Last day in Armenia: Gerghard, Garni and Genocide museum

We got up fairly late as usual on our last day in Armenia and set out for the Armenian Genocide museum by marshrutka (public minibus). It was a very moving museum with a lot of photographs and interesting exhibits about what happened when the ethnically Armenian population were driven out of Turkey by the Ottoman Empire which at that time ruled over Turkey, the Caucasian countries and and most of the Middle East and even parts of north-eastern Africa. The genocide took place during and after World War 1 between 1915 and 1923 and has been generally acknowledged as the first major holocaust of the 20th century. 

Between 1 million and 1.5 million Armenians are estimated to have been killed. The extermination of the Armenian population took place in two stages. First the able-bodied men were murdered or worked to death through forced labour then the women, children, elderly and sick were led on death marches into the Syrian dessert and left there with no food or shelter. Many died on the way to the dessert and still more died of starvation and disease once they arrived. Other Christian minorities in the Ottoman Empire were targeted for extermination in a similar way at the this time including the Greeks and the Assyrians. 

The remains of Armenians massacred at Erzinjan. (photo care of Wikipedia)

Slaughtered Armenians killed by the Ottoman Turks in the spring and summer of 1915.

Starved Armenian refugee children taken in by Near East Relief, an Armerican charity. (photo care of Wikipedia)

Unfortunately, the musuem lacked a good overview of the genocide so visitors who were unaware of the background of the tragedy might have been a bit confused as to why it happened. Still, the museum was refreshingly free of the usual hawk-eyed old women that usually follow visitors around in museums in former Soviet countries though there were a few rude and pushy tour groups to contend with. 

Outside the museum we saw lots of trees planted by various world leaders and other important people who recognised the genocide. It's a strange and sad fact that many people still don't recognise the Armenian Genocide including our own country the UK. Sadly, the Turkish government still attempts to deny that the genocide ever happened and hotly contests its formal recognition by other countries. Interestingly, the word genocide was coined to describe what happened to the Armenians and the reason why there are so many people of Armenian descent living in various countries around the world is because they were scattered about as a result of the genocide. They are known as the Armenian Diaspora and many of them have been calling on Barack Obama to officially recognise the extermination of the Armenians as a genocide though he has been careful to avoid doing so as yet, presumably so as not to upset Turkey.

The tall spike of the genocide memorial at the Armenian Genocide museum.

Trees planted outside the museum by important figures from around the world in recognition of the genocide.

The Armenian Genocide hasn't been officially recognised as such by the British government but there was this plaque next to one of the trees left by a member of the House of Lords.

After the museum we headed over to the other side of ton and caught a bus to Goght, a town near to to the Garni Temple which we planned to visit later on that day but before that we wanted to get to Geghard to see the UNESCO World Heritage listed cave monastery which everyone had told us was stunning. unfortunately there was no public transport to Gegherd so the only way to get there was to walk, hitch , take your own transport or pay for a taxi. It was a 4-5 km walk along a hilly winding tarmac road under the intense glare of the Armenian June sun. We stopped at a little roadside shop to buy some water and some cheerful local guys asked us to take their picture s they sat out on the shop's porch drinking. It was a very rural feeling area. We even saw some guys making hay bales on the road near the shop with pitchforks and an ancient looking machine - very Thomas Hardy! 

The cheerful group of locals who requested that we take their picture as they sat on the porch of a roadside store.

Making hay bales the hard way.

Old fashioned agricultural work at the side of the road.

Old military vehicles were a common sight in Armenia and Georgia.

Rowan found and ate some strange berries on the trees as we were walking to Geghard and he doesn't look too impressed by them here! 

We saw several of these strange insects that looked like a cross between a butterfly and a dragonfly.

They were resurfacing part of the road we were walking on making the air even dustier than before.

Obligatory cow on road picture. There were always cows or sheep or goats on the road in Armenia and Georgia.

The hot dusty road that we marched along for ages to get to the cave monastery. This is the easy downhill section but it had been all uphill before that.

