2019 Eurasia Adventure - Armenian Monestaries And Temples

After a long streak of really nice weather, it turned crummy, rainy and cold. We hired a guide through contacts of #2 at the U.S. Embassy in Yerevan and headed out to see some of what is found outside the capital city.

It always seems when we hire guide/drivers there is some, I don't know, bit of drama. Maybe we have in our own minds certain expectations that just are totally unrealistic for anyone in the guiding/driving business to fulfill. At any rate, we left the hotel to go out of town and I needed to get some cash. When they stopped to let me out, the driver backed into another vehicle and their ensued said bit of drama. But it was only a small delay and we headed off. Our first stop was Lake Sevan and the Town of Sevan.

This is the second largest high altitude fresh water lake in the world. Our primary purpose for visiting was to see the beauty of the surroundings (sort of nixed by the bad weather) and to visit the 9th century monastery their. A note about monasteries and Armenia. As noted in a prior post, Armenia was the first kingdom to adopt Christianity as its state religion. Wikipedia lists 90 of them. Over the following centuries a monastic tradition developed. Two factors influenced where these monasteries were developed. First was monastery life was meant to be a separation from normal life. So there was a desire to be away from the centers of population. Second, the ongoing conflict of the ages meant putting them in less accessible locations so they would be harder to attack and pillage. The result for we moderns is that these Armenian monasteries are in very beautiful physical sites.

Lake Sevan

The monastery here near the actual tow of Sevan, Shoghagavanak, is one of the oldest dating from the 5th century

A feature of the monastic scene are the Khachakars. These are devotional slabs of rock like tombstones with various carvings of scenes and biblical texts. They are on the Unesco Heritage list as unique to Armenia

You could take pictures of hundreds of these

I chose this one because our guide pointed out some very unique aspects

A very unusual depiction of Christ whose hair is in braids, a symbol of nobility in Armenia during the Middle Ages

A similar unique depiction of one of the saints with his hand in the pose of 'the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit

Now the surroundings...sadly studies in grey

The Vista (click here)

 

This used to be an island but during Soviet times they took so much water out for various industrial purposes that the level of the lake dropped dramatically and now it is a peninsula

That is changing but they are not going to drown the whole town that has been built up

Eating at Home

We had told our guide during the planning stages that we were interested in any experience where we could meet people. His family lives in this area and his Mother does home stays at her apartment so he arranged for us to have lunch there (meal details will be in future foodie post)

We stopped at the local store to get some wine

Then drove into the apartment complex

Come on in!

Mom and Sister are busy cooking

Evidently there will be another 30 people based upon the amount of food

The table was set with preliminaries when we arrived

After we ate a group picture

From the left clockwise

Mom, Driver, Wife, Guide, Aunt

The conversation was good and we learned a lot

Just being in an apartment from the Soviet era was informative

Visiting the Hydro-Electric Plant

Two of our guide's uncles work in a big hydro-electric facility near by

It was built during the early 1940's with German POW laborers and is a visual throwback to early Soviet style engineering (though they use modern electronic controls today)

We were given an impromptu tour!

Sadly, you are not allowed to post pictures you take online as this is considered a security risk because it was way cool!

Next we headed for the Mani Temple

But first another brief interlude...this time for a flat tire

We had to stand in an alcove (mercifully as it was rainy as well as cold) and watch the driver attempt to change the tire

It was painful to watch as it seemed the jack was not big enough and three times the vehicle fell off it

(I wanted to say, "Why don't you but a rock or block on the sides of the tires so it can't roll" but decided to not to)

Eventually our guide called a cab to take us the rest of the way which was not super close and the cab seemed like it was not in much better shape than our first vehicle to make the trip

By the time we got there, it was raining harder, was cold and I was not properly dressed and was pretty miserable

The Mani Temple is the only remaining Greco-Roman Temple in Armenia as most were destroyed by the early Christians

Obligatory Roman style mosaic picture from obligatory Roman style bath

The surrounds

If I hadn't been freezing my ass off and trying to take pictures while holding an umbrella, there would be many more of these

By this time our original driver had the tire fixed and met us to finish off the tour

We made our way to the Geghard Monastery

Built starting in the 12th century, it is notable because a significant part of it is carved out of a mountain side!

The weather was still yucky

It was hard to take pictures because of the lack of light 

But most of the decoration was carved into living rock itself

Earthquakes are endemic here and there are huge cracks in the rock

One room had the most amazing acoustics

Ignore the totally black video - listen to the sound of only our guide singing

(Click here)

Then there are parts that are newer and added on

Interesting symbolism that is very definitely NOT Christian

The spring melt had the mountain stream nearby at full fury

On the drive back, the sun broke out for a bit allowing some better pictures of the scenery

And finally

SIGNS OF THE WORLD

No guzzling from the bottle...use a glass for God's sake

A 'No Pushing Rocks Uphill' Zone