Friday's Face-Stepanakert, Nagorno-Karabakh

I recently visited Nagorno-Karabakh which is a place in a bit of limbo. It is a self proclaimed independent state but my understanding is that there is no country in the world that recognizes it. It is officially part of Azerbaijan, but currently under Armenian control.

On entering into Nagorno-Karabakh the passport of non-Armenians are checked by Nagorno-Karabakh but you do not official leave Armenia. When you reach Stepanakert you need to go in and apply for a visa and they asked me if I wanted the visa in or out of the passport. I did not have them put it in my passport so have it as a separate document. I do not plan to go to Azerbaijan but if the Nagorno-Karabakh visa was in my passport Azerbaijan would not let me in.

While I was in Stepanakert I stayed at house where the couple rented out rooms in there house. They ask me to post their details on the web when I left so I put the following on wikitravel for them. They gave me most of what it says but I added the bit about a lovely couple and the English translator. They allowed me to take a picture of them below.

Eduard's Homestay, Str. Nalbandyan 23, ☎ +374 97-24-26-21 or +374 47-95-26-21. This homestay has clean rooms and a new bathroom with hot water. It is 5 minutes walk from the main bus station and 300 meter from the main street. It has a beautiful large balcony. It is a nice and quite place. It is run by a lovely older couple that speak Russian or Armenian. They did call an English translator to help when we did need help communicating. 4000 drams.

While in Nagorno-Karabakh the following taxi drive took me to a couple of monasteries that were not reachable by public transportation.

The last face picture was taken in one of the monasteries and there are military personal all over Stepanakert.