Azerbaijan and the Shores of the Caspian Sea

Many people are unaware of where the Caucasus Mountains are, or where the country of Azerbaijan is, but my visit to this beautiful destination was amazing and memorable. Wedged between Russia, Georgia, Armenia, and Iran, this oil-rich country sits along the Caspian Sea, quietly going about its business, while the rest of the world mostly looks elsewhere.

Until recently, my only reference points for Azerbaijan had been the Formula One Grand Prix in Baku (the capital), and a passing mention in the James Bond film The World Is Not Enough. That was about it. What I discovered instead, was a country of roughly ten million people, overwhelmingly Muslim, but far more secular and outward-looking than I had expected.

About ninety percent of the population identified as Azeri, are culturally closer to Turkey than the Middle East. While most are Shia Muslim, daily life felt relaxed and distinctly modern. Local women dressed in Western clothing; when I saw burkas, they were worn by visitors, not residents. The people were warm and approachable, with one long-standing exception. Tensions with Armenia, rooted in decades of conflict, were never far beneath the surface.

One of the clearest signs of Azerbaijan’s social complexity was the Red City, a fully Jewish community that exists peacefully alongside the Muslim majority. Known locally as Qırmızı, it remains one of the only all-Jewish towns outside Israel, complete with synagogues, schools, and a thriving Hebrew education centre. It was not something I expected to find, and that was becoming a theme.

Baku, home to about a fifth of the country’s population, surprised me most of all. Sitting directly on the Caspian, the city felt sleek, confident, and modern. From my downtown hotel, I looked out over a skyline of glass and steel towers. After dark, LED lighting washed buildings in colour, giving parts of the city an unmistakably futuristic feel. It is not Dubai, but it is certainly making its mark on the world.

The waterfront promenade is the city’s social spine. Stretching several kilometres along the sea, it traces its origins back to 1909 and remains one of Baku’s proudest public spaces. Wide paths, gardens, cafés, shaded benches, and the occasional carousel turns it into an urban park rather than a simple boardwalk. Families strolled, couples lingered, and no one seemed in a hurry.

Just inland, the old city told a very different story. Enclosed by medieval walls and dating back to the twelfth century, it is Baku’s first UNESCO World Heritage Site. Roughly three thousand people still live inside its maze of stone lanes, mosques, and caravanserais. Exploring it properly took most of a day, helped along by dry heat hovering above thirty degrees, and the steady application of sunscreen.

With five days in the country, I ventured beyond the capital. The mud volcanoes, several hours away, sat in a stark, almost lunar landscape. Hundreds of low mounds quietly bubbled and gurgled, releasing cool, mineral-rich mud. There was no crowd, no fencing, and not another visitor in sight.

At the Fire Temple of Baku, I stepped into a site once sacred to Zoroastrian worshippers. The complex, rebuilt in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, had been abandoned by the late nineteenth. Its famous eternal flame, extinguished during Soviet-era gas extraction, had since been reignited, using a controlled natural gas supply.

Further afield, I visited ancient villages, modest mosques, and finally Qobustan, where rock carvings dating back as far as 20,000 years, told the story of early human life along the Caspian. Standing there, it was impossible not to feel how long this land had been inhabited, travelled, and contested.

Tourism remains modest, even now. Most visitors I encountered were from Iran or Europe. That anonymity keeps costs reasonable, food plentiful, and interactions refreshingly genuine.

Tucked between the Caucasus Mountains and the Caspian Sea, Azerbaijan was a country that lingered with me long after I left, not because it demanded attention, but because it never needed to.