Foreign tourists can visit Georgia on the Black Sea for up to a year without a visa, the only requirement being a valid passport.
The visa policy of the country is comparatively liberal, allowing citizens of 98 countries to enter, reside, work and study in the country without the necessity to obtain either a visa or residence permit. In addition, the Georgian government has approved a list of 50 countries whose visa and/or residence permit holders may enter the country without a visa for an appropriate period and under appropriate conditions. South Africa is one of them.
Qatar Airways offers return flights from Johannesburg via Doha, to the capital, Tbilisi. As the Georgian Lari is weaker than the US dollar, euro, and British pound, this, coupled with the availability of budget resorts in the mountains and along the Black Sea, and several winter skiing resorts, makes the country, the birthplace of Stalin, an attractive and affordable travel destination.
Places of interest in the country, formerly a Soviet republic, include:
- Tblisi on the Mtkvari (also known as the Kura) River, the capital since the sixth century, home of the Narikala Fortress and Holy Trinity Cathedral.
- Mtskheta, the religious capital, with historic churches and monasteries, where
4 000-year-old traces of human settlements have been found.
- Vardzia, an underground cave monastery built in the 12th century.
- Uplistsikhe, the ‘Lord’s Fortress’, an abandoned rock-hewn town over 3 000 years old.
- The Katskhi Pillar, a 40-metre-high limestone monolith known as ‘the Pillar of Life’.
- Chiatura, the cable car city, an old mining colony where Stalin’s government installed a cable-car system to access mines.
- The modern city of Batumi on the coast of the Black Sea on the Turkish border.
- Throwbacks to the Middle Ages at fortress village Shatili Khevsureti and remote Ushguli village.
- The beautiful but treacherous 2 900m Abano Pass, considered one of the most dangerous roads in the world.
- Juta, a popular climbing and trekking area for professional climbers.
As of June 22, foreign tourists visiting the country are no longer required to present COVID vaccination certificates or negative PCR tests.
