From the Mountains to the Sea

Once you have been met at the airport, your guide takes you on foot around Old Tbilisi, beginning at Metekhi Church high above the Mtkvari River. The cable car hoists you up to Narikala Fortress; walking down again, you pass the sulphur baths of Abanotubani and reach the Leghvtakhevi waterfall in its little gorge. Narrow lanes then lead to Sioni Cathedral and Anchiskhati, the city's oldest surviving church, and you finish by crossing the Bridge of Peace into Rike Park. A welcome dinner in the evening introduces Georgian cooking and the toasts of the supra.

Mtskheta, once the capital of Kartli, gives you your first two stops, Jvari Monastery and Svetitskhoveli Cathedral, before you turn north onto the Georgian Military Highway. Ananuri, a 17th-century fortress whose two churches look over the Zhinvali Reservoir, is the next break, followed by the Friendship Monument near Gudauri, a curved mosaic wall above the sheer drop of the Aragvi gorge. Beyond the Jvari Pass, at 2,379 m, lies the valley of the Tergi. In Stepantsminda you switch to a 4x4 for the steep track to Gergeti Trinity Church and its view of Mount Kazbek, and then you check in for two nights.

Drive to Sno, a village where a local sculptor has carved huge stone heads of Georgian poets and writers, and continue up the valley road to Juta, about 2,150 m up. From here the trail rises gently through summer wildflower meadows toward the Chaukhi massif, a wall of rocky spires reaching 3,842 m. The round trip to the base of the massif is four to five hours on foot, with about 500 m of ascent, and it is easy to turn it into a shorter walk. Picnic beside the stream at lunchtime and return to Stepantsminda late in the afternoon.

Leave Kazbegi in the morning, drive south past Mtskheta and then west through the Mtkvari valley. At Uplistsikhe you explore a town carved out of a sandstone ridge, whose people stayed from the 1st millennium BC right through to the 13th century: halls, wine presses and, at the very top, a brick basilica. Then it is on to Borjomi, a wooded gorge where a spa town grew up in the 19th century around springs whose salty mineral water became known across the former Soviet Union. In the evening, wander through Central Park and drink the water straight from the spring.

Heading south, the road threads the Mtkvari gorge and passes Khertvisi, among the oldest fortresses in Georgia, perched where the Paravani joins the Mtkvari. Vardzia itself was hollowed out of Mount Erusheti's cliffs late in the 12th century, in the time of King Giorgi III and then Queen Tamar. Hundreds of rooms survive, stacked over several levels and joined by tunnels and stairways, clustered around the Church of the Dormition, where Tamar's portrait is still on the wall. On the way back you visit Rabati Castle in Akhaltsikhe, restored so that a mosque, a church and a citadel share one ring of walls.

Your morning belongs to Borjomi's Central Park: a cable car rises to the plateau above town, and at the far end of the forest path there are warm sulphur pools. After that the Rikoti Pass leads you over into western Georgia. Your first stop near Kutaisi is Gelati Monastery, the foundation of David IV the Builder in 1106, where frescoes cover the church walls and a 12th-century mosaic fills the apse. Bagrati Cathedral comes next, its walls raised in 1003 on a hilltop above the Rioni. Spend the evening exploring the centre and the busy Green Bazaar.

A 20 km drive north-west brings you to Prometheus Cave, where a route of more than a kilometre winds through chambers of stalactites and stalagmites, lit so that their colours show. Next comes Martvili Canyon in Samegrelo: you walk the path over the turquoise Abasha and, in the warm months, drift through the gorge in an inflatable boat. Lunch is Megrelian, elarji and kharcho, and then the road carries you to the Black Sea and your hotel in Batumi. Walk the seafront boulevard in the evening as the lights come on.

Make an early start at the Botanical Garden on Batumi's Green Cape, founded in 1912, where trails lead down through bamboo, magnolias and eucalyptus to the shore. Then head south to Gonio Fortress, which the Romans built as Apsaros; its walls and towers surround an excavated garrison and a grave that tradition assigns to the apostle Matthias. After a lunch of Adjarian khachapuri, your driver drops you at Batumi airport, or at the railway station if you are taking the train to Tbilisi.