6-Day Azerbaijan Travel on the Silk Road - Ways of the Ancient Caravans

Sheki Khan Palace

Ilisu Village

Sumug qala

Heydar Aliyev Center

Show all 13 photos

Highlights

Explore Mountain Park and Baku Boulevard's evening charm

Visit the modern Heydar Aliyev Center and historic Bibi Abyat Mosque

Discover Ateshgyah Temple and the Burning Mountain Yanardagh

Tour Gobustan's rock carvings and mud volcanoes

Experience the rich history of Shemakha, Sheki, and Kish

Shop at Baku's eastern market and local souvenir shops

Baku, Shamakhi, Shaki, Gobustan National Park

art, gastronomical, nature, religious, trekking, winetour, architectural, archaeological, cultural, photography, historical, museums, sightseeing, walking, luxury, airport transfer, Eco Tourism, Pub Crawl, Volcano, Wildlife

Group Tour

6 Days

Easy

English, Russian, Turkish

Description

Understand why the Silk Road was one of the most famous trade routes in the East. From time immemorial, the trade route going from east to west and vice versa has attracted many people and civilizations. Depending on the historical events of wars, raids, and robberies, the Silk Road changed its route but ultimately reached its final address. Explore the enchanting city of Baku and its surroundings with a comprehensive tour that covers everything from the vibrant nightlife and modern architectural wonders to ancient historical sites and natural phenomena. Enjoy guided excursions to iconic landmarks, including the Heydar Aliyev Center, Ateshgyah Temple, and Gobustan Rock Carvings. Experience the rich culture, history, and breathtaking landscapes of Azerbaijan.

Itinerary

Day 01: Baku
- Meet at the airport.
19:00. Excursion." Lights of the Evening Baku".
- Begin the "Lights of Evening Baku" tour with a visit to Mountain Park. Here, the "City of Winds", as Baku is often called, opens to you in all its glory. The observation platform located on the highest part of the city, near the "Burning Flame Tower", shows the city with all its bright lights bordering Baku Bay, reflecting the measured pace of life in the evening Baku.
- Continue your excursion to one of the favourite places of the walk of the Baku guests of the city of all ages and social groups, a place where no one is in a hurry in the evening - "Baku Boulevard".
- End your excursion "Lights of Evening Baku" by going to the most lively and central street of Nizami ", Torgovaya Street" as it is also called from the old times. Trading is the longest of Baku's streets (3.5 km). It is also called the most beautiful street in Baku - it has many architectural monuments, beautiful houses, cinemas, parks, and many modern boutiques and shops.
- Transfer to the hotel and free time
Overnight at the hotel.
Accommodation at the hotel 4 * in the city
Day 02: Baku - Excursion.
- 09:00 Eat breakfast at the hotel.
- Begin the tour with a visit to one of the modern and most recognizable places of the "Heydar Aliyev Center".
- Make your way to Nagorny Park. Here, the "City of Winds", as Baku is often called, opens to you in all its glory. The observation platform located on the highest part of the city, near the sleeping "The Languages of Flame", shows the city with all its beauty and greenery, bordering Baku Bay.
- Go down the stairs and head towards the "Bibi Abyat Mosque".
- End of the modern Baku tour by visiting the world's first oil well drilled in the Bibi-eibat oil-bearing region.
- Visit the old town of Icheri Sheher.
- Enjoy your free time.
Overnight at the hotel.
Day 03: Ateshgyah-Yanardagh-Gobustan
- 09:00 Savour breakfast at the hotel.
- Begin your excursion to the fire-worshipping Ateshgyah Temple, Burning Mountain Yanardagh, Gobustan Rock Carvings and Mud Volcanoes.
- Before the tour of Gobustan, pay a visit to the museum, which is the same name but was recently built and is distinguished by its high technological level.
- Transfer to Baku.
Overnight in hotel
Day 04: Excursion to Shemakha + Sheki
- 08:00 Begin the tour after breakfast at the hotel.
- See the famous sights of Shemakha.
  - Diri-Baba
  - Juma Mosque
- Head to Lagich.
- Departure towards Sheki.
Overnight in Sheki.
Day 05: Excursion: Sheki+ Kish + Ilisu
- 07:00 Breakfast at the hotel.
- Begin your tour to Sheki with a visit to the Summer Palace of Khan, which has magnificent frescoes and exquisite handmade window decorations.
- Visit the workshop, where you can be acquainted with the process of manufacturing "Shebeke" by local artisans.
- Next, visit the workshop for cooking the delicious "Sheki Pahlavas", famous throughout Azerbaijan.
- Continue with a visit to the Albanian church, which is located in the village of Kish.
- Head to the village of Ilisu, where there are several historical architectural monuments - for example, the Juma Mosque, which differs from all previously seen mosques by its minimalism, the absence of a dome and a minaret, modesty in performing mihrab. In Ilis, you will meet two more sights along the road: the fortress of Syangar Gala and Sumug Gala. The fortress of Syangar Gala (Shamilin Galasy) is named so in honour of the famous imam, the leader of the mountaineers of the Caucasus. According to the story, the inhabitants of Ilisu appealed to him for help in the fight against the Russian Empire, and the fortress is a living witness of those years. To see it well, you will have to climb a small crest on which it is located.
- Departure to Baku.
Overnight in Baku.
Day 06: Baku
- 09:00 Start the day with breakfast at the hotel.
- Get free time to visit the eastern market, shops with sweets and souvenir shops.
- Transfer to the airport.

