A cave monastery carved into a cliff face in southern Georgia. Around 641 chambers across 13 levels, stretching 500 metres along the cliff face, connected by tunnels, staircases, and terraces. Wine cellars, meeting rooms, a small church still in use.

At its peak the complex housed some 2,000 monks across 19 levels. An earthquake in 1283 sheared away half the cliff. Ottoman invasions burned the manuscripts. Shepherds moved in after that, which is why many of the chambers are still blackened inside. Abandoned entirely in the 16th century, untouched until Soviet-era excavations, then the monks returned in 1988 and remain on the upper floors today.

Georgia's third-largest city and one of the oldest settlements in Europe, home of the Golden Fleece mythology. Compact, walkable, genuinely charming. Murals, statues, art installations, green spaces, roundabouts with fountains. Within a few hours you feel like you know your way around.

The snack sold outside every market and tourist site, looking like badly formed candles or ugly sausages. Nuts strung on a thread, dipped repeatedly in condensed grape juice thickened with flour, dried in the sun. Think a thicker, softer fruit roll-up wrapped around nuts. Delicious. The only downside: they're sticky.

Tskaltubo, once the most popular spa destination in the Soviet Union.  Up to 125,000 people a year arrived from across the USSR for state-mandated rest and recuperation, prescribed to bathe 20 to 30 minutes daily in radon-carbonate mineral springs that run naturally at 33 to 35 degrees. 

Remants of Sanatorium Gelati, built for children, with this mosaic playground still intact.

Motsameta Monastery: The name translates as "Place of the Martyrs," earned in the 8th century when two noble brothers, David and Constantine, refused to convert to Islam under Arab invasion, accepted torture and death instead, and were thrown into the river. 

The old roads and water channels part of Uplistsikhe - a town carved into the cliffside that used to be an important spiritual center.

150 remaining caves out of a larger complex spanning 8 hectares. Notable remnants include ancient wine cellars (marani), a Hellenistic-style amphitheater, pharmacies, prisons, and the Hall of Queen Tamar

Near the top of the hill sits the 10th-century Uplistsuli Church, a triple-church basilica built directly over the ruins of a former pagan sun temple.

Many of the grand ceremonial spaces feature dramatic tunnel-vaulted ceilings. The soft sandstone has been carved with geometric squares and ribs, creating deep recessed panels called coffers.

Views looking down and out from the ancient rock-hewn caves of Uplistsikhe, Georgia, feature sweeping, panoramic vistas of the winding Mtkvari River basin and the sprawling rural valleys.

The ruins of the newer, abandoned village of Kvakhvreli are visible tucked within the scrubland below the cliff face.

Tbilisi took me a few days to find my bearings: old town, new town, the river, the hills, neighbourhoods folding into neighbourhoods. I started at the top of the city next to the Mother of Georgia statue to get the lay of the land as the sun went down.

The Freedom Monument stands at the centre of the roundabout in Freedom Square, gold against the Tbilisi skyline.

Old Town balconies - Carved wooden balconies cling to the cliffside in Tbilisi's Old Town, layered brick and timber stacked above the rock.

Jumah Mosque, the only surviving mosque in Tbilisi, where Sunni and Shia worshippers pray side by side beneath the same roof.

Abanotubani, the sulphur bath district, domed brick bathhouses built into the hillside, still in use after centuries.

Narikala Fortress, brick and stone walls climbing the hillside above Old Tbilisi, watching over the city for over a thousand years.

Bridge of Peace - A glass and steel canopy arcs across the Mtkvari.

Mtskheta (the town, from Jvari) - red rooftops crowding the riverbank, the cathedral and its walls at the centre.

One of the oldest continuously inhabited towns in the world, founded around the 1st millennium BC, with archaeological evidence of settlement going back even further.

Jvari Monastery - A 6th-century monastery on the hilltop above Mtskheta, where the Mtkvari and Aragvi rivers meet.

Mtskheta (cathedral/vendors) - Svetitskhoveli Cathedral rises above the old fortified walls, vendors hanging carpets, bags, and souvenirs along the fence below.

Capital of the early Georgian Kingdom of Iberia from the 3rd century BC to the 5th century AD. The capital later moved to Tbilisi, but Mtskheta remained the spiritual and cultural centre of the nation. Its historic monuments, Jvari Monastery, Svetitskhoveli Cathedral, and Samtavro Monastery, became a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1994.

Mtskheta remains the spiritual and cultural centre of Georgia.

Sixteen pillars, each over 30 metres tall, on the outskirts of Tbilisi. Biblical scenes at the base, Georgian kings and queens above, literature and national heroes at the top. A whole civilization stacked in stone, created in the 1980s and still technically unfinished.

On a wooded hillside outside Sighnaghi in Kakheti. Saint Nino, who brought Christianity to Georgia in the 4th century, spent her final years here and is buried at the site. The current Cathedral of Saint George dates to the 9th century. During the Soviet era it served as an operating room. The monks returned in 1991.

Georgia's City of Love, perched above the Alazani Valley with the Caucasus Mountains as a backdrop. Walk the 4-kilometre defensive wall and find a patio with a view.

Sighnaghi -The heart of a winemaking tradition stretching back 8,000 years, using the qvevri method: fermenting and aging in clay amphorae buried in the earth, a practice UNESCO has listed as Intangible Cultural Heritage.