Tours and excursions in Georgia

What makes these tours different

Most of our tours are built from scratch. You tell us how many you are, how many days you have, what interests you and what pace suits you, and we assemble the route around that. In practice it means you are not sitting on a coach with forty strangers, and you are not spending an hour at a site you have no interest in.

Every tour comes with a licensed guide who works in Georgian, English or Russian, and a separate driver. The two roles are deliberately not combined: the guide's attention is on you, the driver's is on the road. On mountain routes that require it, the 4x4 transfer and its local driver are included in the price.

How the season shapes the route

Georgia's terrain means it can be 28 degrees in Batumi and snowing in Ushguli on the same day. From May to October every mountain direction is open - Svaneti, Tusheti, Khevsureti, Kazbegi. Between November and April some high villages close off, and the ski season starts instead at Gudauri and Bakuriani.

Kakheti, Kartli, Tbilisi and the Black Sea coast are reachable all year. Rtveli, the grape harvest, runs from mid-September to late October and is the only period when you can actually work in the winery rather than watch. We flag this when we agree dates, so you do not miss the season by a week.

What the price covers

As standard the price includes a comfortable vehicle with a driver, fuel, parking, a licensed guide in your language, and the entry tickets the route requires. On multi-day tours a hotel or guesthouse is added, agreed with you in advance.

Charged separately: lunch, wine tastings, and any activity that is not a compulsory part of the route - paragliding or a horse ride, for example. Everything is itemised for you in writing beforehand: what is in the price and what is not. No extra charges appear once you are on the road.

Booking, payment and cancellation

There is no form to fill in - a message on WhatsApp, Viber or Telegram is enough. For a straightforward tour the full offer reaches you the same day; for a multi-day route it takes 1-2 working days, because we check hotel and guide availability before quoting.

We do not normally ask for a deposit on tours - you settle on the day, in cash, by card or by transfer. Rescheduling and cancelling are free with 24 hours' notice. A mountain tour called off because of the weather is always moved to another date at no cost.

Distances from Tbilisi: real hours, not kilometres

In Georgia the kilometre is a poor measure. Tbilisi to Kutaisi is 230 kilometres and three hours, because almost the whole stretch is motorway. Svaneti is 460 kilometres but takes 8 to 9 hours - the last hundred kilometres wind through the Enguri gorge, where the average speed rarely passes 40.

The real times for the routes people ask for most: Stepantsminda 157 kilometres and three hours, Telavi 95 kilometres and two hours over the Gombori pass, Borjomi 160 kilometres and two and a half hours, Batumi 370 kilometres and five to six hours, Vardzia 260 kilometres and four hours.

Which is why we fix the itinerary against the distances rather than the wish list. With three days, two directions fit; with four, three. When someone asks to see both Svaneti and Kazbegi in one day, we say plainly that it cannot be done, and offer the alternative.

Road reality: what the roads are actually like

There are three kinds of road here and each one calls for a different vehicle and a different allowance of time. The motorway west from Tbilisi is fast and predictable. The main highways - the Military Highway, or the road east to Kakheti - are surfaced but narrow, full of switchbacks and busy with traffic.

The Military Highway crosses the Jvari pass at 2,379 metres and stays open all year, though it closes temporarily in winter when the avalanche risk rises. The Abano pass into Tusheti is 2,850 metres, passable only by 4x4 and open only from June to early October - it is the hardest road in the country.

The third kind is unpaved: parts of Ushguli, Tusheti, Khevsureti and Racha. A 4x4 is compulsory there and it is included in our price together with a local driver who knows that particular valley. Taking an ordinary saloon onto those roads is not worth it.

The UNESCO sites and which tour each one falls into

Georgia has four World Heritage sites. The historical monuments of Mtskheta - Svetitskhoveli, Jvari and Samtavro - are 20 kilometres from Tbilisi and fit into almost any day trip. Gelati monastery, founded by David the Builder in 1106, stands just outside Kutaisi.

Upper Svaneti has been listed since 1996, and Chazhashi, one of the hamlets of Ushguli, is singled out within it as the most completely preserved. The Colchic rainforests and wetlands were added in 2021 - relict forests in western Georgia, parts of which are reachable from Batumi.

