Dilijan: the forest town where Armenians go to breathe
The road up from Lake Sevan enters a two-kilometre tunnel and comes out on the other side into a landscape that does not look like Armenia: dense forest of beech, oak and hornbeam, mist on the slopes, houses with slate roofs and wooden balconies. This is Dilijan, at 1,300 metres, in Tavush, where the northern mountains hold the moisture the rest of the country lacks. Armenians call it little Switzerland, half seriously, half as a joke, and come in summer to escape the 40 degrees of Yerevan.
From Soviet spa to town of wooden houses
In Soviet times Dilijan was a place of sanatoriums and rest houses for composers, writers and film-makers, and from that remain the buildings among the trees and a reputation as a town of artists. The jokes remain too: in the film Mimino, of 1977, a character says that Dilijan water is the second best in the world, and the monument to the three main characters, put up in 2011 on the square, is where everyone takes their photo. Sharambeyan street, in the old quarter, was restored in the 2000s with 19th-century wooden houses, ceramics and woodwork workshops, a craft museum and an inn; it is short and takes twenty minutes, but it is the image of the town.
The national park
Dilijan lies inside a national park created in 2002, 24,000 hectares of deciduous forest, the largest in Armenia. There are marked trails from the town: to Lake Parz, 10 km away, small and green, with boats, a zipline and a restaurant; from Parz to Goshavank through the forest, about five hours; from Haghartsin to the same lake; and two small monasteries hidden among the trees, Jukhtak Vank and Matosavank, an hour on foot from the centre. In October the beech forest turns orange and that is the best time; in summer the nights are cool.
Haghartsin and Goshavank
The area's two monasteries are half an hour away: Haghartsin, in a forest clearing 18 km away, restored, with three churches from the 11th to 13th centuries, and Goshavank, in the village of Gosh, with the lace khachkar of 1291. You see both in a morning and come back to Dilijan for lunch.
How many days and how to get there
One night covers the monasteries and Sharambeyan street; two allow a walk in the park. Dilijan is 100 km from Yerevan, an hour and a half to two along the Sevan road, with marshrutkas from the northern bus station, and an hour and a half from the Georgian border via Ijevan, so it is the natural stop between Sevan and Georgia, or between Yerevan and the monasteries of Lori.
Frequently asked questions
Why is it called the Switzerland of Armenia?
For the forest, the damp and the roofs: Dilijan is surrounded by beech and oak woods at 1,300 metres, with a cool climate found nowhere else in the country, and its old houses have wooden balconies and pitched roofs. The label dates from Soviet times, when it was a spa town.
What can you see in a day?
Sharambeyan street and the Mimino monument in the morning, Haghartsin and Goshavank mid-morning and midday, and Lake Parz in the afternoon. With two days, a walk in the national park, for example from Parz to Goshavank.
How do you get there from Yerevan?
It is 100 km along the Lake Sevan road and through the Dilijan tunnel, an hour and a half to two by car. There are frequent marshrutkas from Yerevan's northern bus station, and those going to Ijevan and Tbilisi pass through.
