No fear in the lands of Karabakh

This was probably our most unusual blog tour, and, frankly, until the last moment I did not believe that it would take place. Now, tell me, with what is Nagorno-Karabakh associated with you? When I asked about this on my Instagram, literally all of my subscribers replied that with the war that was here in the 1990s. Alas, in many Artsakh, this is the second name of Nagorno-Karabakh, it is associated with it. And this is sad, because in fact the region is very interesting. And we knew this firsthand, as we were here three years ago. By the way, times are changing, and in comparison with how many tourists were in Nagorno-Karabakh then, now their number has increased. And now they come here not only from Russia, but even from South Korea, Japan and Singapore.

We went to Artsakh for four days, during which we planned to visit Stepanakert, Shushi, Tigranakert, attend a wine festival in a village called Togh, and at the same time honor three ancient monasteries - Amaras, Gandzasar and Dadivank with our visit.

We entered Nagorno-Karabakh, of course, from Armenia. I must say right away that a visa for Russian citizens is not needed there, and the entire process of crossing the border takes no more than 15 minutes. We were handed a questionnaire with the usual questions: name, passport number, address of residence, purpose of visit, date of entry and exit, which cities in Artsakh we want to visit. And right after we filled it out, we were given a registration card, which indicated that we were allowed to enter, inspection of these cities, too, with the exception of no less than the front line! Like this! We then passed this card to the checkpoint when leaving Nagorno-Karabakh. We did not get any stamps in the passports.

It says "Welcome to free Artsakh."

But foreigners, by the way, needed to be provided for entry into Karabakh.

Border point.

Well, here's another thing. For those who still think that war is still going on in Nagorno-Karabakh, I will say that there has been no war there for a long time, although skirmishes on the border with Azerbaijan happen from time to time. But tourists are still not allowed to enter the border; entry to the border zones is prohibited for them. I also want to say that over the past three years, Nagorno-Karabakh has changed and improved a lot. One road through the Zodsky pass is worth what. As I recall, the last time we made our way along it in the night, on clay and in the rain, practically hovering over the abyss with wheels ... uh ... And now there is beautiful asphalt. Shushi, too, has significantly changed for the better, and there are less and less traces of the past war and devastation there. The rest of the towns where we were also made a very positive impression. Although, of course, there are no limits to perfection. And Artsakh has room to develop further.

But let me finally show you a photo.