Here is the Silk Road to the Selim Pass (height of 2410 meters above sea level) used for transportation of goods since 200BC (I may be wrong, but who of you would argue with me). It is almost scary to think that even before our Godfather Czech made it to ancient Bohemia, traders with caravans of camels and horses were climbing the same pass.

Just south of the pass the family of local oligarchs, the Orbelians, built in 1332.

this beautiful caravanserai (a hotel) for travelers and caravan proprietors who

could stay here overnight in the shelter of its wing even with horses and camels before crossing the Selim Pass the next morning refreshed. It is nice to see that stone arches of the caravanserai built from blocs of basalt survived almost 700 years without any maintenance in such good shape that if it were not for the modern road and huge trucks on it, this caravanserai would still be operational and full of people and camels. Which one could hardly say about the new road after only ten years of use.

If you enjoy soap operas continue reading the bold script insert.

Now, the Orbelians were actually not Armenians but Georgians and had a fortress in Southern Georgia just north of Armenian teritory. Their leader Ivane made a wrong choice in support of his son in law Demetre, a deceased Georgian king’s young son and heir in the fight with the king’s brother (and Demetre’s uncle) Grigor. Ivane sent his own brother Liparit and nephews Elikum and Ivane to the Persians in Tabriz for help, but this was a long way off and with no fast trains or planes the new army travelled on foot and came too late. By the time they arrived in Georgia, Ivane had been blinded, his family strangled, and young Demetre blinded and for good measure castrated. Lovely family, indeed.

What became of the rest of the guys who ran for help? Well, they were not as stupid as to return with the army to fight, they stayed behind with their powerful friends. Like in a good soap opera we have deaths, marriages and as it happened in those olden times even religious conversions. Ivane’s brother Liparit died in exile. The first nephew Ivane, came back to Georgia to his dwindling estates when the situation cooled down. The other nephew Elikum stayed in Persia and became an important official, converting (halfheartedly and maybe not at all) from Christianity to Islam and dying in one of the wars. He left behind a widow, sister of an Armenian Christian bishop of Syunik, and a young son Liparit, named after, of course, his grandad. As women and widows in particular had not much to say in those trivial matters such as who they will marry, they quickly became, involuntarily, the wife and stepson of a Muslim notable. Wait, the soap opera continues!

In the next season the combined Georgian and Armenian army under another Ivane wrested control of Syunik from the Muslims. Remembering the Orbelians Ivane made a search, located Liparit thanks to the bishop, his mom’s brother, and established him as feudal lord. Bolstered by marriage alliances with its feudal relations, the Orbelians flourished, building or supporting a network of fine monasteries and caravanserais, too.

Wait, the ratings are good, we need to extend the soap opera for anoter season. But we need a twist in the plot, an external force that brings forth some challenges for our heros. It comes in the form of Mongols. Our hero, the sharp and multi-lingual Orbelian prince Smbat makes an arduous pilgrimage to Karakorum, armed with a splendid jewel and divine blessing, and persuades Möngke Khan, son of Genghis, the Mongol ruler, to make Syunik and its churches a tax-exempt fiefdom. It does help that Mangu’s mother is a Christian. Indeed, there is another soap opera in early stages of production and it talks about the Mongol kingdom, their expansion and conversion to Islam, with soecial appearances of strong and beautiful Mongol queens, but that is a story for another day.

It was here in the flat and vast Selim Pass were the strange ticking sound came back and I found the source of it. It was the dashboard temperature indicator that was oscillating with regular frequency between 90C and red area above 130C. If the temperature shown was correct the cooler of our car was close to explosion. My wife became quite concerned that should we explode close to the Azerbaijan border, Turkish border or any building of the ruling party or house of a relative of Mr. President such event would qualify as a terrorist act and we would be thrown in jail and die, or be investigated and die, or be tried for treason and die or shot on the spot whichever came first. Under such challenging circumstances I agreed that we should inform local authorities of our indicator problems or seek qualified help at the nearest gas (or as they say „benzin“) station. So as soon as we saw one we stopped and there we found 3 young guys and one older one smoking extensively between the pools of benzin on the station’s unpaved ground. From safer distance of thirty feet (10m) I tried to call to the older gentleman but before I could pull the window down all 3 youngsters were opening my door hoping to sharpen their Russian language skills. When they heard of our little problem they started moving different levers in the car but were not up to the task of finding the source of temperature indicator’s behavior. So they immediately got on their cell phones to call for help to their friends. Meanwhile the smoking elder guy finally got involved and asked me to lift the hood, alternatively to switch the engine on and off, still smoking profusely with one hand and putting his other bare hand on different parts of our Russian tank’s internal organs and piping and when he did not get barbecued he stated his judgment with full authority of the village elder:

