Every Caucasus trip we design starts with the same question, and it is not 'when do you want to go?' It is 'what do you want it to feel like?' A Tusheti crossing and a Borjomi slow week are four hundred kilometres and three thousand metres of altitude apart. Answering the feeling question first is what separates a good trip from an expensive one.

The mountains are not a fixed itinerary; they are a weather system with a road through it. The Abano pass into Tusheti is open from roughly late June to early October, and the date moves every year. The Jvari pass stays open but closes for hours at a time in a snowstorm. So the first document we open is not a brochure — it is the road-status page and ten years of our own trip notes.

Where you sleep is where the planning becomes craft. A guesthouse two hours from the trailhead costs you two hours of daylight every single day. Our rule is that you should be able to walk out of the door and start, whether that is a family house in Omalo, a slope-side hotel in Gudauri, or a room at the edge of the Vashlovani reserve.

Then the practicalities: private vehicle or shared — and in the Caucasus we will argue firmly for private, because the good roads are narrow and the great roads are gravel. Guide seniority matters more than the vehicle; ask how many seasons they have done on that specific pass. And have the honest conversation about mornings, because the best light on the Gergeti ridge is at 6:20 and the vans arrive at eleven.

A trip rehearsed this carefully rarely surprises us. It surprises you without exception — the first sight of Shkhara clearing a cloud bank tends to undo people completely. That part we cannot plan. It is the part we plan everything around.