Had breakfast a little after 9am, then headed out for a full day of touristing in Baku. There’s a lot to see here, and we could have easily have spent a couple more days just in Baku. Yesterday, we planned out the highlights we wanted to see.
First up was the Heydar Aliyev Center. It’s a building designed by the architect Zaha Hadid, whose work we first saw in Rome (the MAXXI museum). After we googled her work, we now have her buildings as one of the criteria for choosing a place to visit. (She died in 2016). In fact, we chose to come to Azerbaijan over Kazakhstan for this leg of the trip because of the Heydar Aliyev Center.
We took a taxi over to the Center around 10:30. Took some outside pics, then bought our tickets to enter. Unfortunately, it didn’t actually open until 11am, so we walked fully around the building to get all our outside pics. It was pretty foggy, but the fog provided nice lighting, it was thick enough that there wasn’t a glare in the background.
The building itself is amazing - it’s now my favourite in the world! It looks like it rose out of the ground. There are no straight lines in the whole structure.
At 11am we entered and walked up the great staircase to the 2nd floor. The curves and full white give the illusion of being inside a white infinity. We were lucky to be one of the first in, as we got pics of just us on the stairs. Later, the stairs were quite busy, and not the same pic quality.
The Center houses a museum (amongst other things), which is very well curated. We spent over 90 minutes going through, but could easily have spent a full afternoon.
The inside of the building is a continuation of the outside. You really do feel it’s the same building.
Took another taxi back to the old city. We were planning to take the funicular to the Flame Towers, but it was still quite foggy, so instead went for lunch at the same place as yesterday. Had a nice table near the window. Lunch was yummy, various kinds of grilled lamb, including grilled lamb liver and fat, which i really liked.
Walked over to the funicular. The fog was breaking (briefly at least), so we rode up to the top. It drops you right at the base of the Flame Towers, a considerably longer ride than we had thought. We almost just walked up, but that would have taken some energy (and time, which we were short of today). There wasn’t much to do at the top of the funicular, so we just took the next ride back down (1 manat each way).
The Carpet Museum was just across the street, our last destination for the day. It’s in a building shaped like a rolled up carpet, much like the Bata Shoe Museum in Toronto, which is in a shoebox-shaped building.
The Carpet Museum was very extensive (with 3 full floors), explaining the different styles in each region of Azerbaijan and their origins. It was interesting, but, by the end, we were starting to get out-carpeted.
Got back to the hotel and showered. We tried a different restaurant for dinner, Dolma. It’s in a basement with lots of character, and excellent food. A great way to end our trip in Azerbaijan!
Overall, we were super impressed with Azerbaijan. Neither of us knew what to expect, and, in fact, we didn’t even buy a guidebook for the country. Here’s my list of top things we did / saw in Azerbaijan (we were only here for four nights, so didn’t get to see much):
- Sheki Khan Palace in Sheki
- Heydar Aliyev Center (Zaha Hadid building), Baku
- Village of Lahic
- Walking around the old city of Baku
- Walking along the waterfront, Baku
- Maiden Tower, Baku
- Flame Towers, Baku
- Carpet Museum, Baku
- Eating anywhere
There’s plenty more that we didn’t have time for. Azerbaijan really deserves to be the focus of a trip on its own and not just an add-on like we did.
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