„Temperatura ni bolšaya!“ (The temperature is OK!).

I could hear my wife’s loud sigh of relief.
Meanwhile encouraged by younger guys‘ phone calls the number of both experts and just interested parties increased and the number of assistants rose to 24. Then somebody suggested the problem might be electrical so they started feverishly disconnecting and reconnecting not only all wires I knew about but many more I did not have a clue this sophisticated product of famous Russian automobile industry could have. But when elder guy with a lit cigarette permanently attached to the corner of his mouth started checking the level of our fuel tank and in my peripheral vision I registered a policeman closing on our group, by now larger than what would be considered a peaceful protest against the government I thanked everyone in all available languages; Armenian, English and Russian (shnolurak alizyun, thanks and spasiba), we jumped into our car and sped away hoping that the thermal indicator troubles may be the least of our problem on the way to Lake Sevan.

You would think it was „Friday the Thirteenth“ as it was not the best day of our trip. But do not worry, like in a good movie all challenges are overcome at the end.

It started at 9 am when we tried to change some cash at the local Unibank in Goris and were told by the bank manager to come back at 9:30 when the bank officially opens . I guess the numerous staff at the tiny branch (3 females, security guard and manager) did not have their morning coffee yet. So with another long driving day ahead of us we decided to save the time and pull out some money from their ATM machine. Good, here is the money for much needed gas, whoops where is the card? The machine ate it with a discouraging message to contact my bank card issuer in the country of origin. When we ask the same bank manager at the unofficially opened bank if he could help retrieve the card he still has not had his morning coffee so he tells us to come back at 9:30. So we decide to find our own coffee and face the same deadline challenge. I guess NOTHING opens before 9:30. Finally an old lady sees our desperation and starts banging on a metal garden gate behind which a cute garden caffe serves a spectacular view with a cup of Armenian coffee for a whooping 25 cents.

We evaluate our cash balance in this country where cash, not credit card, is the king, and concoct plan B coming to a conclusion that we can still make it with cash reserves even if the ATM card is not returned. All of us fortified with morning coffee we resolve the issue with manager returning my card with a smile and „Have a nice trip“ goodbye and we are ready to continue of trip as normal. Well, not today. Nerves frazzled we start fighting in the car, as it sometimes happens after a while being together on a trip. It goes like this:
Where did you put my camera?
Do you have my passport?
Why did you not print out the directions?
I gave you my wallet. No, you didn’t.
Damn, the chocolate melted in my purse!

After a while the beautiful scenery despite the bad road surface calms our nerves and we get to our first cultural experience of the day. We take a ride on the cable car 5km (3plus mile) long ride over a spectacular gorge to a monastery of Tatev. The cable car is appropriately called the Wings of Tatev. It was included in the Guinness World Records as world’s „longest non-stop double track cable car.“ This monastery is from the 9th century and if the age was not an impressive enough factor, the location certainly is. Despite the seeming inacessibility, it’s history reflects all the turbulence of the Armenian state with invaders razing it many times. Mongols, Seljuk Turks and Timur Lenk were amonst a few that came through. There are even more impressive numbers associated with it, like housing 1000 monks in the 11th century. In 14th and 15th centuries it was an important University center that served as the repository for thousands of valuable manuscripts and other documents.

But I am out of sorts because I left my iPhone in the car parking lot, then I hit my head hard on the low ceiling in a dark monastery corridor, almost knocking me out of service.

As we get back to the car I can hear a ticking sound like a time bomb but can not find the source so we go ahead.

