Narek Aleksanyan

After the spring snow melts, residents of highland villages take their animals to graze in the mountain pastures. For residents of Shnogh, a village in Armenia’s Lori Province, that mountain is Metz (Big) Ourtategh. It’s 15 kilometers from the village. In the past, entire families would ascend the mountain during the summer. Nowadays, it’s the adults who take the animals to graze on the mountain, while the others stay down in the village performing daily household chores. They will periodically climb the mountain to bring food to their relatives and to cut meadow grass for fodder. Many Shnogh children spend their summer vacation up on Metz Ourtategh.