Up The Rocks

The last week of August 2008 I was on a business trip in Armenia. I had also free time on weekend, and it was very easy to decide going somewhere in the mountains near the capital Yerevan.
With my Armenian colleague Mkhitar Mkhitaryan we had spend some time in south-east Armenian mountains and we went back to Yerevan on Saturday evening. In the city centre we asked for a taxi to get us to Kari Lake (3190 m) – the base point for Aragats climbs.

On April 8, 2008, two days after flying twelve time zones around the world, I got into a Soviet made 1988 Volga with two Armenian strangers and went off to climb Armenia’s highest mountain. My wife, Kelly, had won a U.S. State Department Fellowship to teach teachers in Armenia for one month. I decided to tag along and see if I could do a little climbing while learning about this ancient culture and people. The two strangers, who quickly became my new best friends, were Ashot and Mkhitar. They met me at the Izuz Hotel in Gyumri, where Kelly was staying while working with the teachers of the Lord Byron School.

On July 26, 2006 my uncle with friends were planning to climb mount Ararat and two days before the trip they offered me to join them. I happily accepted their suggestion motivated by the strong wish to be in Western Armenia.