Azat water rese Geghard Monastery - Pagan temple Garni - Symphony of Stones

This is one of the most popular routes of interest to tourists visiting Armenia for the first time. After visiting the magnificent turquoise Sevan with the 9th century Sevanavank spear monastery, we will go to the Geghard monastery, whose history begins in the 1st century AD. It has amazing acoustics! I will sing a church hymn for our guests))). Next I will show the wonderful rocks "Symphony of Stones". And finally, Garni — the pagan temple of the sun! You will love Armenia, because I will convey my love for it to you!
This is one of the most popular routes of interest to tourists visiting Armenia for the first time.
This tour has 3 destinations:
1 is Azat water reservoir
*The next stop is a cave monastery from the beginning of the 13th century. Geghard is the monastery of the spear, with which, according to legend, Christ was pierced. Inspection of a unique cave temple (carved into the rock), which has interesting acoustics. By the way, I myself will sing one of the church hymns for my guests. At the foot of the monastery, tourists can buy Geghar gata (tasty national pie) and sweet sujukh, prunes, dried apricots, etc.
*Further we keep the direction to the Garni gorge. This is an amazing place: huge pillars from 50 to 100 meters high hang over the surface of the earth in different shades and with a peculiar slope. Looking at the impeccably smooth edges of these huge five and hexagonal boulders, it is hard to believe that they were created by nature, and not specially carved by man. The locals called this place "Symphony of Stones" or "Basalt Organ" because of the similarity with the musical instrument of the same name. All these polyhedra were formed as a result of volcanic activity. According to the laws of physics, any viscous liquid, when heated uniformly and strongly from below, breaks up into hexagonal Benard cells. In other words, the lava shrinks, cracks, and then breaks up into polyhedral columns. The scientific name for this geological formation is columnar separation.
*And, finally, Garni himself! The Temple of Garni is the only monument that has survived in the territory of Armenia, dating back to the era of paganism and Hellenism. The fortress on a steep cape above the Azat River was founded in some very ancient times, Argishti I, king of Urartu in the 8th century BC, more precisely, in 782 BC. e. from Garni, with 6600 troops, he headed south in search of fertile lands and from the point of view of political and military benefits. He climbed one of the flat hills and exclaimed: "I saw" what Erebuni means and built on this hill a powerful fortress of Erebuni — today's Yerevan.