A weekend outside Baku

This weekend we finally managed to leave Baku. It was time to see something new and since it seems to be extremely hard to make a decision in this country (whether it's about choosing between Turkish or Azeri paxlava or to change the political system) it tends to take some time before things actually happen. However, this saturday immediately after the English class at Yasamal we took the bus to Lənkəran, the biggest town in southern Azerbaijan. Along the way, the landscape changed from desert to green vegetation and the building complexes gave way to trees, cows and small farmers' houses. The air also changed and about 150 kilometres south of Baku you could actually feel that there was a sea just around the corner, something you normally don't feel in Baku due to the high level of pollution.

After about five hours on occasionally very bumpy roads we arrived to Lənkəran and could leave the shabby but somehow also cosy old american bus. My first impression was that it was a cute little town although quite sleepy and the fact that Lənkəran is considered the largest city in southern Azerbaijan says quite a lot about the size of the cities in this country. Lənkəran is famous for its flowers, tea and citrus fruits. It can also be interesting to know that during his young years as a revolutionary Stalin was held prisoner in Lənkəran.

The centre of the town is located around the train station and the Dosa Park in which information is given about the Khojaly genocide. We were lucky to meet a group of local women when having a walk through the city centre. All generations were represented and the oldest in the group expressed her gratitude for us visiting the city. It was a shame that we didn't asked this toothless woman with kerchief about her age since the Lənkəran people are famous for getting really old (sometimes even up to 120 years!).

The Caspian Sea is located along with the town and the water is much cleaner than in Baku. However, in some areas it was hard to reach the seaside due to ruined building parts that remain from the old Soviet promenade that got swept away as the Caspian rose. In the morning we had a promenade in the warm sunshine along with the sea and on our way back to the hotel we took the chance to make some photos. It was a pleasant surprise to see dogs in Lənkəran since Baku only advocates cats. Like I wrote in a previous blog entry it was a conscious choice of the President to get rid of all stray dogs. Well, since the only dog I saw in Lənkəran decided to try to bite off my left leg I have to confess that the President might have been right about this one. Thanks to God I wore jeans and not skirt and thanks to the same God I didn't have to pay the price of my non-vaccination against rabies.

Our weekend ended in the small village of Ərçivan, just next to the northern border of Iran, where we could see and drink of the Yanar Bulağ "burning spring". The water is full of methane why it burns when lightening it with matches or a lighter. For the locals, that come to collect the water to their houses, it didn't seem to be that kind of interesting but for us Scanians, used only to a lot of calcium oxide in our water making it white, this burning water was quite startling. And probably the most interesting thing: no matter if you go five hours south of Baku you still get inspired of the incredible amount of natural resources (the state of) Azerbaijan possesses.