Our 7 Day Travel Itinerary to Azerbaijan

It's 2019 and we have completed our 2nd international trip of the year. This time, we traveled to Azerbaijan.

For those, who are not much aware of Azerbaijan, it is a beautiful country by the Caspian Sea that lies on the ancient Silk Road in Central Asia and one of the lesser-known. Azerbaijan is often referred to as "The Land of Fire", and also well known for having 9 out of the 11 climates around the world.

Let's check out our ultimate 7-day Azerbaijan itinerary. It includes sightseeing, major tourist attractions, the best food joints, the most exciting things to do and more. In case, if you feel anything is missing in this itinerary, please write in the comment box for the travelers to read.

We planned this trip with friends. On 10th August 2019, we arrived in Baku, which is the capital city of Azerbaijan and our tour guide was already there waiting for us. Since I had already prepared the travel itinerary, so the role of the guide was just to take us to places we wanted to visit. 😉

We started our first day's voyage by exploring Baku, the Land of Magic Carpets.

Azerbaijan National Carpet Museum and Little Venice

Carpet Museum in Baku

Our first place was the Azerbaijan National Carpet Museum. The carpet museum was huge but not up to our expectations because we have seen much better handmade carpets in India. The carpet museum stores a rich collection of artifacts and carpets (Azerbaijan's most valuable heritage).

After the Carpet Museum, we explored the Little Venice of the city. But we couldn't get a chance to ride on a boat because there was a huge line for the ticket. And no one available at the ticket counter. So, we had to leave.

Tickets for Azerbaijan National Carpet Museum
For adults: 7 Manat
For pupils and students: 3 AZN

Opening Hours
Tuesday to Friday - 10:00 am - 06:00 pm
Saturday to Sunday - 10:00 am - 08:00 pm
Closed: Monday

Heydar Aliyev Center

Heydar Aliyev Center in Baku

On the 2nd day (11th August 2019), we visited the Heydar Aliyev Center, which is one of the most impressive buildings in Baku. The architecture of this building is magnificent inside out. The center has a conference hall (auditorium), a gallery hall and a museum. You can find many artifacts of Azerbaijan architecture, crafts, traditions, and much more.

The iconic Heydar Aliyev Center was designed by Iraqi-British architect Zaha Hadid and is famous for its distinctive flowing, curved style that eschews sharp angles. She was the first female architect to win the Museum’s Design of the Year Award for designing the Center.

It is a must-visit place in Baku. Even if you don't have time to visit the center, you must at least view it from the garden outside. There are giant colorful snails and rabbit sculptures all over the grass. There's plenty of space for kids to run and play outside. Make sure you carry water and snacks with you. As there is no shade outside, it will be quite uncomfortable on a hot sunny day. It's a great place for photography, especially with the I Love Baku sign.

Tickets for Heydar Aliyev Museum
For adults: 15 Manat
Children under 6: Free

Opening Hours
Tuesday to Friday - 11:00 am - 07:00 pm
Saturday to Sunday - 11:00 am - 06:00 pm
Closed: Monday

We spent almost half of our day in the Heydar Aliyev Museum and then planned to visit Ateshgah and Yanar Dag on the same day.

Ateshgah - Fire Temple

Fire Temple in Ateshgah

We heard a lot about Ateshgah before visiting Baku. It's a temple of fire-worshippers. The Ateshgah often called the "Fire Temple of Baku" is a castle-like religious temple that was used as a Hindu, Sikh, and Zoroastrian place of worship. But it was turned into a museum in 1975. There's nothing much to explore but it's worth visiting the place for once.

Yanar Dag - Fire Mountain

Fire Mountain, Yanar Dag, Azerbaijan

Yanar Dag is the mysterious "fire mountain" in Azerbaijan. This natural gas fire blazes continuously alongside the edge of the hill. The locals state that this fire never goes out. The fire keeps on burning even with rain and snow.

Tickets for Yanar Dag - Fire Mountain
For adults: 3 Manat
Children under 6: Free

Opening Hours
7 Days a week - 09:00 am - 06:00 pm

Nizami Street and Old Baku City

Nizami Street is a large pedestrian and shopping street in downtown Baku, Azerbaijan. We all headed to roam into the famous Nizami Street where we enjoyed a nice walk, gossiping around and taking pictures.

I would recommend to not miss walking around Nizami Street and trying their food outlets. And in terms of food, I would say that you must have "Doner Kabab" from Doner House.

