Sanahin is actually two villages: the new and the old one. The new village is more like a suburb of the city of Alaverdi with its concrete buildings. One can get to the city either by bus or by cable car (ropeway).
The old village is not far from the new one (less than one kilometre). It's a traditional Armenian village with old wooden houses. Beside the village, there is the Sanahin monastery, which is coupled with a nearby Haghpat monastery as a UNESCO World Heritage Site.
The monastery was very quiet as there were no other tourists (we saw a couple when leaving). There was a dog that guided us around the monastery area (we came again next morning to bring him food reward) and an old lady selling candles in the church.
We stayed overnight at Hotel Anna-Maria-Lilit. It is located at the edge of the new village, by the road from Alaverdi. The rooms are very small but clean and cheap.
Next page: Haghpat »
See also:
Most of the photographs at this site are licensed under a Creative Commons
licence. See page of each image for further information.
