Armenia: Untouched beauty

The small country located in southwestern Asia, just a two-hour non-stop flight from Tel Aviv – is so unique.

By MEITAL SHARABI
The ninth century Tatev Monastery. Today it holds a university. (photo credit: MEITAL SHARABI)
The ninth century Tatev Monastery. Today it holds a university.
(photo credit: MEITAL SHARABI)
Although the choice of world travel destinations may seem endless, there actually aren’t too many places Israelis haven’t explored. And it’s pretty hard these days to find tourist spots where the natural order hasn’t been disturbed and people still live traditionally, just as their great-grandparents did.
That’s why Armenia – a small country located in southwestern Asia, just a two-hour non-stop flight from Tel Aviv – is so unique.
Sharing borders with Turkey, Iran, Azerbaijan and Georgia, Armenia has varied landscapes, hundreds of rivers and waterfalls and endless mountains and valleys. There are picturesque rural villages at the foot of mountains where farmers work the land using time-tested plowing and reaping methods, abandoned factories in the middle of nowhere and numerous historical sites.
Despite the Armenian people’s rich history, the modern nation is relatively young – only receiving independence in 1991 with the breakup of the Soviet Union. Just 100 years ago, the Armenian people suffered terrible persecution from the Ottoman Empire, ending in the Armenian Genocide; although Israel has not officially recognized the genocide, primarily for political reasons, it does acknowledge the massacre that took place there in 1915.
About 3 million people live in Armenia today, half of them in the capital of Yerevan, overlooking the famed Mount Ararat. The Armenians are very proud of their heritage and rich language, consisting of 39 letters; if you listen to someone speaking it, you’ll be convinced right away that all 39 of those letters are being put to use.
The Armenian culture is quite different from that of Western societies. For example, a traditional Armenian meal can last for more than three hours. It begins with lots of different salads made from mushrooms and steamed vegetables, with the main course almost always including beef and homemade noodles. The weather is almost always mild and the peak season is from April through November – but even then, there’s never a huge number of tourists in the country.
I recently participated in a trip organized by Israeli tour company Medraft, which specializes in overseas jeep tours.
And let me tell you, after five days in Armenia I had completely fallen in love with its colorful people, interesting culture and incredible mountain views.
Although it was an “organized tour,” it felt very loose and I didn’t feel constricted at all, even though I’m a fiercely independent person. I loved learning about the history of places and going to sites I never would have found on my own.
Although there are direct flights to Armenia, we actually began our trip in Georgia, where we hopped into jeeps and headed to Artik to pick up our local guide on the Armenian border. As soon as you cross the border into Armenia, you get the sense you’ve entered a young country that is just starting to rebuild itself as a nation. Some of the roads are falling apart and are full of potholes, which made me extremely grateful for the jeep’s excellent shock absorbers.
We drove past huge cliffs until we reached the village of Haghpat, where we ate our first authentic Armenian meal of vegetables and cheeses, which quickly became part of our daily diet.
From there we drove to the magnificent Haghpat Monastery, from which the village derived its name. Originally built by the Bagratuni royal family, the stunning structure was destroyed and rebuilt numerous times. In the 15th century, the monastery was transformed into a university and today, it functions as a national monument for Armenian Christianity.
Architecturally, Armenian structures are quite similar to those found in Georgia, except that Armenian churches always incorporate a large bell tower.
At the monastery entrance is a floor comprised of huge white stones, which turn out to actually be old gravestones; large ceramic jugs submerged in the ground are said to have been used for storing food and wine. In 1996, the monastery was officially added to the UNESCO World Heritage List thanks to the khachkars (cross-stones) etched in the 11th to 13th centuries.
Our next stop, which is where we spent the night, was the resort town of Dilijan, known by the locals as the Armenian Switzerland. This spa town is famous for locally grown herbs that alleviate respiratory and other ailments.
Dilijan is also home to a highly regarded international high school, whose graduates are accepted at renowned universities around the world. There’s a small park with a lovely pond and a statue in the town center that was created following the filming of a Soviet-era movie focusing on national unity.
