We stopped at a beautiful little church (Khor Virab) with spectacular views of Mount Ararat then drove through the “mini-Grand Canyon” to Novavank, the most beautiful church so far.
Back in Yeravan, we stopped at the Genocide Museum, filled with haunting photographs and horrifying stories of the genocide by the Turks in 1915.
Hermine told us stories of Yeravan four years ago- with the war with Azerbaijan, they had no electricity, no heat, and no water and had queues for bread. The country is still struggling from the 70 years of Communist rule, the earthquake of 1988 and the war with Azerbaijan. Many of the people survive only with the help of family and the Diaspora.
We planned to meet Hermine later that night, but John happened into a driver from a hotel in Tbilisi who had just dropped off his fare from Tbilisi to Yeravan ($300 for the trip) and with his inimitable bargaining skills got the price for the return fare to $30, provided we could be ready in 15 minutes. Given the option of taking a local mini-bus in the morning or a brand new Hyundai that night, we threw our clothes in our bags, checked out of our hotel and by 6:00pm were heading for Tbilisi.
Our driver was a huge Georgian man, an ex-engineer, now taxi driver. We headed off through spectacularly beautiful scenery…following the river valley through carpeted green mountains. We were warned of bad roads when we hit the Georgian border and with a certain anticipation watched the sunlight disappear as we approached the border. With customs to look forward to- and an approaching thunderstorm ahead, our spirits plummeted. The customs process was tense. The driver took our passports and got us through the first Armenian check (regular customs) then had to deal with the Armenian military (where a lot of time and a few bribes got us through the border). Then, we had to deal with a similar process on the Georgian side.
In complete darkness, we headed into Georgia. The only illumination on the roads came from the lighting bolts in the sky. The drivers’ warnings of “bad road for 20 km” were an understatement. Some of the potholes could have swallowed a small car and with the rain, it was difficult, if not impossible to see them. At this point, we realized that our driver had night blindness and John was back-seat driving, warning him of impending disasters in the road. We had some tense moments crossing roads flooded with water, while at other cars sat stalled. At one point, the lightning flashed and we saw a group of men in the middle of the street- blocking the way. Our driver, sensing trouble, took a sharp right onto farm roads and avoided them- probably saving us a very unpleasant confrontation.
After a lot of swerving and bumping (and the frightening habit of turning off their lights when passing) we finally made it to Tbilisi…with no hotel reservations…at midnight. The driver gave us the run-down on the Sheraton rates - $300 for a standard room. A back up option at best. Based on his list of hotels, we picked the “Morkinali” and got a room at the bargain rate of $55/night, with A/C. Midnight, no food (we hadn’t eaten since breakfast) and no water (they told us it was OK to drink from the tap)- but it was too late to care and we crashed.
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