Putting behind me the horror show that was the prelude to this holiday, I found myself in a new hotel that is really fantastic, and closer to the centre of the city. Arriving just after 9am, it was too early to check in, so I dropped off my bag, had some breakfast, and a wandered slightly sleep deprived into town.

There is a half circle park space that spans several blocks and eclipses the entrance to an amazing markets called Vernissage, and continuing on that path eventually leads to Republic Square. Oddly, at 10am on a Saturday, barely anyone was around. It was like Helsinki all over again – even by 11am a few places had lazily opened. This must just be a weekend thing, as visiting the same areas on a weekday, the shops were open, and the people humming about the place.

Alas with my lack of sleep, I was too exhausted to continue going anywhere on this day. Struggling back to the hotel, my room now ready, I scribbled together an idea of what to do on each day, and crashed out and entered the blissful needed realm of Morpheus.

Even on that day one, I couldn’t help but notice the coffee vending machines. These things are everywhere. Need an instant coffee? Literally walk a block and there’ll be a vending machine awaiting to be fed a 100 drams. It’s really weird, as Armenians do love their coffee, but clearly they’re not fanatical like back home (These machines would be vandalised back in Sydney, just out of sheer spite!). After trying Armenian style coffee (similar to Moroccan, basically a long black but with the thick coffee sludge at the bottom), and loving it dearly, it’s just odd that instance coffee machines would be something they’d be keen on. I’ll admit, at this point, I have not tried these vending machine coffees. Maybe it’s awesome.

The walk to Republic Square was really only about 15mins away, despite on that day one it seemed hours away through that fog of molasses sleep deprivation. I was heading to the Armenia History Museum, the major towering building over the Square.

On Republic Square fountains sprayed upwards, kids ran around the place, locals sat on benches taking in the atmosphere, and a clump of people stood waiting patiently at the front door to the museum. Their website said it opened at 10am. It didn’t. The door said it opened at 11am. It didn’t. It’s the Armenian way, and we all waited for the doors to unlock and in we went.

I had to laugh at the chaos next. The tickets were divided into the History Museum, or the Art Museum. I swear no one read the signs. People were buying wrong tickets, getting confused, and the gates to both exhibitions had QR readers, but you had to use the correctly assigned gate by looking at the hologram on the gates glass barrier. Someone get the museum a UX person to redesign this, asap!

The museum is really quite good. Detailing the Neolithic period, the founding of Yerevan in the 8th Century BCE, the various what must have felt like endless conquests of the region, and up to becoming the first Christian kingdom. It’s laid out excellently and has descriptions in English.

The reconstructed horse and cart, excavated from the Necropolis of Lchashen from 4000BCE, is particular a highlight. I was truly was blown away by the amount of cuneiform found there, which considering the date makes sense, but I really didn’t consider ancient writing from Mesopotamia to be found in Armenia.

Like any tourist hotspot, the prices jump up. I stopped for a coffee and delicious lemon juice, sighing at the price but not caring. I needed refreshment and caffeine, and it felt like I was back in Sydney, paying for an espresso and lemon juice tallying in for $22.

My battle plan for Yerevan was breaking the days up between Yerevan adventures and taking day trip tours outside the city. This worked surprisingly well considering the time I had lost stuck in airports, and with the ease to get around the city with Yandex (Russian based Uber, but much better), I was able to get to a place like the Matenadaran in 15mins rather than my usual attack plan to walk everywhere and destroy my feet in the process (I need those for walking!).

The Matenadaran is, at its heart and soul, a place to love books. Ancient manuscripts are housed here, kept safe and painstakingly restored. The goal is to preserve books, mostly from antiquity, and the bulk on display Christian scriptures and bibles.

I don’t care how little you care about books, I challenge the most jaded to look upon a manuscript from 1300 with hand written text that would put a word processor to shame, accompanied with beautifully illustrated images of angels accompanied by, for some reason, demons bumming each other. The illustrators sure liked their porno devils and imps.

The only negative I will say about the Matenadaran is the over abundance of Christian texts. There’s a room for foreign manuscripts, mentioning Greek and other ancient cultures, yet all the displays are Christian books. It got a little too repetitive.

I do hope they change this, so the Matenadaran becomes the go to library in the world to visit for ancient manuscripts from all cultures around the world. A modern Library of Alexandria.

I like to find a pub/bar to end my days on, and looking around on Maps.me I saw there was bar a block away from my hotel, enticingly named Voodoo Hooka Lounge. I rocked up one afternoon and at the door was a woman in black lace, black eye liner, and black nail polish. “Do you speak English?”, I asked. She looks at me, “Badly”. I was sold, this smokey little hooka/sisha den became my end of day crash out and chill venue.

I still have the amazing surrounding sites, which involved needing to take tours. Let’s see next up how I fair with being a tour bus tourist…