You do not need to go through Tbilisi to see Svaneti. That is the idea behind this trip: six days in western Georgia coming in through Kutaisi airport, with two nights in Svaneti, the land of the towers. The first full day stays close to Kutaisi (Bagrati, Motsameta, Gelati and Nikortsminda cathedral in Racha, which few tours include because it means 120 km back). Then real road: 161 km to Ushguli, at 2,200 metres, and a night in Mestia. The next day is for walking: the Chalaadi glacier on foot and the Hatsvali chairlift to look Ushba in the face.

On day five we come down through the Okatse canyon, with its walkway bolted to the cliff, and Martvili, where you take a boat along a river the colour of turquoise; day six is just the transfer to Kutaisi airport, from Batumi (125 km). Fair warning: days three and five have more than five hours in the car. Private car and Spanish-speaking guide throughout; hotel in Kutaisi and a family guesthouse or hotel in Mestia [DATO: tipo de alojamiento en Mestia]. Between November and April, ask us before booking: the road to Ushguli closes with snow.

Itinerary

Day 1 - Transfer from Kutaisi Airport to Kutaisi

Total road of the day - 25KM 0 Hours and 30 Minutes We pick you up at the airport whenever your flight lands. It is 25 minutes to the hotel. Road 25KM 0 Hours and 30 Minutes

Day 2 - Kutaisi - Bagrati - Motsameta - Gelati - Nikortsminda - Kutaisi

Total road of the day - 192KM 4 Hours and 21 Minutes A long day, all of it close to Kutaisi except the end. We leave early so that Nikortsminda does not fall at the last minute. Road 2KM 0 Hours and 9 Minutes

Bagrati Cathedral

You can see it from half of Kutaisi, so you arrive already knowing what it is. What you cannot see from below is the controversy: Bagrat III consecrated it in 1003, the Ottomans blew it up in 1692 and it stood in ruins for three centuries until, in 2012, it was rebuilt in full, with concrete and a glass lift stuck to one side. UNESCO took it off the list in 2017 for that. Some people see it as a botch job. We still like it, mostly for the site: the terrace has the best view of the city and the Rioni valley. Ten minutes uphill from the centre and a full circuit of the building to find the original carvings left on the walls. Road 8KM 0 Hours and 17 Minutes

Motsameta

First the legend, because it is what you are told the moment you arrive: in the 8th century the Arabs killed the brothers David and Konstantin Mkheidze, nobles of Argveti, for refusing to give up their faith, and that is where the monastery gets its name, "the place of the martyrs". Their relics lie in a casket inside the church and passing under it three times, they say, grants a wish. Then the site: a rocky spur above the Tskaltsitela canyon ("red water" in Georgian), ten minutes from Kutaisi. The present building is 11th century, much altered. Half an hour is enough. The best part is not the church, it is the balcony over the gorge. Road 4KM 0 Hours and 8 Minutes

Gelati Academy

David the Builder asked to be buried in the floor of the south gate, so that everyone who came in would step on his grave. He has been there since 1125, and the monastery of Gelati, which he founded in 1106, was for centuries the great school of the kingdom: in its academy Greek philosophy was translated and copied at a time when Georgia looked to Byzantium. A UNESCO site since 1994 and, unlike Bagrati, still on the list. As soon as you enter the main church, the 12th-century mosaic of the Virgin in the apse; then frescoes on every wall, from different centuries. We give it almost an hour between the church, the tomb, the academy (a long hall with stone benches) and the church of St George. The domes were under repair for years because of leaks [VERIFICAR: estado de la restauración del tejado en 2026]. Road 58KM 1 Hours and 15 Minutes

Nikortsminda

This is the debatable detour of the day, and we are the ones saying so, since we are the ones who include it: an hour and a quarter of mountain road from Gelati and 120 km back to Kutaisi that feel long once it gets dark. Why is it worth it? The façade. Nikortsminda cathedral is small, built in 1010-1014 under Bagrat III, but its outer walls are the most elaborately carved in Georgia: the Last Judgement, St George, animals, vines, all cut in stone. Inside, 17th-century frescoes. If you would rather shorten the day, it can be left out and the time given to Gelati; just say so when you book. In good weather we also stop at the viewpoint over the Shaori reservoir, which is on the way. Road 120KM 2 Hours and 32 Minutes

