Small Group Tour in Georgia

Culture in the High Caucasus

DAY 1 International Flight

Today your small group tour in Georgia begins. After meeting at the airport you will boardyour morning flight from the UK to Tblisi via Istanbul to arrive in the evening. It's a 30-minute drive to your hotel in the capital, where you will be staying for the next three nights.

DAY 2 To Mtskheta

Today you'll be heading west from the capital to Mtskheta, which is one of the oldest towns in and the cultural and religious centre of Georgia, as well as a UNESCO World Heritage site.

Enjoy browsing the Dry Bridge Market, a wonderful flea market stocked with curios and antiques from the Soviet era. Once you're done bartering, it's a short distance from Tbilisi to Mtskheta. Once a crossroads of many trade routes from the third century BC, this small town has a wonderful 11th century Eastern Orthodox cathedral where you can often hear local choirs, before you head off to the sixth century Jvari mountaintop monastery nearby. After all of this exploration, it's time for lunch at the wonderful Chateau Mukhrani with its glorious restored castle before returning to the capital for some polyphonic singing.

DAY 3 Up to Kazbegi

For the next leg of your small group tour in Georgia, depart the capital for Kazbegi, a valley town instantly recognisable by the towering Mount Kazbek and the silhouette of the Gergeti Holy Trinity Church.

In the morning, you will leave the capital to make your way up to Kazbegi on the old Russian Military Highway; a fantastic journey of hairpin bends and glorious views. On the drive, stop off at Ananuri Architectural Complex, which was the former residence of the splendidly-named Dukes of Aragvi. Stop for lunch with a local family and learn to make khinkali, a delicious local speciality, before continuing on to check in to your lovely hotel for two nights.

DAY 4 Head south into the Kakheti Region

Time to pack your bags to meet your driver and travel to the next stop on your small group tour in Georgia, the Kakheti region. This part of Georgia is famous for its wine producing (and wine drinking) culture, but before you get too into that, make a few cultural stops including at the Bodbe nunnery complex and the town of Sighnaghi, reminiscent of Tuscany with its red brick roofs and old town.

Then, after lunch you will head onto the city of Telavi to check in for two nights.

DAY 5 Head west into Imreti region

It's time to leave the Kakheti region and head west into the Imreti region. En route, stop at the impressive rock-hewn town of Uplistsikhe - an ancient cave town dating from the first half of the first millennium BC. The entire town is a complex of rock-cut streets, residences, churches, secret tunnels, water passages, markets and the oldest theatre in Georgia and it's a great site to wander around. Continue onwards to Gori, the birthplace of Stalin. Here visit the museum and the house he grew up in before hitting the road one last time to arrive at your hotel in Kutaisi.

DAY 6 Becho Valley to Mestia

Enjoy a hike this morning under the shadow of Mount Ushba in glorious surroundings, taking a picnic lunch to enjoy in a lovely spot. Afterwards, continues a short distance to Mestia to check into your hotel for two nights. Mestia is dominated by a forest of ninth century defensive towers and is the starting and finishing point for many hikes and treks into the mountains. It is also home to the Svan people who speak a dialect and eke out an existence through the land having done so since the Middle Ages. There is lots to explore including the excellent Ethnographical and History Museum.

DAY 7 From Mestia to Ushguli

Today is an adventure on your small group tour in Georgia, as you depart early this morning depart early in 4WD vehicles to head up the rough bumpy track high into the mountains to reach the little village of Ushguli, one of the highest continuously-inhabited villages in Europe. It's a glorious drive (weather permitting!) with stops en route at the Love Tower - a beautiful isolated defense tower near a river - and a locally-run café for the best yoghurt and coffee, before reaching the village where cows and pigs wander the muddy main thoroughfare. You will visit the church and take time to explore this extraordinary place which is pretty much cut off throughout winter. Lunch will be at a local artist's house before returning back to Mestia for the last night in the Svaneti region.

DAY 8 From Mestia to Batumi

Sadly the time has come to depart Mestia, so this morning you'll start the journey back down the winding road all the way to Batumi on the Black Sea coast.. The drive time will be around seven hours with several leg stretching stops en route.

The main stop will be in the Becho Valley, which is one of the most beautiful areas in Svaneti, where pigs and cows wander in the road in front of picture perfect houses. Enjoy lunch here and then carry on before stopping again in Zugdidito to visit Dadiani's Palace, where one of Napoleon's bronze death masks is kept.

You should arrive into Batumi in the early evening and check in to your hotel for two nights.