This is where modern turkey shares a common frontier with the region of georgia known as adjara. The province of racha in georgia nudges up against the caucasus mountains, and boasts some fabulous scenery. This is the poorest mkhare (province) of georgia, a district that is a world apart from tbilisi.
Few are the foreign visitors to akhaltsikhe who. This issue of hidden europe travel magazine features articles on europe's exclaves and enclaves, estonians in georgia, aromanian vlachs, the latvian port of ventspils, la chaux-de-fonds in the jura. Poets’ heads in stone, georgia (photo © laurence mitchell) home the magazine hidden europe 9
Welcome to hidden europe 40, in which we sweep from georgia to sweden, from istria to the french capital and explore norway's arctic ports, britain's rarest bus and the pleasures of berlin's. Akhaltsikhe has seen better days. The town has had georgian, ottoman, russian and soviet masters.
Today it is one of the remotest towns in georgia, and still engagingly multicultural, for akhaltsikhe. But the georgian city curates an important cultural legacy as the supposed home of the golden fleece. Guest contributor laurence mitchell slips over the border from turkey into georgia to explore.
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