We flew from Dubai to Baku, the capital city of Azerbaijan, there are lot of flight going to Baku. We flew with flydubai, it is a budget air in Dubai. We departed from terminal 2 in Dubai, in total there are 3 terminal. Terminal 2 is for budget airline, it is very crowded and the toilets are always occupied and not as clean.
The flight only takes 3 hours from Dubai to Baku.
Once you arrived in Baku, make sure you have already applied for the visa, if you have not, don’t panic, you can still appl the visa upon arrival at the airport. But there is a line. Singaporean need to have a visa to enter Azerbaijan.
Upon clearing the custom and getting your luggage, go to money changer to change some local currency. The local currency is called manat. You can also change in Dubai airport but the Indian money changer who works in the Dubai sound so rude to me when I told him I wanted to change SGD200, he replied, “What? You only changed so little!” His comment pissed me off and I just walk away. He even added,”Oh, you won’t get the rate that you found in google.” This man is so rude and why he bother how much I wanted to change? It is a waste of time to even have another look at his face and I turn and walk away. I can still change in Baku airport.
Baku airport is not very big, there is a money changer near the belt conveyor for luggage. The money changer does not accept Singapore dollars and luckily we have some USD. We just changed USD300 and the rate wasn’t good at all but we got no choice, no other places to change. Singapore money changer does not carry manat.
We stay Azerbaijan 5 days and USD300 cash is more than enough. Hotel and restaurants can be paid by cards and the day tour too.
Sim card
There is sim card counter in airport, we gotten our Azerbaijan sim card here. It is a lot more expensive compared to the city but we don’t want to waste time to find in the city. We needed to use immediately so we just gotten here at the airport. It is 48 manat/ SGD38 for a lot of data.
Airport Taxi Scam
This is the number 1 scam for tourists who first arrived in Baku. When you exist out the airport, you won’t find any normal taxi, you only see the big red London cab. Those cabs look expensive so forget it.
We tried to use Uber but nobody pick up our order so we asked around and a Filipino tourist told us to use Bolt app. Bolt is widely used here. True enough, within seconds, we got a Bolt driver. We were quite surprised he reached in 1 minute. He took our luggage in his car and then he told us that the fare we saw in the app is 9 manat and that is the starting fare. There is a meter in his car and the meter will run and it will be around additional 40 to 50 manats depending on the traffic. Alternatively, he said we can cancel the order and just pay him 40 manat. The moment he told us to cancel the order, I knew it is a scam. But we were already out of the airport. He said he can go back to the airport but we have to pay for the parking fees. Aiya, too troublesome and we were tired the morning flight so we just agree to go ahead. It is about 20 minutes drive to old town. On the way, I did a lot of google search on Baku airport taxi and found out so many similar scam cases like mine. I knew it is a scam but it is too late.
The taxi driver stopped us near our hotel, not in the front but near a quiet alley behind our hotel and asked us to pay 45 manat. Additional 5 manat is the entrance fees to the old town. What, the entrance fee to old town for car is only 2 manat, this is what we found out from the hotel front desk!!
Well, you could ask why we paid him 45 manat? We have no choice because he didn’t want to release our luggage if we didn’t pay him 45 manat.
Ok, now the moral of the story. Most people gotten this scam when they first arrived in Baku. How to avoid it? You can go online to prebook the airport pick up service. This is what we did we go to airport to fly out of Baku. We used “Welcome Pick up Baku”, it cost 20 Euro. The driver came on time, dressed neatly and helped us with the luggage. His car is clean and new and mineral waters were provided too. I like how the driver told us history about Azerbaijan and told us landmarks we saw on our way to the airport.
Where to stay in Baku?
We stay 2 nights in old town and 3 night in new town. The hotel we stay in old town for the first 2 nights is called Shirvanshhahs Hotel, the hotel only has about 4 stories. It is an old resident housing converted into a hotel. It is pretty new and at the top floor is the restaurant with seaview overlooking the promenade. You can also see the iconic Flame towers from here. Well, the hotel offer breakfast and it is about SGD 100 plus per night. It is very convenient to walk to the Unesco World Heritage sites from this hotel. One thing that I have to mentioned is the hotel is located in the old town and to enter the old town, there is a 2 manat entrance fees for car. Your taxi driver will tell you to pay. Don’t let your driver drop you outside the old town gete. The path in old town are cobblestones so it is bad for your luggage wheels. There are also restaurants and cafe in the old town so finding food is not a problem.
The last 3 nights we stayed in new town, the hotel is called Courtyard by Marriott Baku. The building is super impressive and big. It is also nicely located in many attraction nearby and the metro too.
Day 1
- Arrive in Baku at noon, check in hotel in old town
- have our simple lunch in the hotel
- take a nap and prepare to explore old town by foot :-
- Palace of the Shirvanshahs
- Maiden Tower
- Fortress Walls of Icheri Sheher
- Dinner at Dolma restaurant, this is a cafe restaurant serving Azerbaijan cuisine.
