Mestia

Currency budget Georgia

Exchange booths are everywhere, competitive and honest — the rate is posted in the window and there is no commission. Euros and dollars both change well; bring clean notes.

ATMs & cards

TBC and Bank of Georgia machines are everywhere in the towns and most are free with a foreign card. In the mountains there may be one machine for the valley and it may be empty on a weekend — arrive with cash.

Bank machines are free with most foreign cards, and the exchange booths are genuinely good. In the mountains, arrive with cash: the one machine in the valley empties at weekends.

Wherever you are: if the machine offers to charge you in your home currency, decline. That is dynamic currency conversion and the rate is set by the ATM's operator, not your bank.

Safety all of Georgia

Very comfortable in the villages, which live by hospitality. The mountains are the care: the Ushguli road floods, the trek crosses rivers, and the weather at 2,000 metres turns in an hour. Take a guide for anything beyond the marked trail, and cash — the one ATM empties.

Our own assessment, not a sourced index.

Entry & visa Georgia visa rules

Health & emergencies all of Georgia

Required to enter

No vaccinations are required for entry from Europe or North America.

Orientation, not medical advice — entry rules change and what you need depends on your own history. Check with a travel clinic four to six weeks before you go.

Food tip

Kubdari — the Svan meat pie with spices — is the dish, and every guesthouse makes it. Svan salt, the spiced salt, goes home in the bag. Guesthouses feed you breakfast and dinner, and that is where the food is; there are a few cafés on the square and not much else.

Getting around

• Walking — the town is small; the trails start at the edge of it
• Marshrutka — Zugdidi in three hours, Kutaisi in four, Tbilisi in eight; from the square
• 4x4 — to Ushguli in two hours on a road that is a river in places, agreed at the square
• Cable car — Hatsvali, for the view of Ushba, summer and winter
• Airport: Kutaisi (KUT), four hours by road; the small Queen Tamar airfield has a Tbilisi flight when the weather allows

Internet speedall of Georgia

Getting online: Airalo or Holafly — a data eSIM for Georgia, installed before you fly and working the moment you land.

Source: Ookla Speedtest Global Index · measured June 2026

Must-see

Nearby day trips

Say a few words

Georgian

• Helloგამარჯობა (Gamarjoba)ga-mar-JO-ba
• Pleaseთუ შეიძლება (Tu sheidzleba)too shay-DZLEH-ba
• Thank youმადლობა (Madloba)MAD-lo-ba
• Yes / Noხო / არა (Kho / Ara)kho / A-ra

Its own alphabet, its own language family, and related to nothing. Older people answer in Russian, younger ones in English. Two words of Georgian changes a room.

Religion

Georgian Orthodox

One of the oldest Christian nations, converted in the fourth century, and the church carries real authority. Cover shoulders in a church; women are handed a wrap at the door and men should take a hat off. Crossing yourself three times at the entrance is what everybody around you will do.

Do's and don'ts

Do

• Accept the toast, and let the tamada — the toastmaster — run the supra; the order of toasts is fixed and meant
• Say gaumarjos when glasses are raised, and drink the glass rather than sip it
• Accept the hospitality, which is offered without expectation and is close to a religion here
• Cover shoulders in churches; women are given a wrap at the door

Don't

• Do not toast with beer, which is considered a curse rather than a compliment
• Do not pour your own wine, and do not refuse a refill by covering the glass — leave it full instead
• Do not raise Russia, Abkhazia or South Ossetia lightly; the war was in 2008 and it is not history here
• Do not offer to split the bill if you were invited