Beyond those, the intangible heritage list carries the qvevri method of winemaking, inscribed in 2013, and the three scripts of the Georgian writing system, inscribed in 2016. Both are woven into the Kakheti wine routes and the cultural walks in Tbilisi.

High season and low season: the practical difference

July and August are the busiest months. Hotels then need booking three or four weeks ahead, particularly in Batumi, Kazbegi and Mestia. The popular sites - Gergeti church, Uplistsikhe, Vardzia - fill up around midday, so we plan to arrive before nine in the morning.

From mid-September to late October it is rtveli, the grape harvest, and that is a peak of its own in Kakheti. The wineries are at their most interesting then, and also at their busiest - family cellars often take visitors by prior arrangement only. So we book harvest dates a fortnight ahead.

April, May, late October and November are the quietest: the sites are open, the crowds are gone and hotels have space. The only constraint is that some high mountain villages may not have opened yet or may already have closed - which we check against your specific dates.

Food, diet and allergies

Georgian cooking is built on meat, yet it is still easier for a vegetarian here than elsewhere in the region. The reason is fasting: the Orthodox calendar produced, over centuries, a large body of entirely plant-based dishes - lobio, pkhali, aubergine with walnut, mushrooms, beetroot salads.

For a vegan the things to watch are walnut and cheese: plenty of dishes that look plant-based contain cheese. In a restaurant the guide checks this properly in Georgian, because the English translation on a menu is often inaccurate.

If you have an allergy - walnut above all, which is everywhere in Georgian cooking - put it in your first message. We warn the restaurants and guesthouses in advance, and on routes with overnight stays we follow it up particularly carefully.

Language and communication on the route

The state language is Georgian and it has its own alphabet - 33 letters that resemble neither Latin nor Cyrillic. In practice that means you will not read the street signs in a village, though the main highways carry Latin transliteration alongside.

In Tbilisi and Batumi younger people speak English, while the middle and older generations speak Russian. In the regions, and particularly in the mountains, neither will get you far - which is why a guide here is a practical necessity rather than a luxury.

Our guides work in Georgian, English or Russian. If you need another language, tell us in advance: for some languages we can find a separate guide, though it takes a few days' notice and does not work on every date.

Safety and emergencies

Georgia has a single emergency number, 112 - police, ambulance and fire. The operators answer in English. That number is printed on every route sheet we hand out, alongside our own 24-hour line.

On mountain routes three things matter: signal, weather and altitude. The mobile network drops out in parts of the gorges, so the driver reports the group's position to our dispatcher each time he comes back into coverage. If a group has not appeared by the agreed time, the response starts automatically.

Medical insurance is not included in the tour price, but we arrange it separately and on mountain routes we recommend it outright. That applies especially to hiking and 4x4 tours, where the nearest hospital can be an hour away.

Photography, drones and the rules on filming

In most churches and monasteries photography inside is forbidden or restricted, while outside it is free. That is each monastery's own rule rather than a general law, so the guide tells you before you go in. Flash on frescoes is forbidden everywhere.

Drones require registration in Georgia, and flying near airports, military installations and border zones is prohibited. That last point applies particularly to Kazbegi, Tusheti and parts of Svaneti. The rules change from time to time, so we check close to your dates and give you the answer in writing.

On clothing: in working monasteries women need a head covering and a long skirt, men long trousers. Wraps are usually available at the entrance, but not everywhere. We mark on the route sheet which rule applies at which site.

Money, cards and what to carry in cash

The currency is the lari and in Tbilisi, Batumi and Kutaisi cards work almost everywhere. There are plenty of cash machines in the cities and they take foreign cards, though some add a fee of their own to the transaction - they show it on screen before you confirm.

In the regions the picture changes. In mountain villages - Ushguli, Tusheti, Khevsureti - cards are often taken nowhere and there is no cash machine either. Family wineries, markets and local carriers work in cash only.

A practical rule: draw cash in the last sizeable town before you head up - Mestia, Telavi, Stepantsminda or Kutaisi. How much depends on the route, and we put a specific figure in the offer. Exchanging currency at a bureau in town beats the airport rate.