Gobustan (Qobustan) National Park

Gobustan National Park in Azerbaijan

On the 3rd day (12 August 2019), we started our tour from the Gobustan National Park. It is a hilly mountain site featuring an outstanding collection of more than 6,000 rock engravings and petroglyphs. The mountains display mesmerizing images of prehistoric life in the Caucasus. The reserve also features the remains of inhabited caves, settlements, and burials.

After completing the park tour, we saw two local women making Qutab for the tourists. (Qutab is an ancient Azerbaijani cuisine.) It is made from thinly rolled dough filled with some green leaves as stuffing. Although we were not very hungry, we tried and it was very delicious. 😋

Mud Volcanoes

Mud Volcano in Gobustan

The Gobustan tour is not completed yet. Apart from rock art engravings, Gobustan will amaze you with mud volcanoes. These mud volcanoes are supposed to have healing qualities. The location is off-road, so it is recommended to hire a tour guide. A guide will arrange the tour to see Gobustan’s petroglyphs and mud volcanoes on the same day. We also did the same.

Most of the world's mud volcanoes are located in Azerbaijan. This bubbly oozing mud is cold with no lava, so it's completely safe to get up close. Scientifically, methane and carbon dioxide gases released from deep within the Earth causing Gobustan's mud volcanoes to keep bubbling, releasing a slow drizzle of wet mud. We had fun covering our hands and faces in the mud. After washing out the mud, it left our skin feeling soft and smooth. I would recommend you to not miss this fun part. 😄

After the Gobustan tour, we headed back to Baku and went to Maharani restaurant for dinner. The aroma of the restaurant was good and the food was delicious.

An Evening in Baku

Fairmont Flame Towers in Baku

Later we went for a walk at Baku Boulevard which is also known as Denizkenari Milli Park. This park runs parallel to Baku's seafront, located on the shore of the Caspian Sea. It is an amazing place to admire the sunrise and sunset. And the view of Baku Flame Towers from seafront near Milli Park is also stunning. The towers can be seen from almost anywhere in the city, but the night is when they truly come alive. I liked walking in the city and admiring the beauty more than anything else in Baku.

After heading back to our hotel in Baku, we took some rest and later that night, we went to The 15th Restaurant and Terrace located on the 15th floor in our hotel to have Shisha. It was an elegant furnishing terrace with live music. We were confused between so many Shisha flavors available in their menu. The waiter helped us by offering their special Shisha. I don't remember the name but it was the best Shisha we have ever had. It was a perfect way to end the day.

Our 4th day (13 Aug 2019) was planned to visit Gabala, a city in northern Azerbaijan. This city is quite famous for its beautiful lake and cable car ride. We checked out of the hotel in Baku and headed to Gabala where we had already booked the hotel, White Boutique in Gabala for one night. We decided to cover some of the famous tourist places in Gabala before hotel check-in. We stopped at some viewpoints on our way and spent our road trip by playing multiple rounds of Dumb Charades. Oh, I forgot to mention this before... we had been playing Dumb Charades all the time in the car. It was the best and my favorite part of the trip.

Tufandag Ski Resort

Tufandag Cable Car Ride

Our first main tourist destination was the Tufandag Ski Resort Complex in Gabala (Qabala) for the cable car ride. It took us around 4 hours from Baku to reach there. We reached late in the afternoon and didn't have proper lunch, so we put our hands on some snacks in the complex first and then purchased the tickets. I don't remember the ticket price now.

It was a great experience riding a cable car that climbs 1660 m high up to the mountain. It was so amazing that I could imagine the view in winter when there will be snow. It's a paradise for locals. It's a must-visit place for all nature lovers and adventure seekers.

Nohur Lake

Nohur Lake

Our next destination was Nohur Lake in Gabala (Qabala). It's a very beautiful lake surrounded by mountains, located 700 m above sea level. I love those places where you can just go and relax and escape from the noise of the city. It was such a nice place.

We hired a boat to ride on the lake and enjoyed the surrounding landscape. It was fun. We also had the street corn which was made similar to the one we have in India, which we call Bhutta.

After the Lake, we headed towards the White Boutique hotel to check-in. Thankfully, we had informed at the hotel about our late check-in, so we had time. On our way to the hotel, we stopped at a restaurant, Raja Indian and Azerbaijani Cuisine for dinner. The food was amazing with their special drink Ayran. Ayran is more like Masala Chaas (Spiced Buttermilk) in India. Later that night, we checked-in to the hotel that features a huge garden, which we liked the most.

We woke up quite early the next day to see the hotel surroundings. It looked lovely with the sunrays scattered on the mountains surrounding the hotel.

It was our 5th day (14th August 2019) in Azerbaijan and we had it all planned. We were going to explore the beautiful Yeddi Gozal Waterfall in Gabala and then Goygol lake in Ganja.

