Handpicked experience · Tblisi
Tblisi, Georgia
Two rivers running side by side in different colours, a cathedral named for a floating pillar, a fortress above a drowned valley, and a myth chained to a five-thousander.
A sixth-century hilltop church above a river confluence
A UNESCO-listed cathedral in Georgia's old royal capital
Castle walls standing over water that did not exist forty years ago
A mountain pass crossing at nearly two thousand four hundred metres
Sightlines to a five-thousand-metre peak from the last village
A long day north from Tbilisi along the Georgian Military Highway, taking in the old capital at Mtskheta, the fortress at Ananuri, the high ground at Gudauri and the mountain views from Kazbegi. Eleven to twelve hours, most of it on one road.
This is a driving day with stops rather than a walking day with transfers, and the road is genuinely part of it — the route climbs from river valley to alpine pass and back down again. The stops are short walks and viewpoints; nothing asks for a hike. The order can change, because weather at the pass decides what is sensible.
From the hilltop church above Mtskheta you look down on the meeting of the Aragvi and the Mtkvari. They arrive carrying different sediment, and for a stretch below the confluence the two waters run side by side in visibly different colours before finally blending. The church itself dates from the sixth century and stands where a wooden cross was raised when Georgia adopted Christianity, in 337 — among the first states anywhere to do so.
Svetitskhoveli means life-giving pillar. The story attached to it is that Christ's robe was carried back from Jerusalem to Mtskheta and buried with the woman who died holding it; a cedar grew from the grave, and when it was cut for the church's first column the pillar hung in the air until prayer brought it down. The cathedral standing today is eleventh-century, and Georgian kings were crowned and buried in it.
Ananuri belonged to the dukes of the Aragvi, and in 1739 a rival duke besieged it, burned the church tower and killed the family inside. The walls survived. The water beneath them did not exist until the 1980s, when a dam flooded the valley for a reservoir and put several villages under it.
The highway was cut by Russian military engineers between 1799 and 1817, following a pass that traders and armies had used for centuries. It crosses the Greater Caucasus at just under two thousand four hundred metres, and it remains the only paved crossing for a long way in either direction. At the top sits a curved concrete monument from 1983 with a bright mosaic inside it, built to mark two hundred years of a treaty with Russia — a piece of Soviet public art with a complicated afterlife.
Kazbek rises to just over five thousand metres, and Georgian tradition puts Amirani on it — a Prometheus figure chained to the rock for defying God. The small church on the ridge below the summit is where treasures from Mtskheta were carried in times of invasion. From the village you see both. Reaching the church itself is a separate arrangement.
Site admissions are paid at each entrance. The pass is far colder than Tbilisi and can close in snow. Shoulders and knees must be covered at the churches, and women are given headscarves at the door. Cancellation is free up to a day ahead.
Open it to pick a date and work out the price.
What the fare covers, and what to budget for separately.
The practical detail, and the answers people actually ask for.
Eleven to twelve hours from Tbilisi and back. It is a driving day punctuated by short walks and viewpoints rather than a walking day.
The Aragvi and the Mtkvari carry different sediment loads, so below their confluence the two waters run side by side in visibly different colours for a stretch before blending.
Life-giving pillar. The legend holds that Christ's robe was brought to Mtskheta and buried with the woman who died clutching it, that a cedar grew from the grave, and that the column cut from it hung in the air until prayer settled it.
A rival duke besieged the fortress in 1739, burned the church tower and killed the family inside. The walls survived; the reservoir below them was created by a dam in the 1980s, which flooded several villages.
The Georgian Military Highway crosses the Greater Caucasus at just under two thousand four hundred metres. Russian military engineers cut it between 1799 and 1817 along a pass already in use for centuries.
No — it is seen from the village. Reaching the church itself needs a separate arrangement, since the track up is steep and unsuited to a standard vehicle.
No, they are settled at each site. The booking covers the vehicle, the driver and the fuel for the route.