Why go
Likhauri Church rises from a rocky spur as both sanctuary and stronghold, its 14th-century walls enclosing a sacred space that Gurian villagers once defended against Ottoman raids. Inside, extraordinary frescoes survive from multiple periods—Byzantine-influenced work from the 1300s, vivid 16th-century portraits of donors in regional dress, and later Georgian Baroque additions—layered like palimpsests of regional resilience. The church commands the Supsa valley from its fortified platform, where crenellations once sheltered archers and now frame views of tea plantations and humid subtropical hills rolling toward the Black Sea. This is Guria's spiritual heart: unmonastic, martial, deeply local.