Yeddi Gozel Waterfall

The Yeddi Gozel Waterfall is a beautiful natural landscape surrounded by nature in Gabala (Qabala). Some people say that it is hyped but I feel, it all depends on the season you are visiting this place. For us, it was a good time to enjoy nature and the waterfall view in Yeddi Gozel Waterfall. To reach there, our guide stopped at a place where we had to hire another guide because you need an off-road vehicle to reach there. Once there, it was quite a long walk to climb the stairs to reach the waterfall. When we reached, it was so nice to feel the cold breeze coming out of the waterfall and there was a small place to sit and eat as well. We tried Azerbaijan's local tea, which was appetizing.

Please note: There are some steep and slippery stairs that you need to climb to reach the waterfall. So, I will not recommend ladies wearing heels. Put on something with a great grip.

Goygol Lake

Goygol Lake

After visiting the waterfall, we went to the Goygol Lake. The name Goygol means Blue Lake in Azerbaijani language. The. It is a lake with pure mountain water that was created due to an earthquake a long time ago. When we reached the entrance of the lake, it was around 10 minutes walk downhill to the Lake. We took some nice pictures going down the hill. It is one of the most beautiful and cleanest lakes in the world. We clearly saw the underwater life as the water in Blue Lake is very clear and it was beautiful.

Maralgol Lake

Maralgol Lake

We still had time to visit another lake, so our guide recommended visiting Maralgol Lake which is connected with Goygol ("Blue Lake") via Akhsu River. The lake is surrounded by mountains and dense forests. It is also considered as one of the most beautiful and picture-perfect places in Azerbaijan.

We took Marshrutka (public transportation) to go up to Maragol Lake. It took s about 15 minutes from Goygol to reach Maragol. From the drop off point, we climbed approx. 300 stairs. You can also ride a horse if you find difficulty in climbing upstairs. The Maralgol Lake is incredibly beautiful surrounded by a stunning landscape.

You can skip the Nohur Lake for once but definitely not the Goygol Lake and Maralgol Lake.

We were too tired and hungry. So, we decided to have dinner at the same restaurant, Raja Indian and Azerbaijani Cuisine. 😋

There was not much left in our itinerary for the remaining days, except a few.

For the 6th day (15th August 2019), we had already booked a resort in Sheki - Sheki Olimpiya Hotel and Resort. So, we checked out from Gabala and visited some places on the way to Sheki.

Gabala Shooting Club

We went to the Gabala Shooting Club first where we enjoyed shooting. It was a nice experience. There were many shooting options like shooting with pistols, rifles, and archery. We opted for the indoor rifle shooting. Though there was waiting time, we enjoyed when we got our turn.

Our next destination was food, lol. We had an amazing lunch at Delhi Karachi Darbar restaurant.

After lunch, we went to a local shop on our way from Gabala to Sheki to buy some local fruit jams and sweets. We bought the White Cherry Jam and Mixed Fruit Jam. We can say it was yum because we were having it every day in our breakfast in the hotels/resorts we stayed in.

After buying Azerbaijan's local sweets and jams, our guide took us to a lake. I don't remember the name of the lake with a waterfall. I personally didn't like it much. So, there's nothing much to talk about that.

Palace of Sheki Khans

Sheki Khans' Palace (Source: Wikipedia)

Finally, we entered the Sheki and went to visit the famous Khan's Palace. But it was our bad that the palace entry was temporarily closed for tourism. Our tour guide told us that a branch of the old tree (dated 1530) with a diameter of about 50 centimeters fell on the territory of the palace a few days back and some tourists got injured. So, we just took some pictures from the outside and headed to check-in at Sheki Olimpiya Hotel and Resort.

We reached the resort late at night so we couldn't really see how it looked like. The next morning, we woke up early to walk through the resort and it was so beautiful that we ended up taking too many photos. There was no other place to visit in our itinerary so we decided to stay in the resort and just explore the resort. It was huge with a lot of greenery and a kid's play area.

We checked out after spending some quality time with our group in the resort and headed back to Baku. On our way, we again went to the same restaurant, Delhi Karachi Darbar for lunch. We checked-in late at the Soffia hotel in Baku that we booked for one night only we had to catch an early morning flight on 17th.

When it was night and we went to explore the Baku city. It was a nice time out there. We found a nice restaurant for dinner i.e. Maharaja Restaurant. After dinner, we just walked around the city and went back to the hotel.

On 17th Aug 2019, we traveled back to Dubai with lots of happy memories.

Please note that the above information is based on our travel experience in Azerbaijan.