We got quite tired and hot walking so we decided to try our look hitching and we got a lift immediately with  kind young couple in a rather flash car only to find that we'd only been 200 metres or so away from the monastery at that point. We felt a bit stupid but it was still nice to get a brief respite from the stifling heat. The cave monastery at Gegherd was really interesting, cool and dark inside with a natural spring in one of the caves and lots of dark nooks and crannies with carvings and stuff. It was founded in the 4th century around the cave spring by Gregory the Illuminator, the man responsible for introducing Christianity to Armenia. The monastery was made up of lots of different chapels and churches dug out of the rocky mountains and was surrounded by beautiful towering cliffs.  We explored the caves for a while and enjoyed the coolness inside . The weather was beginning to turn and we could hear distant thunder rolling off the mountains behind us. As we were leaving we saw a wedding with four old men playing traditional musical instruments. The bride had a very large white dress and there was one drunk looking middle aged male guest dancing solo up the hill to the monastery to the sound of the music much to everyone's amusement.

Finally we made it to Geghard Cave Monastery tucked away among the mountains in this picture.

Inside the monastery complex.

Chapel inside one of the caves.

Interesting carvings inside one of the caves.

More carvings around subterranean doorways.

Worshippers lighting candles in the cave chapel.

Church in the monastery complex.

Carvings on the cliffs round the monastery.

The stairs up to the carvings were extremely worn.

View of the church spire through a cave chapel window.

Visitors braving the worn old steps.

Look carefully at the cliffs on the left side of this picture and you will see a tiny cross that some brave pious soul placed on the mountains long ago presumably without any mountaineering gear.

The four old musicians playing for the wedding party.

The bride, groom and their party make their way up to the church in the monastery complex.

A large shed snake skin that we found on the road near the monastery.

We started walking back to the Garni Temple down the same tarmac road as the weather was turning really threatening. Luckily, just as it started to rain, we managed to hitch ride with a guy who was already giving a lift to an artist from Yerevan. We listened to some crazy Armenian or possible Russian hip hop on the way and got dropped off by a marshrutka which we were then able to catch to the temple. The marshrutka took us to the end of the temple road and its kindly driver didn't want any money from us for the journey as it had been too short. We were really grateful for the kindness local people showed to us in the countryside that day when we were hitching and trying to get to Geghard and Garni. The rain had just about stopped so we bought a bottle of beer o enjoy on the walk down to the Garni Temple. It was a beautiful looking Hellenic Parthenon-style temple presumed to have been constructed in the 1st century AD by an Armenian king. The temple was in a very dramatic setting, with gorgeous scenery and thunder still rolling in the surrounding mountains as the rain seemed to hasten to catch up with us. The temple looked in surprisingly good condition for something supposed to be so old so we wondered how much of it was reconstructed but it was still lovely to look at. It was a shame there was quite a lot of scaffolding around the front of the temple. I think they were building a stage or something. 

The Garni Temple with some scaffolding in front of it.

The scenery around the Garni Temple was stunning.

Me drinking a bottle of beer standing on the temple.

 The weather suddenly darkened while we were admiring the temple and looked very ominous.

 Last shot of the pretty temple and the scary looking weather.

After we'd had our fill of the temple we walked back down the road to try to catch the marshrutka back to Yerevan and then of course t started raining, really raining. We ran and hid under some trees and met another Armenian couple sheltering there who we ended up catching a taxi back to to Yerevan with. It was the most ancient looking taxi we'd ever seen with a dashboard bereft of all the usual modern dials. The taxi dropped us off in some random part of Yerevan we'd never seen before. We had to get another taxi with the same couple which dropped the young woman off in her little town then the guy off at his flat near our hostel then finally we arrived at our hostel. The guy from the couple was very kind and paid for all of the second taxi journey and gave the driver instructions on how to get to our hostel.

We rounded off the day with a visit to the "oldest tavern in Yerevan" for dinner. It was a strange place with an unpronounceable name but the food was very tasty. The restaurant seemed mainly deserted and was built underground and looked like an abandoned subway station. You could actually feel the vibrations from the metro coming through the walls! Then it was back to the hostel for a last night night of restless sleep in the creaky metal bunkbeds before we set off back to Georgia.

Our dinner of mushroom kebab and lamb kebab at the old tavern.