Driving out to Gobustan State Reserve which is about 40 miles from Baku I soon realised that once out of the city the Az landscape is kinda like fucking bleak! It is strange how the mind works, an instant recall of a classic 70's soft rock tune by America. "A horse with no name", and even writing this up now it has started playing in my head again.
The reserve was established back in 1966 when the region was declared as a national historical landmark of SSR Azerbaijan.
"Rocks with inscriptions and tamgas are monuments of ancient Azerbaijani culture. It is forbidden by law to climb or damage them. Academy of Sciences of the Azerbaijan SSR. 1950
Not exactly a great nature experience, out in the hot flag cracking sun with no shade saw a few of the party wilting, and wandering off back to the jeeps, fuck me it is the middle of summer do you not research in advance what the climate is like?
It is a UNESCO World Heritage site known for its extensive collection of over 6,000 pre-historic rock engravings, depicting scenes of ancient life, hunting, and rituals, which our guide took great delight in explaining in great detail what a selection of them were all about, at which point I started to wilt and wandered off back to the jeep
Hardly pre-historic
Our next stop the mantra went, we are going to see some volcanoes, now I mentioned "do your research" and I know yes I really fucking know that Azerbaijan does not have any volcanoes!
Welcome to volcano land, I kid you not
Mud volcanoes! they don't spew out molten lava, but just a mixture of mud, water, and gases. Very underwhelming.
Apparently there are about 400 of these things in the country.
They say it is good for the skin, so is the range of Oil of Ulay, but I wouldn't slap that on my face either.
Yanar Dağ, the 'burning mountain', ( over egged the pudding somewhat as the mountain is about 12 ft high!), is a natural gas fire that burns perpetually on a hillside near Baku, stop number three! The flames escape from a thin, porous layer of sandstone, probably be better seen at night not in the middle of the afternoon. No it would definitely be better seen in the dark.
Another religion Zoroastrian, to them "fire is considered a sacred symbol of the divine, representing the light, wisdom, and purity of Ahura Mazda, the supreme creator"
That is the problem with religion it came before science, and because they knew no better and believed in superstition blah blah blah.......well.
There is a hell of a lot of natural gas beneath the ground in this area and once ignited, so it flames once the combustion triangle is complete.
And an abandoned ride on thingy