What's Included

Accommodation in hotel 4 * double room on the program based on breakfast

Transfers and transportation according to the program

Excursions on the program

Services of an English-speaking Azerbaijan Tour guide

Entrance tickets to museums

What's Excluded

Lunch - from 15 USD (soft drinks included)

Dinner - from 20 USD (soft drinks are included)

Supplement for single accommodation: $199 per tour

The cost of a visa is 40 USD (if not citizens of the CIS)

Charges for photos and video shooting in museums

Know Before You Go

Silk Road - Ways of the Ancient Caravans

Silk Road is one of the most famous trade routes in the east. From time immemorial, the trade route going from east to west and vice versa has attracted a lot of parvants and civilizations. Depending on the historical events of wars, raids, robberies, the Silk Road changed its route but ultimately reached its final address.

Visa upon arrival at international airports of Azerbaijan can be obtained only by citizens of Turkey, Israel, Qatar, Oman, Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, Kuwait, Japan, China, South Korea, Malaysia and Singapore. For citizens of Russia and the CIS (except for Turkmenistan), a visa is not required to Azerbaijan. Citizens of other countries must obtain a visa prior to arrival, through the consulates of Azerbaijan in their country or to issue an electronic visa through travel agencies. To apply for a visa, contact the managers at least 4 weeks before arriving in Azerbaijan.

Local currency: Manat

The recommended currency for the exchange is USD or Euro.

Where to exchange currency: Upon arrival at the airport, the guide will provide accurate information on where and how to exchange cash for local currency.

Availability of ATM: Only in large cities.

Accept credit cards: Only in large cities.

Baku Boulevard": The national park, sometimes called the "diamond necklace of Baku", stretches along Baku Bay for 16 km. At each time of the day, the boulevard has its charm - in the morning you can walk in silence, feel unity with nature, go in for sports; during the day, especially on weekends, the boulevard is fully revived thanks to the small inhabitants of the capital, riding on attractions, rollerblades and bicycles; in the evening, it turns in the magical world of dreams for all lovers. Also, the original illumination and illumination of the park, fountains and other innovations give the boulevard a special charm.

The center of Heydar Aliyev is a cultural center, which is a complex building, which includes an auditorium (congress center), a museum, exhibition halls, administrative offices. The famous architect Zaha Hadid designed the project of the centre. Baku is a city that combines modern and ancient, traditional and unusual.

