Cycling Georgia: Mestia & Jvari

This is the second of three parts detailing my cycle tour around Georgia's Upper Svaneti in July 2025. Here are links to Part One and Part Three.

After a fantastic couple of days hiking around Ushguli, I was back on the bike, with a pretty easy 45km ride throught the Upper Svaneti to Mestia. The route followed paved roads the whole way, although there were a few temporary gravel sections where the asphalt had been destroyed by heavy rains and snow melt.

It was another beautiful ride, framed by the peaks of the High Caucasus, including the distinctive Ushba. This section of the road was busier than my previous ride from Lentekhi to Ushguli, but was still not overly crowded. The main highlights were the winding road out of Ushguli and the fantastic descent from the modest Ughviri Pass.





It was a short ride, taking less than three hours with many stops for photos and to admire the scenery, and so I arrived early in Mestia. I checked into the apartment where I was staying (one great thing about the Svaneti, and Georgia in general, is that check in times are very flexible if you arrive early), and sought out somewhere for a large and tasty lunch.

Mestia

I knew that Mestia was the largest settlement and main tourist hub of the Upper Svaneti, with what seemed like thousands of different accommodations advertised online. This made me slightly apprehensive that it might feel crowded and a little inauthentic.

However, these fears quickly subsided upon arrival. There were definitely more tourists than in Ushguli, including a couple of coach parties, but it was still very much a traditional Svaneti town in many ways. The tower houses are not quite as charming or as plentiful as those in Ushguli but are still awe-inspiring and delightful to stroll around.

The main street of the town itself is also very charming, with tourist establishments intergrated alongside shops and services for locals. To my delight, I found the food here to be significantly better than in Ushguli, and I immediately set about trying to devour as much of it as I could!

At Lushnu Qor restaurant I enjoyed some delicious salads, mtsvadi and khachapuri, as well as some delicious beer, before strolling around the town and chatting briefly with some friendly locals.




I spent four nights in total in Mestia, with the highlight being an absolutely fantastic out and back ride towards the Koruldi Lakes and Chalaadi Glacier. I have included this in the map above, and highly recommend it.

It is a mountain biking route on dirt roads, but I found it all rideable without any suspension. The gradients were steep at times, but also eased off in placesto give some recovery, and without panniers it was all manageable.

The views were absolutely incredible once I emerged above the tree line and there was an amazing plateau section (marked on the map) where they were several differrent smooth single and double track trails to explore. The final short climb up to the lake was a bit of a slog, and probably not really worth it, but the rest of the climb and descent was fantastic.





There were a few vehicles on the dirt road, ferrying lazy hikers up to the lakes; however, it was mostly very quiet until the plateau section, where more hikers emerged who had taken a steeper, direct path up from Mestia.

After the fast descent, I took a gravel road to the foot of the Chaaladi Glacier. This was a nice and easy ride and there was a view of the glacier at the end, but it wasn't overly impressive. There is a popular hiking route from here, which I guess has some better views, but it didn't look great for riding, so I headed back to Mestia.

I later did a ride to Mazeri as well which was quite nice, but not a patch on the climb to Koruldi Lakes, which was breathtaking at times, in every sense of the word!








As well as cycling, I also did a short hike around Mestia. I was feeling quite tired, so abandoned my original plan of taking a shuttle to Mazeri and walking back. Instead I did a short circular route, hiking up to the Cross over Mestia. This was another very enjoyable route on pleasant trails, which descended back through some of the tower houses on the outskirts of the town.

Some of the hiking trails here are a little bit slippery with loose stones and dirt, so its useful to have trekking poles, or at least shoes with a good grip.

Jvari

The ride from Mestia to Jvari would see me leave the Upper Svaneti and head towards lower altitudes. The route was mostly downhill, but still had a considerable amount of climbing (around 1,400m (4,700ft) elevation gain in total), which made for a tough day at over 110km (70 miles).

The first part of the ride was the most enjoyable, with scenic rolling roads taking me to Hebudi, the high point of the route. From there, it was mostly descending alongside the raging Patara Enguri River. The road was entirely paved in theory, but there were a few badly broken sections that were more like rough gravel, it was all easy enough to ride though.

After the lively town of Khaishi, the road was newer, wider and in better condition. There was also quite a bit more traffic from this point and a few tunnels for which I was grateful for my powerful rear light. I was glad I chose to quickly descend this way, rather than climb it, as it wasn't the most enjoyable section of the trip. Still, there were some impressive views of the lakes, and the final long descent down past the Jvari Tower was good fun.




The day finished with a short rolling road to Jvari and, by the end of the ride I was pretty tired. It was tougher than I had expected and the increased traffic and wider valley road after Khaishi was a bit of a contrast from the quiet, beautiful roads of the Upper Svaneti. It was still very scenic though, and I largely enjoyed it despite this contrast with my previous days.



I think that a lot of cycle tourists continue from Jvari towards Zugdidi, from where you can take the train to Tbilisi. My plan was to head across the Samegrelo region into Imereti and back to Kutaisi. In my head, this was a bit of a transition section just to get back to the starting point from the Svaneti. However, it actually turned out to be some of my favourite riding of the entire trip.


Part 1 - Kutaisi & Ushguli

Part 3 - Martvili & Gelati

Georgia Svaneti 2025 Tour Overview

Georgia & Armenia 2024 Tour Overview

Cycle Touring Guides