Another 50 miles ahead I feel like I need a coffee and a bite since our breakfast at the B&B today was not very filling. As I am slowly trying to pull into a parking lot of the LPG filling station, an Armenian Michael Schumacher tries to squeeze full speed between me and the curb! Thanks God our reaction prevented the worst as he jumped on his breaks and I pulled my car sharply to the left while my wife was screaming! The guy of course immediately jumped out of his car and started arguing. People began to gather. One can imagine this kind of hot blooded young Armenians given a gun to occupy a village and ensuing results. Seeing that he is rather short on stature and has no gun, he jumps back into his car, and engine roaring, floors the gas pedal. Armenian guys!!

With no metal damage, just blood boiling I get my two coffees (a typical misunderstanding when ordering a coffee with mom standing around) and both of us a wonderful piece of Armenian pastry, so our blood pressure goes back to normal. Still, watch out Mr. Mirek, something bad written in the stars may still happen! To be continued. No relief in sight.

A new day, blue sky, a lot of sun

The guy who converted Armenia to Christianity, Grigor the Illuminator, spent here at Khor Virap, 13 years, imprisoned in a well by our old friend Trdat the Third. No wonder Trd was pissed when he found out that Grigor was not only a Christian but that his dad Anak assasinated his own dad
king Khosrov II when they were both kids. In revenge Anak and his whole family were killed, but Grigor was spirited away by his nanny to Capaddocia (Roman Cesarea) and brought up as a Christian. As the only heir infant Trdat was also spirited away to Rome. They both met as grown men back in Armenia. Their story would make a great Hollywood movie with murder, friendship, betrayal, unrequited love, madness and a happy ending. So, Gregory was sitting in a well, poor chap, and if it were not for an older widow, who kept secretly throwing a loaf of bread into the well every week, he would have been dead long, long time ago. He would never have had a chance to convert anyone and the Armenians, who knows, would be Zoroastrians or Muslims
instead. The veil of clouds above the monastery is hiding Mt. Ararat, the sacred mountain of Armenians, just a short crow’s flight across the stolen border in Turkey. Bastards! Standing here in the dramatic landscape one can feel the pain of all Armenians around the world.

From there on we spent our day stuffing ourselves with cherries and apricots from the roadside vendors. We struggled not to buy a live fish as well, available like during my childhood in Prague before Christmas holidays. We were driving through fertile river valleys, beautiful mountains, bypassing Naxichevan, the enclave of Azeri people whose borders with Armenia are closed in revenge for mutual favors after the Nagorno-Karabakh war.

Occasionally we were puzzled looking for the roads, places or gas stations as the dashboard indicators revealed the quality of information we would otherwise take in any non-Russian car for granted. For example the fuel level in our car’s 40-liter (10-gallon) gas tank was being reported half full most of the time, so after a day of driving I bought additional 20 liters of gas. After this transaction our gas indicator showed our tank…..half full!

Thanks God, the roads of Armenia are sprinkled frequently with gas stations on both sides of the road. You just have to understand the system. Not all of the stations are open, and those that are, are not necessarily manned. Do not despair and be patient! If the station operator does not sleep behind the counter, in a minute or five, you will see the sole owner of the gas station leaving a nearby bar or restaurant to serve you. It does not mean necessarily that you will get what you want because a power failure could stop your pump in the middle of the operation.
There is no point to wait for electrical power to be restored. You simply pay for approximate value of fuel delivered and move on, hoping that you do not run out of gas before you can find a new supply. The relatively high cost of gas in Armenia ($1.25 a litter, about $5 a gallon) may not seem as very high to us and compared to $8 per gallon in EU even cheap, but for somebody with $80 a month paycheck it becomes pretty tempting to steal gas from somebody’s gas tank. It sounds incredible, doesn’t it? But it happens! So the advice the rental car agency gives is to not overfill your tank if not necessary, just keep it at half empty!

