Honeymoon Around the World » Dél-Örményország http://360fokbringa.hu 4 years, 46 countries, 40.000 kilometers Mon, 01 Oct 2018 08:08:56 +0000 en-US hourly 1 https://wordpress.org/?v=4.1.41 Yerevan http://360fokbringa.hu/en/002-asia/jerevan/ http://360fokbringa.hu/en/002-asia/jerevan/#comments Fri, 23 Sep 2011 06:00:01 +0000 http://360fokbringa.hu/?p=2716 We thought Yerevan is a very good, easy to live in town, which we both liked a lot.
One defining feature of the town is transport. They have Metro (like in Budapest), trolleybuses and Marschutka.
The marschutka is a local speciality. These are old microbuses, which were adapted inside, so that more people would fit in. Every marschutka has a number, they travel along the route according to their line number, and you can hail them anywhere along this route. Getting off works the same way, you can tell the driver anywhere that you want to get off, give him the fare, a 100 Dram note (50 forints) and you can go. This is the technical part, this was probably not so exciting, but now come the people! :) At the back 3 complete strangers sit down on 2 seats! This is really serious, it happened to me too, it was a girl who squeezed me in next to her. And the luggage of those standing gets looked after by those sitting down.
This would be utterly impossible in Budapest, but here it works and it is a joy to behold.
Yerevan is a modern city, in downtown the streetscape is pristine.
The inner city has many parks, they are full of restaurants with outside places, where you can find perfectly good wifi – much to my delight.
The centre is perhaps formed by the Opera House and the surrounding sqaures and parks.


The downtown area is modern, you can find anything you want, food, drink, restaurants, pubs, markets, but quite a few fashion shops too. However, McDonald’s is banned! :D Apparently this gets the local youth rather annoyed, if only they knew how well off they are!
The outer suburbs are a bit more rundown, but they are still homely and livable in.


The townscape is dominated by the twin peaks of Mount Ararat. This is the holy mountain of the Armenian people, although nowadays it is in Turkey, but perfectly visible from Yerevan.
On the last night we were invited as guests in Yerevan, we visited Zita’s Armenian acquaintance, Lusine and her husband Laci.
We caught the bus from Yerevan to Tabriz in Iran, because otherwise we would have been unredeemably behind on our planned timescales. Unfortunately we had to stick to our schedule due to our visas and the approaching winter in Tadjik, Kirghiz, Chinese and Pakistani areas. Otherwise we would have literally frozen to our bikes.
After our departure we could admire the twin peaks of Mount Ararat in the first hour.

As soon as we left the valley of the Ararat, the bus travelled amongst higher and higher mountains. Occasionally we could climb 1000m in a few minutes, which would have taken us a whole day by bike. The views were unbeliveable, although due to the speed and looking through windows it felt like we were looking at a movie screen.

Thank you Armenia!
I can only write about Armenia that it was absolutely fantastic, both the countryside and the people. We both enjoyed our days spent in Yerevan, and by the end we felt it was our town too. Should you ever travel in Armenia, we suggest you quickly learn those few words with which you can thank the people for their kindness.

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