Thoughts on a potential MTB/gravel tour in Georgia

[Scott roy]

I recently moved to the tiny and country of Georgia in Eastern Europe. Since my first visit here I was struck by how beautiful the country is, its very mountainous, green (in summer), is steeped in history with many old forts and monasteries and has loads of Jeep track style roads through the mountains.

Additionally the food here is excellent and the beer fantastic, they also claim to be the origin point of wine for the world. 
 

I’ve been contemplating the idea of doing MTB/gravel tour style trips for South Africans (simply because I know them), this has been spurred on by friends and friends of friends saying they want to come tour and cycle here. 
 

I’m looking for some insight on a few points, mainly:

 

Would South Africans be willing to fly half way round the world to come cycle around for a week. Obviously this would be a fairly small target market. 

How many days would they want to ride? I’m thinking something like a week here with maybe 1 rest day, maybe an extra day before flying back home to explore the capital for instance. What would you guys want to do?

What kind of distance and elevation would be most suitable? Due to all the mountains it’s not hard to do 3 000m vertical ascent in 80km, I would think maybe one day like that, followed by a shorter day of maybe 40km with under a thousand metres ascent and the remainder of the days around 70km with varying elevation. 

Would it be better to stay at one location and do all the riding from there, one would definitely need to then drive to some places and ride from there then drive back (not an issue as I have a couple of Vito’s). Or stay at a different town or place each evening and move around like that, logistically that could be tricky. Or a mix of both, stay one or two nights in 3 separate locations. 
 

Regarding the above point, having family along would make the staying at one location rather nice as the wife and kids or whoever can do there thing and you could come back to them each afternoon/evening. 
 

Backup vehicles, do people want one or not? I feel it’s very nice to have in some regards but in others it seems to take some of the thrill out of it, additionally routes would have to be doable by car which will definitely be more limiting. 

Group size, I think groups of no more than 12, but maybe people want more?

What to do if it rains? Push through and ride or rather rest up, explore, eat and drink beer? But if it rains for a couple of days people are going to be cheesed off at having payed for a trip that’s not lekker. 

Lastly, what are people willing to pay? I’m not looking to make money out of this but rather do it for the love of cycling and sharing the experience. My idea is a package that has air tickets, transport and accommodation. However even (just covering costs) prices will be from about 22k (best case scenario) to 35k per person depending on group size, ticket pricing and how busy it is (accommodation wise). This is a lot of money for anyone. 
 

The trips would be in early and late summer so as to not be too hot or too cold (think June and late September)
 

I would greatly appreciate any input, advice, suggestions or anything else.