Svaneti, Georgia: Exploring Medieval Towers, Remote Villages, and Europe’s Last Truly Wild Mountain Region There are stone towers in the Caucasus Mountains that have stood for eight hundred years without mortar, built by families who needed to retreat quickly when raiders came down from the passes, and they rise from village floors in clusters that make the landscape look like a medieval fantasy until you walk close enough to see that people still live in the houses beneath them. Svaneti sits in the northwestern corner of Georgia, pressed against the Russian border where the Greater Caucasus reaches its highest peaks, and it has retained a cultural and architectural identity that…