Day 3 - Baku

Amiradjan Mosque (about 30 minutes drive east from Baku) is in one of the oldest villages on the Absheron Peninsula which juts out into the Caspian Sea.

Mardakan Towers - Used in medieval times as defensive and signal towers. Rebuilt in 14th C. The holes in the ground were used for refrigeration.

This man not only feeds the cat, but he tends the garden and the buildings on the grounds as well.

Climbing up to the top of the wall

Holes in the ground for refrigeration

An abandoned oil well in the garden

Ateshgah Fire Temple - This Zoroastrian Fire Temple was originally built over a burning natural gas vent perhaps as early as the 6th C. That the fire never went out seemed a miracle to them. It became a place of worship and a stopping point for caravans. The fire went out in the late 1880's when drilling for oil and gas depleted the natural supply. The current temple on the site was built in the 1880's by Hindi-speaking Indians. The fire was relit in the 1960's by Indira Ghandi and is supplied by gas which is piped in.

The symbol of Zoroastrianism

Heydar Aliyev Cultural Center / Museum - named after Azerbaijan’s leader from 1969-1982 and from 1993-2003, it includes a performing arts auditorium and spaces for major art exhibitions. It was designed by Iraqi-British architect Zaha Hadid, one of the most influential female architects of the 20th and 21st century. (She also designed the London Aquatics Center, the Rosenthal Center for Contemporary Art in Cincinnati, Ohio, and the Guangzhou Opera House in China.) This building was stunning, both inside and out!

There was a couple taking their wedding photos there!

A display of the presidential vehicles

Villa Peterolea Nobel Brothers Museum - The Nobel family had a house in here; about 12% of the money Alfred used to fund the Peace Prize came from an oil company they started in Baku. Their home was turned into a museum in 2008.

After a long day of sightseeing, we went out the peninsula to friends of my Uncle Steve. Steve lived and worked in Baku many years ago and has remained close friends with people here. We were invited to a bbq dinner at their "dacha," their "summer home." The evening was beyond words - hospitality at its finest, food, vodka, dancing, for hours on end. (photos forthcoming...perhaps!)