Yerevan

Yerevan is twenty-nine years older than Rome — the founding inscription of Erebuni, 782 BC, is on display like a birth certificate the city keeps handy — and she is built of pink volcanic tuff that turns rose, salmon and violet as the day moves. Over every street stands Ararat: the holy mountain on the money, the cognac and the coat of arms, close enough to count its snowfields — and across a closed border, which is the tenderest fact in the city's geography. Yerevan lives with the view the way other cities live with the sea.

The sensible traveller climbs the Cascade's art-filled stairways at dusk, when the whole city turns rose and Ararat — in season — floats above the haze; drinks the coffee that comes with every conversation and the brandy Churchill famously rationed for himself; walks Republic Square when the fountains sing at night; hunts the Vernissage market on the weekend for carved crosses and Soviet cameras; and pays Tsitsernakaberd, the genocide memorial, the unhurried, flower-bearing visit that this nation's memory deserves.

The Guide's honesty: the memorial is the country's heart — go, keep silence by the flame, and let the museum speak —; Ararat hides in summer haze: September mornings are the honest window, and Khor Virap monastery is the front-row seat; the dram is cash-friendly and taxis run by app; and Armenian hospitality escalates through coffee, fruit, lavash and toasts — arrive curious and unhurried, leave adopted.