Lamb Chop above and below is binjar. Azerbaijan uses a a lot of binjar in their cuisine and super delicious
Fried shrimp
Day 2
- Baku Promenade
- Flaming Towers
- Mini Venice
- Carpet Museum
- Highland Park- there is a funicular to go up every 15 mins.
- Lunch at Chapman Taylor’s Deniz Mall in Baku
- Nizami Street for shopping and restaurant and street performances
- Dinner at Nizami street
Day 3
- Book a day tour to outskirt of Baku via Viator
- Gobustan – discovered prehistoric rock engravings
- Mud volcanoes
- Flaming Mountain Yanar Dagh
- Fire temple – a 17th-century place of worship that was frequented by Hindus, Sikhs, and, most importantly, Zoroastrians. The natural fire stopped burning in 1969 and now the fire is lit again via a gas pipe connected from another city
- Bibiheybat mosque
- Heydar Aliyev cultural center
- Lunch is included at 3pm
- Back at Baku city at 8pm
- Dinner near our hotel
Day 4
- Gabala and cable car to go up to ski resort
- Juma Mosque, Nohur Gold Lake, and Tufandag
- Lunch is included but only start at 5.30 pm. The private van has only 6 pax and an English speaking guide and a driver. Total 8 pax in the van. The van came to pick up at 8 am. Once you booked through Viator, they will whatapp you and tell you the exact meeting time. Normally they will pick you up at your hotel lobby. The first stop is at Juma Mosque for about half an hour. Ladies need to have a scarf or use your hoodies to cover your head. Shoes needed to be taken off before entering. The mosque is carpeted so it is very comfortable to walk on. The second stop is at the small rest area where they sell snacks and drinks at around 11 am. Please grab something to eat because the lunch won’t start until 5 or 6pm. They should call it dinner not lunch.
- The total duration to up to Gabala Ski resort is about 3 hours. We reached Gabala at around 2 pm plus. Ticket is included in the Viator. There are few cable car station where you need to come down and change to go to the summit.
- At the summit, it is very windy so make sure you have all your winter clothing, non slip shoes, gloves, beanie and hoodies.
- There is a restaurant at the summit if it is too windy, you can stay inside and enjoy the view
- There are also some snow activities out there but it is simply too cold so I could really enjoy any.
- Next we went to see the waterfall, it is really funny because the waterfall is only very tiny one. From the carpark to the waterwall, it is about 15 mins walk. On the way, there are souvenirs shops and Turkish ice cream.
- The last destination is the lake, because it is in the winter month and the sky already turned dark so we couldn’t do the boat ride. We had our so called “Lunch” near the lake at around 6pm.
- Reached Baku at around 11pm
Day 5
- Free and easy in Baku city
- Catch the metro to May 25. Walk around the city and the underground shopping center.
- Lunch at a Chinese restaurant
- Went to their local supermarket
- Dinner at Chinese restaurant
Day 6
- Book Baku welcome pick up service to send us to airport at 9 am
Final thoughts:
Baku is a beautiful city with both European, middle eastern and Russian vibes. The old people speak Russian, young speak English. Azerbaijan has strong ties with Turkish, you can see both Turkish and Azerbaijan flags flying up high in many of the buildings. So people here too speak Turkish. There are a lot of similarity that I found with Turkish, such as, Azerbaijan also love using eggplants in their dish. And yes, they are making good eggplant dish. Pomegranate is another common thing, they used in their salad, cuisine and juices of course.
Azerbaijan is named as Land of fire because this place has lot of natural gas and oi. The iconic landmark, the Flame Towers that can be seen almost in every corner of Baku city also resemble the shape of a fire. At night, the 3 buildings get lit up with neon light so super pretty.
I have met many filipino and Indian tourist visiting Azerbaijan on their own but didn’t meet so many Chinese tourists. I only saw a group of two Chinese from Taiwan and Hong Kong but they are in a tour group with Chinese speaking guide.
After few days in Baku with bread and kebab, we were tired of the local cuisine but luckily there are some Chinese restaurants here.
The majority of the people here are muslim but they don’t seem to be very strict with their tradition. I saw many have dogs as pet and walking and holding their dogs. The muslim groceries shop owner are allowed to sell alcohol but she told me she didn’t consume. Overall, the young look very modern from the way they wear their outfit. The young girl usually don’t have hijab.
It was during Christmas when I was in Baku, amazingly the muslim too celebrate Christmas. I was in a restaurant and saw a birthday girl having a party and invited many of her little friends. I know for sure they are muslim because her mom was wearing a hijab, taking photos of them. It was a grand party and Santa was also hired to perform for the children. I guess it is due to inherited Soviet tradition. Azerbaijan is only independent in 1991, out from the Soviet Union. Therefore you will see lot of Russian culture here.
