Yerevan, city of monuments

We would have loved to spend some time in the beautiful mountain area around Dilijan, but time is scarce, so today we took an all-day trip to the capital, Yerevan, which seemed appropriate.

Yerevan is quite the place; there are several parks, with quite a lot of interesting monuments, half of which seem to have been erected after the fall of the USSR.

Old Ladas are parked next to luxurious Mercedes and decadent neighborhoods abut new luxury condos and bourgeois avenues, with gorgeous restaurants and fashionable stores.

Monument to Mothern Armenia

Stalin wrapped in the Armenian colors

Museum of Armenian History

Then, there are museums galore. I let Eric talk me into visiting two of them, the Armenian Folk Museum and the Museum of Armenian History. They were both quite interesting, but mainly they served to get away from the 100-degree heat and the scorching sun, which does not mean we didn’t walk plenty of city streets. By the end of the day, exhaustion had set in, at least for me.

A show worn in the bronze age

Old wooden chariot dating back to pre-Roman times

View from museum window

Armenian bible from the 1200s

The miter worn by one of the first patriarchs

When we started out early this morning, we had no local currency. We stopped at a gas-station minimart to get some coffee and croissants, but when we had to pay, the card reading machine was malfunctioning and could not process the purchase. We had to find an ATM so we could settle the bill, and when I went to make the withdrawal in Armenian Drams, I miscalculated the exchange and withdrew $400 instead of the $40 I had intended.  We’ll see how much I have left and hopefully I’ll be able to cash it back into dollars or euros.

We returned to Dilijan long after sunset. The fatigue of the day caught up with me and I was ever so happy to settle down on that big white bed.

The town of Dilijan

Never a meal without a friendly dog

Love to all.