Long drives today over often rough country roads, but the destinations were worth it.
Memorial to a young N-K soldier killed in attack on an armored troop transport
Dadivank monastery nestled near the base of a densely wooded mountain.
This monastery is named after St. Dadi, an disciple of Thaddeus the apostle,
who spread Christianity in eastern Armenia in the 1st century A.C.
Dadivank is being restored. Italian experts are restoring the frescos in the church.
Color patches for the frescos, on a wall of the church
After Dadivank and lunch we took a long drive to Gandzsar Monastery,
which overlooks a dramatically long, deep valley.
Gandzasar Monastery is the headquarters of the Armenian Apostolic Church in N-K.
It is claimed to hold the skull of John the Baptist.
The dome and a window of the church, built in the 10th-13th C. Austere and beautiful.
Stairway to the altar in the church, with ornate, intricate stone carving
The sky had become dramatic by the time we left the monastery.
In the town of Vank, near Gandzasar, one of a number of large-scale, fanciful amusements
A bittersweet display in Vank: A wall (this is a small part) of
the license plates of cars left behind when Azeris fled after their defeat in 1994.
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