Almost as frequent as gas stations are beautiful churches and monasteries in this God loving country and their locations spectacular. To kick over a thousand of years old sacred buildings is quite common. And ocassionally we do simply kick over one. Following the signs for Areni winery and not finding it we came across this little jewell-S. Astvatsatsin church. Try pronouncing that! It means Holly Mother of God in Armenian. While we did not find the new winery a team of archeologists just a few years before us discovered the world’s oldest winery in a cave close by. It is over 6000 years old!

We were really on the way to find another monastery at the closure of a spectacular red brick colored canyon. Noravank, a 14th century masterpice was designed by the same guy as the little church we saw on the way. He was a sculptor and miniaturist with a fitting name: Momik. Innovative entry into this church makes visitors do their fair share of exercise.

As we returned back to the main road we were crossing high mountain passes, faced deteriorating pavement, 10% ascends and descends – we could reach there 120km per hour speed, where our car doors threatened to open, the car wheels to fall off and we felt like taking off, or….

we had to suddenly stop as the moving of people and goods on the road was complemented by frequent participation of herds of domesticated animals in the roadway traffic. Then we patiently waited till they passed and used this opportunity to exchange with herdsmen
information on availability of…

no, kidding, Internet signal in the area. Truly, as the guy on the horse with a nifty leather jacket, blue colared shirt and white cardigan leaned in towards our open car window, he waved his cell phone in our face and asked first in Ar,enian and then in Russian, „Do you have any service?“ When we replied „None“, he said, „Me neither!“ and went merrily on his way. In those people to people contacts we went an extra mile in our effort to befriend significant segments of Armenian population by providing them with transportation to their homes even as it would inconvenience us a lot. As we were driving to our next historical encounter, lost as usual, we saw an old chap standing by the side of the road stretching empty for miles around.
We stoped the car and I rolled down the window to show him a picture of some bronze age stones called Karahunj or Stone Army. He nodded that he knows where they are and suddenly opened the back door of the car and climbed in. A bit taken a back we started a simple conversation with his Russian worse than ours. Still we understood he was a road construction worker on his way home that was close to the site we were looking for. Of course we offered to drop him off at his place first, which was on the outskirts of a small town in an old appartment building. Of course he insisted that he has to thank us properly and dragged us up a few flights of rather rudimentary cement stairs with no lights. But then his daughter opened the door and a
new world opened within with a spotless little appartment with all manners of creature comfort, such as a large sofa and a large TV. His family welcomed us as long lost relatives and proceeded to empty all the cupboards in their kitchen. We had no choice but to accept everything proferred or deeply offend the heart of these welcoming people. We consumed

varieties of alcoholic drinks of questionable origin, ate food whose consumption can prove fatal for the high sugar content, checked the granddaughter’s 2nd grade English homework, listened to the stories of their neighbor who was immediately called to show us videos of his attempts to
make it to the Guinness Book of Records by repeating some excercise a few thousand times during his military service, go through their family albums to familiarize ourselves with the second cousin of their long forgotten girlfriend from the second grade living now in Arkansas, get ourselves involved in discussion on secret movements of Russian troops along the border with Azerbaijan, and other even less probable events in their family lives until we realized that the sun was already setting over a distant horizon and we have just half-an-hour left to find our large group of Bronze Age menhirs (220 of them) and

dolmens, the rocks whose origin, function, and purpose is still unknown to human mankind, as its location is to us.

Damn it, we are nearly too late again. But the setting sun and the long shadows give a special mysterious feel to this old site.

Being in Yerevan

….can bring you into a full cycle of emotions. It began with the cold rain which started drumming on the roof of our suburban B&B at midnight and had not stopped when we woke up just in time for our spread of local breakfast at 8 prepared by a group of entrepreneurial women from the host family. It included home made lavash bread that was still being baked in a deep underground pit in the garden. Having bravely driven our rented Russian tank called four wheel drive Niva out of town for the night did not make my depression any milder, BUT….if you do not like weather in Yerevan, just wait for a minute and it would improve-and it did.

