Driving in Georgia with a foreign licence
The Kazbegi military highway, Svaneti's towers behind ten hairpins, qvevri wine country an hour from Tbilisi: Georgia is the Caucasus' great self-drive secret, and its paperwork culture is refreshingly simple.
Do you need one for Georgia?
Georgia recognises the 1968-convention framework and is famously easy-going with foreign licences — many nationalities drive on their home card alone for up to a year. The catch is readability: patrol police and rental insurers process what they can read, and Georgian script tolerance doesn't extend both ways.
Where the translation earns its keep here: insurance claims after Svaneti's rock-strewn shoulders, police reports in Kutaisi, and the second-driver questions at family-run rentals. Cheap certainty in a country where everything else about driving is gloriously informal.
At the rental desk
Tbilisi and Kutaisi airports plus local agencies (MyRentalCar-style brokers dominate) rent Deltas and Priuses at Caucasus prices. Check tyre condition and insurance excess honestly — mountain gravel is standard itinerary here, and contracts vary wildly on it.
If you're stopped
Patrol police are professional and everywhere (the 2004 reforms are a national pride point). Stops are quick document checks; radar vans work the Kakheti highways. Zero-tolerance alcohol enforcement is real: 0.02% effectively means none.
Georgia questions, straight answers
Is the Military Highway hard driving?
It's a real mountain road with trucks queueing for the Russia border — hairpins, fog, cows. In summer it's straightforward with patience; in winter, chains and daylight. The Gergeti view costs nothing extra.
Svaneti in a sedan or 4x4?
Zugdidi–Mestia is paved; Mestia–Ushguli is gravel where 4x4/high clearance is honest advice and half the rentals on the road are Priuses anyway. Contracts often exclude Ushguli — read yours.
What's with cows on the roads?
They're traffic. Villages assume drivers yield to livestock; hitting one is legally and socially expensive. Dusk is peak cow.
Can I take the car to Armenia or Azerbaijan?
Armenia often possible with the rental's cross-border letter and extra insurance; Azerbaijan effectively no (border/insurance). Georgia's own loop deserves the full week regardless.