Day 3 - Kutaisi - Ushguli - Mestia

Total road of the day - 208KM 5 Hours and 20 Minutes Today is mostly road, and it is the best road of the trip: the Enguri valley, the Jvari dam and the climb to Mestia. Road 161KM 3 Hours and 35 Minutes

Ushguli

The last 45 km, from Mestia, are dirt road. It gets better every year and it is still dirt road [DATO: estado de la carretera Mestia-Ushguli esta temporada]; in winter it closes. At the end are the four villages of Ushguli, at 2,200 metres, with their more than twenty towers from the 9th to 12th centuries and Shkhara (5,193 m) closing the valley. A UNESCO site since 1996 and, depending on who you ask, the highest inhabited village in Europe; a couple of villages in the North Caucasus dispute the title. We arrive around midday and have lunch in a village house. Then, on foot, the Lamaria church at the top, with Shkhara behind it, and one of the tower houses turned into a museum. With daylight short in the mountains, we drive down to sleep in Mestia. [VERIFICAR: el original decía que se duerme en Ushguli y se camina al glaciar de Shkhara; el día termina en Mestia]

Day 4 - Mestia - Chalaadi - Hatsvali - Mestia

Total road of the day - 34KM 1 Hours and 11 Minutes Hardly any car today: 34 km in the whole day. The rest on foot and by chairlift. Road 9KM 0 Hours and 20 Minutes

Chalaadi Glacier

Closed shoes: that is the only thing we ask for this morning. The Chalaadi glacier is 9 km from Mestia, at the end of the track up the Mestiachala valley, the river that is born from it, and it is one of the few glaciers in the Caucasus you can touch without being a climber. From the suspension bridge it is about 3 km of forest trail and some 300 metres of climb, the last part over a moraine of loose blocks. The ice comes down from the Ushba and Chatini massif and arrives grey with rock, not white. Three hours there and back, with stops. We do not go near the mouth of the glacier because stones fall, and if it rains we leave it for the afternoon and do Hatsvali first.

Hatsvali

Ushba, with its two summits, is the mountain in every photo of Svaneti and the hardest to climb in Georgia. From Mestia you cannot see it properly. That is what Hatsvali is for, the village's small ski resort 9 km away: a chairlift of about 15 minutes from the base at 1,870 metres up to Mount Zuruldi at 2,340, with Ushba right in front. At the top there is a café with a terrace and, if you feel like it, you can walk down along the ridge. In winter a handful of runs operate [DATO: precio del telesilla en 2026]. A tip: by midday cloud usually sits on the summit, so we stay at the top without hurrying until it clears. We get back to Mestia with time for the museum or a walk among the towers of Lanchvali. [VERIFICAR: si este tour se vende también en invierno, aquí iría el esquí en lugar del telesilla de verano]

Day 5 - Mestia - Okatse - Martvili - Kutaisi

Total road of the day - 252KM 5 Hours and 25 Minutes Down from the mountains. Two canyons and 252 km, the longest day at the wheel. Road 174KM 3 Hours and 45 Minutes

Martvili Canyon

The water of the Abasha river is a turquoise that looks edited. It is not: this is Martvili canyon, in Samegrelo, three and a quarter hours from Mestia and the most visited canyon in western Georgia. It has two sections. In the upper one you take a boat ride of about fifteen minutes between walls 20 to 40 metres high; in the lower one there are walkways and a waterfall. It was the bathing place of the Dadiani princes, whose palace was in Zugdidi. Since it was developed in 2016 there is a ticket office, a car park and quite a crowd; on July and August weekends there is a queue for the boats [DATO: precio de entrada y de la barca en 2026]. We do the boat as soon as we arrive and then the walkways, half an hour without hurrying. If the river is swollen after rain, the boats do not go out and the water loses its colour; on those days we swap the order with Okatse.

Okatse Canyon

If you have a fear of heights, read this first. Okatse canyon, back in Imereti, is not visited from the water but from above: a 700-metre metal walkway bolted to the wall of the gorge, some 50 metres above the river, with a grid floor that lets you see the bottom, and a final platform that juts a few metres out over the drop. From the car park in the village of Gordi it is 2.5 km through the forest of the old Dadiani park to the start of the walkway; you do it on foot or in the locals' 4x4s, which charge extra [DATO: precio del 4x4 en 2026]. Two hours in all. We usually walk there and come back by 4x4 if the group prefers.