Tag Baku

Pretty Kitty

We only had a five day transit visa for Azerbaijan. It is a relatively small country and while we would have liked to stay longer than five days, the visa was 130$ for 30 days or $20 for five days, so we took the later and decided to see as much as we could in the time we could afford to buy.

We spent the morning walking around the city as we weaved our way to the train station to reserve tickets for the evening’s 10pm train to Tbilisi. When we arrived at the station we wondered from window to window asking about a train to Georgia’s capital. Every window-attendant just shrugged, mumbled in Russian, and pointed to another window. We literally made our way, one on each side, down the entire 24 window ticket buying area asking each person, all of whom was rude, and down-right mean. Finally, I started asking other travelers. Most were friendly enough, but said that they did not know how to buy a ticket either. Everyone looked frustrated, annoyed and disgusted with the ticket salespeople. Finally, as I was about to cry, two Azeri boys said they would help us. They stood there patiently with Mike and made sure he got a good ticket for a fair price and then even helped translate from Russian to English for us. Without those friendly boys we might still be wandering around the ticketing office from window to window like lost children.

We headed to the train station at 9:30 a bit depressed that we already had to leave. Our time with the American family in Baku was great, and as we waited for the train to leave we found we already missed the fun loving antics of their young child, who had kept us company over the past few days.

The train was supposed to take 15 hours, but as with everything in the Caucus we’d experience thus far, the time was much more. But, this turned out (as it usually does) to be a good thing. We met Famil on the train, the young man who had helped us purchase our tickets earlier that day. His bunk was only a few doors down from our sleeper train compartment, so he spent the evening drinking beers on the train with us and chatting. His English was phenomenal, and he told us how he spent time in Barcelona and Turkey, as well as in Georgia and his home country of Azerbaijan. He speaks several languages fluently and is learning Spanish. An older gentlemen calling himself Frank (for our benefit) was also in our compartment. He tried to communicate with us in Russian and charades, the latter of which was more effective. A friendly and talkative cabin-mate, this gentlemen was fun to travel with and kept us all entertained with his storied (some of which Famil translated for us).

Azerbaijan, being currently in the middle of an oil boom, is as expensive as Europe. We were confined to Baku because we only had a few days on our transit visa. We talked with other travelers about the best sights and heard about the James Bond Oil Fields, which were featured in the opening scenes of The World is Not Enough. We set off on a bus for 20cents to the city’s largest mosque, which was destroyed (not surprisingly) by the Russians and rebuilt recently atop the hill overlooking the oil fields. Several dozen nodding donkeys pumped oil out of the ground in the field along the Caspian while dozens others were nestled in people’s backyards or along the side of the road. The entire area was alive with up and down movements everywhere you looked. The site, however, sounds cooler than it actually is because you are not permitted to go anywhere near any of them, and can only look down on the chaos from atop a rather tall hill. We spent most of our time watching the dock workers at the Caspian Shipping Company as they loaded a research vassal and an oil rig builder.

We heard about the mud volcanoes outside of Baku several hours, but everyone said they were lame and to skip it because the cab drivers who wait at the bus stop to pick up tourists will take you out to the mud volcanoes and then charge an arm and a leg to get you back to the bus. Meanwhile, the volcanoes themselves are apparently very small and unimpressive. Having seen the boiling mud craters in Darvaza in Turkmenistan, we were fine to skip it.

The Maiden’s Tower in Old Town was amazing. The architecture and construction of the tower was unlike any other for its time, and historians still argue about the purpose of the odd structure. It is called the maiden’s tower not for any damsel in distress saga, but because the tower is impenetrable, with 5m thick walls. From the top there is a great view of the Caspian, but an even better view of Baku.

Old Town is well worth some time getting lost. We spent hours walking around the back alleys, admiring the stacks of moldy bread and playing with the endless supply of feral cats. The nearby fountain park area displays old European architecture that is steadily being rebuilt and recovered in sandstone facades of the new style. The entire area was under construction when we were there, with sandstone flying everywhere as experts carved new bricks.
The Boulevard along the Caspian is a beautiful, several kilometer long parkway that is soon to be the gem of the city. This was also under construction while we were there, but this did not prevent us from enjoying the views, or the shade of the trees in the hot summer sun.

By far the two most interesting things we saw in Baku were the Monument to the Martyrs and the Cemetery. The first was a large park with a headstone for each person slaughtered by the Armenians in the massacre of 1992. There was a monument to those who fell to the Russians in 1990 and even a small monument marking the graves of the British who died in Baku trying to keep the Turkish from invading during World War I. The cemetery contains the resting place of the president, as well as celebrities, scientists and other important people from Azerbaijan’s history. You can take a little tram ride up the side of the hill to reach these two spots for 20cents, and it’s well worth the trip.