Bibi-Heybat Mosque (Azerbaijan's Bibiheybət məscidi) is a mosque located on the shore of Baku Bay, in Azerbaijan. The existing structure, built in the 1990s, is a reconstruction of the mosque of the same name, built in the 13th century by Shirvanshah Abu-l-Fath Farrukhzad and destroyed by the Bolsheviks in 1936 when a fierce struggle with religion was going on throughout the territory of the USSR. The Bibi-Eybat complex, in addition to the mosque, includes tombs and tombs of revered people (including the grave of Ukeima Khanum, the descendant of the Prophet Muhammad), as before destruction, and today is a spiritual center for Muslims of the East and one of the significant monuments of Islamic architecture of Azerbaijan. The mosque was once visited by Abaskuli-aga Bakikhanov, Alexander Dumas, Khurshudbanu Natavan. The local population in the past called it "the mosque of Fatima". Using the same name, described the mosque and visited it in the 40 years of the XIX century, Alexander Dumas.

Very often Icheri Sheher is called a fortress, as a well-preserved fortress wall surrounds it. People in the territory of Icheri Sheher lived in the Bronze Age, and by the 8th-11th centuries, it was completely populated. Behind the walls, there are many unique monuments: the palace complex of the Shirvanshahs with a burial vault, a sofa, a mosque; "Gyz Galasy" ("The Maiden's Tower"); mosques and minarets, the remains of caravanserais, baths. Buildings of the old fortress are of a special nature. Because of the lack of the territory of the building, the wall to the wall was erected here from ancient times. There are no gardens; the yards are extremely small and separated by "threads" of narrow streets, lanes and dead ends. When the Shirvanshahs moved their capital from Shemakha to Baku in the 15th century, massive buildings began in Icheri Sheher. During this period, the pearl of the fortress was built - the Palace of the Shirvanshahs. It should be noted that Baku's XVII-XIX centuries did not go beyond the boundaries of Icheri Sheher. Here were located the palaces of the rulers, and residential quarters. From 1747 to 1806, there was the capital of the Baku Khanate. Only after the beginning of the oil boom, the city began to expand and goes beyond the boundaries of Icheri Sheher. The fortress wall itself is of interest. Once Baku had two of them, and they were separated by moats, but at the beginning of the XIX century, the city grew so fast that it was necessary to demolish and build the outer wall. Remained only the inner wall. It has 25 towers and 5 gates. They say that back in the 30s. The twentieth century in the fortress there were more than 900 buildings, and by the beginning of the XXI century, only half remained.

The Temple of Eternal Fire - Ateshgyah - is an authentic Azerbaijani exotic. It is well-known practically all over the world. It is located 30 km from the center of Baku in the suburb of Surakhany. This territory is known for such unique natural phenomenon as burning natural gas outlets (underground gas coming onto surface contacts oxygen and lights up). The temple in its present state was constructed in the 17th-18th centuries. The Baku-based Hindu community related to Sikhs built it. However, the history of the Temple is even longer. From times immemorial, this was the holy place of Zoroastrians- fire worshippers (approximately beginning of our era). They attributed mystical significance to the inextinguishable fire and came there to worship the relic. After the introduction of Islam, the Zoroastrian temple was destroyed. Many Zoroastrians left to India and there continued their worship. But in the 15th -17th centuries the Hindus-fire worshippers who came to Absheron with trading caravans began to make pilgrimages to Surakhany. The Indian merchants started the erection of the temple. The earliest temple part is dated 1713. The latest - the central temple-altar was built with the support of merchant Kanchangar in 1810. During the 18th century chapels, cells, a caravanserai were added to the central part of the temple. On у can find carved inscriptions in Indian lettering there. In the early 19th century the Temple acquired its present-day appearance. Ateshgah is a pentagonal structure with a castellation and entrance portal. In the center of a yard, the altar-sanctuary executed in the form of a stone bower on which angles some more centres are located towers. In the center of an altar - a well from which beat "eternally" burning gas.

Burning Mountain Yanardagh: One of the most famous and popular tourist places of the "eternal flame” in Azerbaijan is the mountain of Yanar Dag. Actually, it is rather a hill than a mountain, with natural gas burning on its slope from ancient times. Meter-long tongues of fire are licking the stratified earth approximately 10 m in width, searing those who approached too close. People occupy the benches to watch the blazing hill in the evening when its sight is most effective. Yanar Dag is located 25 km to the north from Baku, in Mehemmedi village. There are buses running to it from the city, so you can get there fairly cheap and easy. From the year 2007, Yanar Dag is declared a state-protected conservation area.

