The Absheron Peninsula

Location: Babayurd Yurt Camp, Near Pirguli, Azerbaijan

The day started with Hertz delivering our “Full Size 4WD” vehicle, a Honda CR-V! Apparently, Hertz Azerbaijan has a fleet of six vehicles so I’m not complaining. We need some wheels to get around off the beaten track, and that’s just what we’re doing - though my advice to you whenever renting a vehicle outside of North America or Western Europe is to very carefully check the vehicle, not just for bumps and scrapes but also that it has a jack and wheel-brace, the wheel nuts are in place and tight (I once had one with 4 nuts, and one of those was loose), and that the engine bay can pass a visual inspection.

We checked-out of the Radisson (miffed that they quoted us a net-rate though), loaded up and headed out of Baku. Advice to Azerbaijan - use some oil money on road-signs! We have a GPS, but only for compass functionality and trackback. Getting out of Baku was a bit of a nightmare, heavy traffic and construction. Still, all we had to do was head North-East-ish and we finally got out of the city.

Everything east of Baku is on the Absheron Peninsula, a great piece of land shaped like an eagles head sticking out into the Caspian Sea. It’s also your de-facto Soviet wasteland. I reckon one sight of a place like this would convince most people to drive less. I guess the USSR didn’t have a place in it’s 5 year plans for the environment. I imagine it’s much better than it used to be, a lot of the old smoking factories have closed down, but it’s still a little shocking. The whole place smells like a refinery!

There are gems out in Absheron though, and first on our list was the Ateshgah Fire Temple, a Zoroastrian temple with permanent fire fed by natural gas. Without a single sign, we asked a friendly cop (who didn’t have a non-gold tooth in his head), who promptly jumped in the back of the car and took us half-way. Once on the right road, it was pretty easy to find using the map in our guidebook.

We had the Temple to ourselves. It’s arranged as a caravanserai, with rooms on the outside of a courtyard with the temple surrounding the permanent fire within. There’s a small exhibition in some of the rooms, and you can also climb on the roof for a better view of the temple and the town around.

Next up, the search for Yanar Dag - the flaming hillside. Here, since 1958, part of the hillside has been on fire, fueled by natural gas. It is a truly strange spectacle. You also have to watch for the wind, a quick gust and you’ll loose an eyebrow! There’s a teahouse right next to the site, we though we’d support them by having some tea - they said it was AZN 9 - over $10! We made our apologies and left…

Next we turned west, and headed off the Absheron Peninsula and onto the Azeri mainland. We’re heading for Sheki, but planned to spend the night about halfway near Pirguli. Just off the main road we’d heard about some “mud volcanoes” at a place called Perekishqul, basically piles of mud with methane bubbling through water to the top. Just south of the road, just after KM38 (if you’re heading west, turn left at the signposts on a sweeping right-hander). We drove around 600m up a gravel road, passing a huge flock of sheep and a surprised sheepdog (which I didn’t even see, Kristy tells me it was an Anatolian Sheep Dog, looks just like a sheep), to the top of a hill. The funny shaped volcanoes (only a few feet high), are easily visible to your right. We parked up and had a wander around. I stuck my finger in (they’re cold), and regretted not having a lighter! It was strange to see the mud bubbling up, looking like, well, at least what I imagine, a fart would look like…

Finally, we made it to a cool campsite at about 3500ft up in the mountains consisting of 3 or 4 Mongolian Yurts (gers) - the Babayurd Yurt Camp. We think it’s early in the season as we’re the only ones here and have not seen any tourists today (and only 3 or 4 since we arrived). Anyway, as I write this by lantern (my Macbooks keyboard gives off more light), we can hear the rain lashing down on the hopefully watertight roof…