As we steeled ourselves for our drive through downtown Yerevan the windshield wipers of our tank ceased to work so I was spared seeing clearly the horrors of downtown traffic until the rain stopped upon reaching the other side of town. That was a clear sign of the Goddess protecting us and our car and she additionally blessed us with the wipers starting to work into the full sunshine which followed. Good car! One more note about our transmission. All speed limit signs alongside Armenian roads are very much irrelevant on our trip either because of the frequent potholes we have to avoid or for the fact that even if we do reach the maximum speed with gear #5 of this vehicle we only rarely and exceptionally reach 80km/hr (about 50mph) when the transmission/ engine system goes into screaming overdrive giving the driver a triumphal feeling of Emerson Fittipaldi as he was on the verge of winning Formula 1 Monte Carlo Grand Prix.

Successfully crossing the capital in the morning rush hour improved my self confidence enough to be looking forward to our long drives around countryside. To grasp the Armenian history we visited the site of Christian conversion of Armenian King Trd III (Trd the Third, no kidding, this was his name).

This pagan ruler first killed all Christians (virgins that refused to marry him were tortured first) in his fiefdom before changing his mind, converting to Christianity in 301, building the church, (coincidentally looking like a Greek temple), becoming the facto first Christian kingdom in the world, and then started killing all of those that did NOT want to be baptized. What can I say, it is good to be a king, right?
We had a lot of fun with locals, truly a pleasant bunch of people. Very approachable and willing to sell you anything to improve their standard of living in this otherwise gloomy economy. With the lady manning a stand by the historical church we negotiated very hard for a significant acquisition for mom’s folk art collection of mother and child statues. After agreeing on the price of $8.45 we were served on the meadow with Armenian coffee (otherwise known around the world as Turkish coffee – politically very incorrect here), by a pound of sweet cherries picked from the trees growing around the site by her assistant and a standing invitation for dinner at her home in Etchmiadzin, our next destination. And that place was really something.

Not only is it a location of the first real Christian church of Armenia and the seat of their Catolicos (a sort of a pope) in a rather extensive complex of buildings it also has some with some stunning modern additions. The architectural design and workmanship in stone cutting and masonry of the local tuff, volcanic material of amazing quality and color is first class. You can see no money was spared to have the best, yet compared to Vatican, this is a pope’s abode with no pomp, but quiet serenity. We stumbled upon some sort of a private rite with a young couple and a priest or two accompanied by the melodious religious incantations that reverberated through the marble vaults with eery historical spirituality.
As the weather became really hot we drove back to Yerevan to stroll the streets of this pleasant downtown with all the locals out in force, particularly girls in jeans, that could hardly be taken off without using surgical tools and in heels high enough that may cause the owners to also need expert help of another surgeon when they break their ankles on the uneven surface of the city sidewalks. We sheltered ourselves in A/C’ed (was it raining in the morning?) National Library to get another lecture in cultural history of this nation thanks to an amazing young woman we met in those 36hours in Yerevan. Her exceptionally good English was acquired through self-study on top of her deep knowledge of the plethora of Armenian manuscripts that she showed us. We particularly liked the original antifeminist Christian propaganda of Eve’s original sin and consequent expulsion of the First Couple from Paradise. Here is Eve, for obvious reasons not naked, getting a scolding from God, looking over her shoulder for advice coming from the snake

what to do with that guy (Adam).

Our guide, her name being Sunshine, was one of a few smart women we met here so far. In this country with average monthly salary of just $80, we met quite a few gifted women, hoping to travel, which of course is way too expensive and almost impossible to realize. We really felt sorry for our guide, she was absolutely dedicated to such a plan, with almost no hope to accomplish it.

Culturally uplifted we left the library to take a short break in a cafe next to an outdoor gallery of an American Armenian guy named Cafesiyan who finished a large scale public project of the enormously tall stairs sprinkled with major art donations from his collection, including the largest statue of a cat I have ever seen.

To see even more we decided to taste some local Armagnac
just to elevate our mental receptors before attending the final event of our busy first day in Yerevan- the Armenian National Orchestra performance in the Opera House.

