Why go
Established in 1912, Lagodekhi is Georgia's oldest protected area—a 24,000-hectare sanctuary where Colchic beech forests, some over 200 years old, climb toward the Dagestan border. The reserve preserves relict ecosystems untouched since the Russian Empire's conservationists recognized their value. The Ninoskhevi trail rewards hikers with a 40-meter waterfall plunging through moss-hung gorge, while higher elevations reveal East Caucasian tur and brown bear habitat. Its significance lies in continuity: a century of protection in a region where wild places grow scarce, offering accessible immersion in subtropical-to-alpine transition zones that elsewhere vanished.