We arrived in Baku at 1:00am and disembarked from the ferry with a sigh, it had been an amazing trip, and although it was over 30 hours from boarding to alighting, we were sad that the ‘cruise’ was over. By the time we got through the ridiculously lengthily customs and border check at the sea port it was around 3:00am. Being thrifty, “a penny saved is a penny earned,” we decided that spending $20 each on a hostel that night was a waste of money since we’d only get to sleep a few hours. After a short debate we decided it would be humorous to stay awake all night and watch the sunrise. We heard a rumor that there was a McDonald’s in town, and we were determined to be there for the Mc-Awesome-Breakfast. We strolled along Baku’s main boulevard along the Caspian shore-front, a magnificently redesigned and renovated walkway that parallels main European fairways.

At one point along the walkway Mike rested himself upon a bench and I walked down to see if there was anywhere in the cover of trees to pitch our tent for a few hours of rest. As I was walking alone looking for a spot, a man approached me and was so persistently asking for something and winking so devilishly that when he came close and attempted to reach out at me I was forced to yell for him to desist and put my hand on the knife I always carry. He continued to pester me and I had to pull the knife out and glare grumpily. All the while I was walking (trying to appear calm) towards Mike, and when I was within earshot I called out to Mike and the creepy stranger sauntered off into the trees and disappeared. Having pulled my knife on someone within an hour of landing in a country we decided that all night walk-abouts were perhaps best carried out on lighted streets.

We cut into downtown Baku and were amazed at the beauty and architecture of the city. The entire place is being renovated and upgraded as Azerbaijan is in the midst of a very profitable oil boom. New facades of shaped sandstone with wooden balconies are going up all over the main parkways in the city, giving the entire city a facelift. We walked around in bafflement at how European the city appeared. Having found that the McDonald’s was not a 24 hour establishment in Azerbaijan, we walked to a nearby Turkish donar booth and purchased a few beers. This was the earliest breakfast beer of my life at 4:30 in the morning, but we toasted our much-anticipated arrival in Baku as the sun rose above the sandstone buildings around fountain park.

Awaza Resort (New Dubai) Hotel

Having heard and read countless horror stories of the ferry situation from Turkmenbashi to Baku, we were eager to try for ourselves. Many a tried and tested traveler has waited for these infamous ferries only to give up and fly across the Caspian after several days of waiting. We were determined not to spoil the integrity of our “by land only” trip from Shanghai to the Western world by jumping on a plane now, having come so far. With a difficult path across the ocean ahead, we set off from Ashgabat, the capital of Turkmenistan, by car to Turkmenbashi, the city on the Turkmenistan coast. The ride is a bone-jarring seven hours, which Lauren spent entirely, unconsciously asleep while Mike looked out the window at the camels and barren landscape. We rode in style in a Land Cruiser with decked out suspension and four-wheel drive. Even more importantly, we had a cooler with day-old pizzas and a recently acquired (thanks Emily) bottle of Captain Morgan and coke. The industrious driver quickly poured out a bottle of water and used his bowie knife to cut it into a cup for Lauren’s cherished Captain Coke. The driver would yell out “SIP BREAK!” between bumps and Lauren would gulp a bit down, making this the most luxurious ride so far. The trip, thanks to the Captain and the napping, went by quickly and we pulled into Turkmenbashi without incident.

Turkmenbashi is a fascinating city with brightly painted buildings that make the white marble palaces of Ashgabat seem bland. We situated ourselves in a hotel in Awaza (the ritzy new area of Turkmenbashi that the president hopes will soon

be “the Dubai of the Caspian.” There is much work to be done before this collection of hotels along the coast picks of the resort vibe that city planners hope to achieve. One is required to drive past a large lake of oil sludge and sewage that has collected over several years and reeks in a way that is indescribably bad, though I’ll try: boiled eggs, vomit and peanut butter mixed with fish rot and the smell of sweaty sandals after a long walk.

Having situated ourselves comfortably in the hotel, we ran down to the beach and jumped in the Caspian without fanfare. The water was cold and the waves were strong, but the sea snakes that had been present on our last visit to Turkmenbashi were now gone. After several hours Mike and the driver set off to find beers, and returned with a nice collection of beer and chips, which we ate after dinner, while watching TV and gazing out across the Caspian.

The following morning was D-day for our first attempt at catching the ferry. We awoke and ate breakfast at the hotel. We picked up our translator and together drove to the ferry terminal. Originally, we wanted to do this entirely without assistance, but as the stories mounted of travelers being rejected or stranded, we opted for help. Our translator inquired around the ferry terminal about when the ships that were docked would leave for Baku. Nobody could provide an answer and the window where you buy a ticket was decidedly vacant. A border guard told us that nothing would launch until the storm passed. There were, currently, very high winds but no rain or clouds in the sky. There were about six women and their various children sitting in the waiting room, all of whom looked dejected, miserable and downtrodden. One woman, who turned out to be from Ashgabat, spoke to us in English saying a ferry might be possible that afternoon.  We got no other information and decided not to sit around and wait since we had the luxury of a driver and translator.  We went back to the hotel, swam in the Caspian until we were exhausted, ate a hearty lunch and then all returned to the ferry terminal.  More had gathered in the waiting room, but there was still no information.