Reserve of rock carvings Gobustan. The reserve is located 60 km from Baku and is located between the slope of the Great Caucasus Ridge and the Caspian Sea. Gobustan is an open-air reserve reflecting the life and everyday life of primitive people who lived here since the Mesolithic period until the Middle Ages. A special place is occupied by ancient rock carvings pictograms and petroglyphs. These ancient monuments of art reflect the worldview, economy, customs and traditions of ancient Azerbaijanis. Gobustan is characterized by male and female images. Men in the drawings are depicted in a hunting appearance with bows and arrows. They are tall, with slender bodies, belted and muscular muscles. On the pictures of the Reserve, you can see pictures of animals that lived here during the last 10 thousand years - gazelles, wild goats, deer, wild pigs, horses, lions, etc. On the rocks, there are also images of birds, fish, snakes, lizards and various insects. Ancient rock carvings along with a variety of topics abound in compositional scenes, reflecting in all the diversity of various spheres of human activity. They were reflected in the Azerbaijani dance of Yally, collective labour, hunting with various weapons, swimming on a Tigris-type boat, reaping of animals, attack of predators on herbivores, etc. Perhaps Yally was performed to the sound, published by the oldest musical instrument "Gavaldash" (a stone with a deep resonating sound).

Excursion to Mud Volcanoes: You will also have a chance to visit quite a unique site where 300 of the planet's estimated 700 mud volcanoes sit Gobustan, Azerbaijan and the Caspian Sea. Many geologists, as well as locals and international mud tourists, trek to such places as the Firuz Crater Gobustan Salyan and mud tourists trek to such places as the Firuz Crater, Gobustan, Salyan and end up happily covered in mud which is thought to have medicinal qualities. In 2001, one mud volcano 15 kilometres from Baku made world headlines when it suddenly started spewing flames 15 meters high.

Shamakhi is an ancient Azerbaijani city. Originated in the 5th century. BC. e. In the IX-XVI centuries. - the capital of the Shirvan kingdom, the residence of the Shirvanshahs is one of the most beautiful cities of the East. From the middle of the XVIII century - the center of Shemakhan khanate. For a long time, Shemakha was one of the most important points throughout the Great Silk Road. This is due to the fact that the city for a long time was one of the centres of the Shirvan-Apheron architectural school and the school of decorative and applied art (carpet making) and miniatures. Located at the intersection of caravan routes, Shemakha was one of the major trade and craft centres in the Middle East, occupying an important place in the silk trade, as early as the 16th century trade ties between Shemakha and Venetian merchants were mentioned. In Shemakha, Azerbaijani, Iranian, Arab, Central Asian, Russian, Indian and West European merchants were trading, who owned factories there, had numerous silk-weaving, paper-spinning and carpet workshops. The city became famous as the home of many prominent Azerbaijani philosophers, architects and scientists, and poets such as Khagani, Nasimi, Sabir.

Diri Baba is a unique monument, a two-story mosque-mausoleum of the 15th century, located on the road from Baku to Shemakha in the village of Maraza opposite the old cemetery. For a long time, local residents believed that this place was buried and remained an imperishable saint named Diri-Baba. However, this monument is associated with many legends and mystical details. Therefore, since the 17th century, it began to attract many pilgrims and ordinary travellers. The peculiarity of the structure is that the architect, as it were, "built" the tomb in the rock, and it seems as if it is kept "on weight", torn from the ground. The tomb admires the strictness of architecture, the purity of the lines, and against the background of irregularities of the dark rock the light and smooth surface of its walls, standing out, seems solemn.

