Blogs from South, Armenia, Asia

The Sun ain’t up, the sky ain’t blue, what on Earth should we both do? The morning breaks. We remain positive about an extremely hard mattress and a bit of lost sleep and prepare ourselves fo breakfast. The hôtel table is laden with local food. Cottage cheese and feta, tomatoes, peppers and cucumber, parsley and spring onions, eggs, apricot jam, and butter. Only the frankfurter sausages look out of a tin. The bread is a fresh squidgy confection - delicious. The low cloud still clings to the mountains around us. We decide to explore this ancient town of Goris on foot until lunch then drive to the gorge of Khndzoresk, 10km away. The monastery of Tatev, perched high on a mountain, is the main site in the area and the reason we are here. But until ... read more

We packed and left the Moscow boutique cinema hotel this morning, breakfasted as normal on delicious pain au raisins at Baguette & Co just round the corner, then made our way to the enormous Ayn Savid Hotel to pick up a hire car. And so began our rather epic journey over mountains to the southern town of Goris. Satnav said 254 kilometres and 3 hours 45 mins. We found our way bit by bit out of the traffic hotspot of Yerevan. Then trundling along for some time on E117 until directed off up into the hills and mountains, higher and higher, my ears popping. The hills initially seemed like brown scrubland, deprived of rain... and then it rained. We seemed to go from plains to hills, to valleys to hills to craggy mountains to cloud land. ... read more

Ako predpokladala predpoved rano zatiahnute ale nastastie nie dazd. Odovzdavam kluc, vyplacam a pomaly presun na nove ubytko. V stanku kupene ranajky, dva sladke rozky plnene orechovou naplnou. S tym ale problem kde to zjest, ziadne lavicky. Nakonec sa postastilo. Prechod cez cestu konecne civilizovany ked auta zastavuju a clovek sa nemusi obavat o svoju bezpecnost. V banke menim mensi obnos. Kurz lepsi nez v zmenarni, sice len o 1d ale lepsi. Prichadzam na ubytko, dom pootvarany ale nikde nikto, nuz nechavam batoh na poschodi s listockom, ze sa vratim. Idem si odbyt povinnost a pesibusom navstivit pamatnik na zaciatku mesta, v pohode v pesej dostupnosti. Mesto oproti vcerajsku uz plne ludi. Na ulici aj par pekarnicok, tak uz viem kde dam zajtra ranajky. K pamatniku tatik patik sa ide dol kopcom tak pohodicka. Pri poslednej ... read more

Noc totalne nahovno. Postel mala, trcali mi nohy, neuveritelne teplo a kokoti nechali rozsvietene na chodbe. Takze tu dalsiu noc neostavam. Co som nakukol do nemcovej izby, ten tam mal fan. Nemec siel na marsutku o 7.30 co ide smer jerevan, v rovnakom case ide aj smer goris, potom uz nejde nic. Vyplacam ubytko i veceru a okolo 9.00 zahajujem vystup na blizku pevnost. Prechadzam mini centrum, dedkovci opat v parku na lavicke. Idem k miestnemu kostoliku pod drobnohladom jedne zenskej. Male mesto, kazda cudzia tvar je tu dokladne skumana a sledovana. Kostolik zavrety. Pomedzi cinziaky stupam vyssie k horam. Za cinziakmi sa davam doprava a po polnacke idem k pevnosti. No k pevnosti,je to len jedna mala buda z kamena. K nej musim vyslapat kopec, cesta ziadna, tak idem rovno za nosom. Na vrchole ma ... read more

Picked up our Lada Niva for a 6day tour around Armenia. First stop was Geghard monastery, not so far out of Yerevan (UNESCO world heritage site, Medieval monastery). This is a big complex founded by Gregory the Illuminator (3rd Century founder of Christianity in Armenia and patron Saint of Armenia). There are some lovely carvings in the stone, both inside and outside. We were fortunate to catch a choir singing beautifully in a cave chapel. It was a very popular destination, probably due to it being Saturday. Close by is Garni temple, a left over from Roman occupation, interesting history but not so interesting to visit. From there a longer drive took us to Khor Virap monastery (17th century) which has great views to Mt Ararat, it's also where Gregory the Illuminator was incarcerated for 13 ... read more