The road to Tatev

Jul 9 2017

Originally, we wanted to follow the Մ2 highway to Goris, but then we spotted a smaller road that goes to Tatev village. Tatev has an old monastery, which still was on our list of things to see in Armenia. There is also the longest aerial tramway in the world, that goes up to the village.

While we were standing at the junction, deciding if we wanted to take this route or not, a family stopped next to us in the parking lot. They are Armenian, but are living in Moscow nowadays and were in the area for holidays. They invited us to awesome breakfast with lots of delicacies, including grilled chicken, cheese and basturma. We didn't have breakfast yet, so we were extremely grateful for this!

In the end, they packed the rest of the food for us, so we would have something to eat on the way. They even packed us a bottle of homemade strawberry wine, that they bought on the street. Amazing! Thank you so much!

These street dogs were very happy about the leftover chicken bones:

The family also told us that we absolutely must see Tatev. So it was decided, we took another detour into the mountains!

Shinuhayr village from above:

Arriving at the famous aerial tramway:

View from the lower station:

Our original plan was to take the tramway to Tatev, but it was Sunday and extremely crowded, so it was not possible to take the bicycles with us. They told us that every other day it would be no problem, but today it was just not possible. Well, bad luck. The only other option was to cycle. First down into the valley and then up again to the top of the mountain, where Tatev village lies.

Ok, let's go!

The road up to Tatev from the other side of the mountain:

On this side, it was still paved:

In the valley, there was a canyon with hot springs, called the "Devils Bridge". It was very crowded with tourists, but strangely, no one was bathing in the spring. Well, the atmosphere was not really relaxing to be honest...