Adventures & Misadventures Abroad: 4-15 First Impressions of Yerevan

After our wild ride yesterday and the depression of the Armenian countryside, we landed in an upscale section of Yerevan. Our dinner last night was at Tavern Yerevan and was a typical Armenian barbecue meal. They use a lot of different flavorings on the meat or fish and basically cook until dry. The potatoes and other vegetables have been quite tasty in the whole region.

The breakfast buffet this morning was an ornate spread of both local specialties and western breakfasts. More unusual there was a pianist serenading us for breakfast. Apparently this is a trend in the pricier hotels in Yerevan. A similar hotel in the US would cost around $175 a night and would not include breakfast or especially a pianist! We are paying a lot less here because of the drop of the AMD to the USD.

We headed out to a park nearby. Hopefully the fountain below will be turned on tonight.

Across the street from the park was this decorative entrance to a office building.

Still part of the park - on either end of another section of the park.

While in Azerbaijan and especially in Georgia the big push seems to be in restoring historical buildings damaged by wars and by the Soviet Union. But here in Yerevan it the push seems to be modernization at the expense of history. Tomorrow we have a tour with a history professor so I should be getting a lot of my impressions confirmed or put down! We saw a lot of modern building, some finished and a lot more under construction.

We came across this building. It looks like it could be an old bazaar. But it is a modern grocery store/mall.

A lot of the historical buildings in Yerevan have been destroyed. Those that still exist are far apart. So we have been doing a lot of walking. We reached the Blue Mosque. It was established in 1765 and restored between around 1999. It is the only functioning mosque in Yerevan.

Inside - I believe this is the meeting hall.

And across a lovely garden is the mosque itself.

We walked on to the Opera House where we were to meet our guide for tomorrow to finalize our plans.

We accidentally went to the back of the Opera house - Wednesday we hope to see the front.

Random Wall art on our way to see a section of town called Kond. It has the remaining 19th century buildings left in Yerevan.

This seems to be an Armenian Brandy house. The most famous brand is Ararat Brandy. We bought some to try - not the top end as it is too expensive. It is very tasty!

Random park with carpet covered animals.

This section of town has a lot of buildings with the color and pattern in the two central buildings. It was very close to:

A long staircase leading up to the Kond area.

A look back.

An apartment building in not great shape.

And then the Kond - or so we thought. We went to the left of the ram shackled building below. Only to be stopped by the frightening barking of a huge dog - looked more like a wolf. As the area deteriorated into separate footpath leading to individual homes - we decided to turn around and try another way.

We followed a road around this small section - but there did not seem to be a way in - everything was blocked by high fabricated metal pieces or stone walls.