Juma Mosque: This Azerbaijani mosque is the oldest and largest in the Caucasus. According to legend, it was founded in the 8th century, when Shemakha was chosen as a residence by the Arab caliph. The exact date of its construction is 744, which was established as a result of research conducted by the geological commission arrived from Tiflis, headed by Prince Shakuli Kajar. This date was determined by the Arabic inscription on the facade of the Juma mosque, which indicates the 126th year of the Muslim calendar as the date of foundation. It was at this time that the construction of new religious buildings (mosques) began in the territory of modern Azerbaijan. The Juma mosque in Shemakha is the earliest mosque in the Caucasus after the Derbent Cathedral Friday Mosque, built in 734.

Lahic is a village named after the name of the Lagic tribe that came here in the 4th - 5th centuries from the territory of Iran. This historical and architectural monument was built in the 5th century on the territory of the canyon of the river Girdimanchai. Old mosques and baths, medieval water supply and sewerage system are preserved here. Despite the fact that the village is declared a historical and cultural reserve, the local population is still living here, mainly engaged in handicrafts: the manufacture of elegant household items made of copper (Kazan, trays, jugs), leather, carpet weaving and agriculture. From time immemorial, the Lahic tribe traded with its products, which became known throughout the Middle East. And today in special workshops and souvenir shops visiting tourists can buy a variety of handmade products: carpets, dishes, daggers and much more.

Sheki is one of the most famous and ancient settlements of Azerbaijan. It is located 700 m above sea level and as an amphitheatre is surrounded by mountains. This ancient city has long been known as the center of silk and an important transit point on the Great Silk Road.

Albanian Church: According to the legend, this church is the first Christian church built not only in the territory of Caucasian Albania but in the whole of Transcaucasia. This place is also remarkable, as burial places of people were found on the territory of the temple, which in their structure are very different from the current inhabitants of the region. In the year of 2003, the church was restored to the money of the Norwegian government thanks to the personal efforts of Tour Heyerdahl. Here, next to the territory of the Church, you can find a memorial bust, in honour of a famous researcher set as a token of gratitude from local residents and the state.

Excursion to Ilisu - Sultans Garden with Water Aroma. This region of Azerbaijan is a treasure trove of historical and natural sights, it is necessary to write books about it, to dedicate epic poems, to compile encyclopedias; one article can not cope with a description of all that can and should be seen in the vicinity of Gakh. Therefore, the guide will not talk about the district but will talk about the village of Ilis with its rich history, which stones of fortresses, which have remained since the Middle Ages, still tell.

What To Bring

Positive Emotions

Passport

Water

Sunglasses

Meeting Point

Baku, Azerbaijan

Cancellation Policy

For cancellations upto 2 days before the tour -

Refund of 80% of the tour price.

Price

Adult
1 to 15	/person
Child
1 to 15	/person
This is a group tour

Check Availability Hide

Starting from

/person

Adult

Child

Total

0.00

Can't Find the Perfect Tour? Tailor Your Dream Trip!

6-Day Azerbaijan Travel on the Silk Road - Ways of the Ancient Caravans

Highlights

Locations Covered

Tour Type

Description

Itinerary

Day 01: Baku

Day 02: Baku - Excursion.

Day 03: Ateshgyah-Yanardagh-Gobustan

Day 04: Excursion to Shemakha + Sheki

Day 05: Excursion: Sheki+ Kish + Ilisu

Day 06: Baku

What's Included

What's Excluded

Know Before You Go

What To Bring

Meeting Point

Cancellation Policy

Price

Check Availability Hide

Starting from

Can't Find the Perfect Tour? Tailor Your Dream Trip!

Create your own adventure!

Choose Currency

6-Day Azerbaijan Travel on the Silk Road - Ways of the Ancient Caravans

Highlights

Locations Covered

Tour Type

Description

Itinerary

Day 01: Baku

Day 02: Baku - Excursion.

Day 03: Ateshgyah-Yanardagh-Gobustan

Day 04: Excursion to Shemakha + Sheki

Day 05: Excursion: Sheki+ Kish + Ilisu

Day 06: Baku

What's Included

What's Excluded

Know Before You Go

What To Bring

Meeting Point

Cancellation Policy

Price

Check Availability Hide

Starting from

Can't Find the Perfect Tour? Tailor Your Dream Trip!

Create your own adventure!

Choose Currency Close modal

Cookie icon We use cookies!

Choose Currency