus, small plane, or your own two feet.
By minibus — marshrutkas go to Mestia from Kutaisi and Tbilisi, via Zugdidi and past the huge Enguri Dam. From Zugdidi it's about 3 hours. From Tbilisi it's 9–10 hours, so many people take the night train to Zugdidi first.
By plane — small planes fly to Mestia from Tbilisi and Kutaisi in about an hour, but they're cancelled in bad weather. Don't plan anything tight around them.
In Svaneti — shared 4x4 taxis go from Mestia to Ushguli and the trailheads. Drive yourself only if you're used to mountain roads.
Guesthouses, from the town to the end of the road.
Mestia centre — guesthouses and small hotels, with cafés and transport.
Mestia's upper quarters — Lanchvali and Lakhiri, quieter, with tower views.
Ushguli — simple guesthouses under Shkhara. Reserve ahead in August.
On the trek — family guesthouses in Zhabeshi, Adishi and Iprari, with dinner and breakfast.
Becho — a quiet valley below Ushba, for climbers and hikers.
Find Mestia stays →Cheap beds and dinners, expensive rides.
Svaneti is cheap once you're here. Guesthouses with dinner and breakfast are good value, and the trek itself costs very little. What costs is getting around: 4x4 rides to Ushguli and the trailheads, and the horse at the Adishi river.
Prices in 2026 Georgian lari. 10 GEL is about €3. Ushguli fills up in August.
Go if you want medieval towers, a four-day village trek and the highest peak in Georgia at the end of the road. Skip if you hate long bus rides, have a tight schedule or want empty viewpoints in August. Five days at least.
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