Transcaucasian Trail
Photo: Simon Polster, CC BY-SA 4.0 via Wikimedia Commons
The Transcaucasian Trail is a long-distance hiking route under development across Armenia, Georgia, and Azerbaijan, eventually linking the Greater and Lesser Caucasus in two intersecting trails totaling about 3,000 km. As of 2026, more than half of that—around 1,900 km—is already open and waymarked to some degree. The trek can be done independently or with a guide.
Understand] Efforts began in 2015 by two former Peace Corps volunteers, Paul Stephens and Jeff Haack. It involved piecing together existing shepherd and village paths with newly built trail.
PrepareWaymarking varies by section: some stretches are blazed, others are entirely unmarked, so a GPS track (available from the official website) is essential rather than optional.
Get inFor the Svaneti section, transfer by shared taxi ("marshrutka") or private car from Tbilisi or Kutaisi to Chuberi, generally via Zugdidi; the drive takes 4–7 hours.
WalkThe Armenian stage is the first completed national section of the TCT: a continuous 819-km route between Lake Arpi National Park in the north and Meghri, on the Iranian border, in the south.
Stay safeThe route crosses remote, high-altitude terrain with unpredictable weather—carry a map and compass as backup to GPS, since phone signal is unreliable on many stretches.
Go nextIf the Transcaucasian Trail whets your appetite for the Caucasus, consider continuing on to Svaneti for more high-alpine village trekking, or head south into Dilijan National Park for gentler forested trails.
Sources and licences
- Guide text adapted from the Wikivoyage article "Transcaucasian Trail" by its contributors, available under CC BY-SA 4.0. Read on Wikivoyage · Contributors · CC BY-SA 4.0
- Photo: Simon Polster, CC BY-SA 4.0 via Wikimedia Commons