Kakheti wine country's quieter corner — a Khareba cave cellar carved into a mountain, Alazani River floodplains, and a fortress that once held off Lezgin raids
Kvareli is a small town in eastern Kakheti, Georgia's wine heartland, set on the Alazani River plain below the forested Tsiv-Gombori ridge that separates Kakheti from the Greater Caucasus. It is less visited than the more famous Telavi and Sighnaghi but has some of Kakheti's most interesting wine infrastructure: the Khareba Winery has carved 7.7km of underground tunnel cellars into the mountainside above town, maintaining a constant temperature for wine aging and now functioning as a dramatic cellar-tour and tasting destination. The surrounding landscape is quintessential Kakheti: vine rows,…
Kakheti has been producing wine for at least 8,000 years — the traditional Georgian qvevri method (fermenting wine in clay amphorae buried in the ground, a UNESCO Intangible Cultural Heritage) originated in this region. Kvareli and its eastern Kakheti neighbors have historically been the most vulnerable part of Georgia to raids from the North Caucasus mountain peoples (particularly the Lezgins of Daghestan), and the 18th-century fortresses along this stretch reflect centuries of defensive necessity. The town's fortress was built by the Kakhetian king Erekle II (Heraclius II) in the 18th centu…