It was quite remarkable. If I have expected a regular Western style concert evening, I was dead wrong. We were not allowed to take any pictures or recordings so you have to rely on my description of what happened that evening. Firstly, the orchestra’s musicians did not wear regular evening outfits but rather mildly stylish folk clothing. Secondly, their instruments were different. This orchestra got rid of all violins, violas and cellos and replaced them with sort of Armenian style Russian balalaikas, with one group, on the conductor’s left hand, playing balalaikas with bows, while the other group, on the conductor’s right, played them with fingers like banjos. Between those two groups were five or six very attractive women in a kind of Mayan red dress, chosen for their physical attributes by the conductor to sit just in front of him, providing either a better view or better inspiration for him while playing something like hand held harps and making happy faces at the conductor to secure their jobs. The back of the orchestra was filled with more conventional instruments played by less attractive women. What can I say, it is good to be a conductor!

I do have to say the sound of this musical body was both pleasant and interesting until they were joined by a guy in a very oversized jacket who started to sing. Unfortunately, he continued to pop up too often and with too many boring songs throughout the evening. It must have been a popular guy with the locals, because he was getting a lot of flowers and finally some sort of diploma in the red folder. I hope a discrete check was included in appreciation of his life time achievements…. enough for him to buy a new and better fitting jacket.

We left during the concert’s first intermission (the best tickets cost just $7.25, so no big deal) to have a last drink and bratwurst before going back „home“ to the Yerevan outskirts.

Well, I can see it is not going to be a very easy country. The weather is not picture
perfect and we should not expect it. But we certainly hope we will make it. As we tried
today.

• arriving at the crack of dawn to a deserted railway station is not the best introduction
  7am arrival time is not an ideal time to come to town. Way too early for the Caucasus
  people, everything is closed, except for the Marriott hotel coffee shop or rather the
  espresso machine. Except we have no local money to pay and the receptionist is not
  eager to help.
• the alphabet is not exactly the bubble scripture of Georgia, Burma, or Cambodia or the
  tea leaves of Arabic alphabet. It is a kind of Xmas cane style. It does not matter too
  much when it is followed by Latin (English) or at least Russian version because Latin
  transcript of Armenian original is rather phonetic so it could vary from case to case, but
  mostly it is completely missing.
• google maps have not yet mapped all of Armenia, including our B&B

When we finally got the rental car 2 hours late from the office in the Marriott we had to follow the sun hidden behind clouds and our feelings to get to our B&B on the outskirts of Yerevan. After getting totally lost and stopping numerous times at the side of the roads to ask for directions we found it, had a late breakfast, saw the preparation for today’s lunch on the fire

…..and Armenian bread called lavash…

..and we were back on the road.

I should actually say bad roads reminding me of a practice field for Armenian tank divisions. Our car, Soviet era style Jeep Niva, has its own problems with age, the gear box (it looks that gear #1 died a few years ago making me hop embarrassingly all over the parking area like an antelope) and average mileage of another Soviet era product, a top of the line jet fighter MiG-27.

Luckily the first sights on our Armenian self drive itinerary are just about 1/2 h down the road from our accommodations.

We start off with the Temple of Garni, a well preserved example of simple and simply divine Greek architecture from the times when Armenia was the Wild West of the Greek Empire. Ksenija visited it when she was here for the first time, thirty years ago, but of course the temple was not where it stood in her memory and it looked much smaller now. Still it was a cute and perfectly restored souvenir from those times of antiquity.

She has been telling me about this temple for the last 30 years so now she finally dragged me here.

This long day we ended by visiting our first monastery, a real gem at the end of the valley, called Gerhardt. It was partially carved into the rock, some sort of Armenian answer to Jordanian Petra. It had very primitive, but very powerful animal carvings and spectacular acoustics. An Australian Armenian woman sang an Armenian song and in the near pitch dark of the chamber pier ed by a few thin devotional candles it was so beautiful, you did not want it to end.

By that time we were very much tired by all of the events of the day and mobilized all our inner strength to drive back through an unfamiliar landscape, occasional showers, Mt. Ararat hidden in the clouds, all the while fighting with the gear box, to our home away from home, a place called „Three Jugs“ for a before dinner talk with a visiting ceramic artist who, like almost all Armenians left in this country, has only a limited command, if any, of English and to communicate with most of them we have to dust off our rather rudimentary Russian which is most of the time a lot better than their English. After the hard benches of the Georgian first class train we will sleep well in real beds tonight.