In the morning, we drove north past a snowy ridge until we reached our next destination: Kalavan – a small village that at first glance does not look very impressive. Home to only 25 families, a number of exciting archeological discoveries were made in the village in 2005, so we stopped there to listen to local archeologist Robert Ghukasyan.
The artifacts – which were found almost by accident – are dated to the Byzantine period, and are currently on display in the local museum.
Kalavan residents did not let this golden opportunity of newfound fame pass them by, and all the families are collaborating on a project they call Time Land – in which visitors get to participate in age-old activities such as kindling a bonfire, building houses from tree branches, archery and gathering medicinal herbs.
Tourists can sleep locally in hostels or tents, and some families open up their homes as bed and breakfasts.
We then continued on to a lookout point over Lake Sevan, a natural body of water that sits at an altitude of 1,900 meters. The lake lies between two mountain ridges and next to the small village of Tsaghkunk, where we stopped for a lunch of smoked lamb chops cooked in an outdoor stone oven. Though it was a huge meal, we stopped again that afternoon to taste smoked fish along the storied Silk Road, which links northern and southern Armenia. We slept that night at the family-run Basen Hotel in Sisian, built on the ruins of a Soviet-era factory.
Despite being exhausted, we managed to wake up early the next morning – to perfect weather and extremely high visibility. We set out right away for the Wings of Tatev, a 5.7-km-long cable-car line that reaches the isolated Tatev Monastery, which was built in the 9th century and housed 1,000 young men in the 10th century.
During the Seljuk Period, the monastery was attacked and almost completely destroyed. In the 13th century, the structure was rebuilt and even expanded, and a university was opened within its walls. As is common among all ancient Armenian monasteries, there is a village next to it – where we were hosted by Isabella and Nikolai Gwarkian.
The female family members taught us how to make zingel, herb-filled fried dough. After fully stuffing ourselves, we hopped back into the jeeps and drove towards Sisian.
Our next stop was a compound with stones entrenched in the ground, assumed to be about 7,500 years old. Of course, there are dozens of hypotheses regarding its origin and what it was used for, and one of them posits it was an observatory for stargazers; if you look at aerial photographs of the area, the site looks like an eagle with its wings spread wide.
When we finally reached our hotel in Sisian, there was hot food waiting for us and local dancers put on a festive show.
Lavished with brandy, all of us were soon on our feet dancing to the lively music. We felt such a deep connection with our Armenian hosts by the end of the evening; I don’t think I’ll ever forget that experience.
The next morning, our muscles still sore from the previous evening, we left for the capital of Yerevan, stopping along the way at a number of spots with gorgeous views such as Spandaryan Lake. Driving along the wine route, the tour stopped at the village of Areni – where we were hosted by David Simaonian and his family. He showed us his private vineyard and the wine distillery where he produces red wine and pomegranate liquor. Afterward, we picked strawberries in Simaonian’s fields and learned how to make Armenian flatbread.
This was, in essence, our last experience in rural Armenia; we spent the remainder of the trip in Yerevan. The heart of the bustling metropolis is Republic Square, which is always full of tourists, and the city is divided into large and small centers.
Before we all set out in different directions to explore, our last group activity was visiting the Megerian carpet factory, founded in New York in 1917.
Megerian began as a carpet-cleaning and repair service, but in 1970 when the grandchildren took over the business, they decided to weave their own carpets – with all the weaving done by hand, using only naturally dyed fibers.
I then set out to explore Yerevan’s nightlife, discovering that it was pretty similar to that of Tel Aviv! On our last morning, we once again climbed into jeeps and drove up a canyon, where we were welcomed with a breathtaking view of the sun rising over the multicolored mountains. We continued up the narrow road until we reached a pagan temple (the only one that remains, since Armenia is a strictly Christian country). The temple was destroyed twice by earthquakes, but was rebuilt both times by the Soviet authorities since it was considered an important tourist attraction.
Upon our return to the city, we stopped at a monument commemorating the Armenian Genocide.
The modern nation-state of Armenia is in its infancy, and its people have many obstacles to overcome as it grows and develops – but this is exactly what made visiting the country so special.
The author was a guest of Medraft Tours.
Translated by Hannah Hochner.


Related Tags
denial of the armenian genocide