Part 34: Ganja, Azerbaijan

My next stop on my tour of Azerbaijan would be Ganja, Azerbaijan's second biggest city (written as Gəncə in Azeri script). It being March, mountain destinations didn't seem like a good fit so I opted for this historical city as my second and last stop in the country outside the capital of Baku. A small bus took two-and-a-half hours to drive from Sheki to Ganja, making one stop en route in the town of Mingecevir.


Rather boring scenery along the way..


Driving through the town of Mingecevir, which is located on an artificial lake and a river.

The bus dropped us off at a roundabout at the outskirts of Ganja, so I was forced to take a taxi into town as I had no clue about public transport and nobody spoke English. I asked the taxi driver to drop me off at a random at a random intersection of what looked like the town centre.

Ganja was already a very important city in the Middle Ages. In the 19th century, the Persians who then ruled it were however forced to cede it to the Russians. The town was renamed as Elisabethpol after the wife of Tsar Alexander I. Stalin renamed it Kirovabad, only for a newly independent Azerbaijan to give the city back its historic name of Ganja.

The first thing I noticed is how Russian this city looks. And I don't necessarily mean Soviet Russian, but old school Tsarist Russian. Ganja is famous for its redbrick buildings, which makes it look almost European in character. For all I knew I could have easily walked in a city in the Baltics such as Klaipeda.





My first stop in town was a nice looking park/botanical gardens.





There was even a nice cafe in the park, which unfortunately had some pretty terrible coffee. At least the views were nice and the sun started to come through.



Next stop was Ganja's lovely main square. Big eyecatcher here was the lovely philharmonic concert hall, which only in recent years was fully renovated.


Ganja philharmonic concert hall

In fact, the big square was an odd mix of buildings from different ages in the city's rich history. Right in front of the concert hall was an old hammam [bath house].




The old hammam/

The twin-minaret mosque on the square dates back to the year 1620.




The mosque from the year 1620

Towards the other end of the large rectangular square is the city hall. No question from which historical area this building belongs. You can instantly recognise the massive Stalinist architecture.






The Stalinist city hall

Towards the far end of the square is a statue of Heydar Aliyev, the third President of Azerbaijan who served from October 1993 until his death in October 2003. He is the father of current president Ilham Aliyev. Basically, Azerbaijan is run by a family dictatorship.




Heydar Aliyev statue

I stopped at one of the restaurants on the square for a quick takeaway chicken kebab. Costing around 0.50 EUR, it was quite a steal.



Across the street from the square was Ganja's main university building as well as the city's main hotel, simply called Gandja Hotel. I went in for a quick toilet break and it looked decidedly Soviet and empty inside, although it is apparently still functioning as the reception was manned.


The Gandja Hotel


Gandja University

This is also where Cavadxan street starts, a lovely pedestrian street lined with shops, restaurants and teahouses, many located in beautiful red-brick buildings.








Lovely Cavadxan street

I was stopped by the Azerbaijani constabulary in the street. The cops seemed slightly annoyed with me taking pictures and inquired in Azerbaijani what on earth I was doing. As I didn't speak a word of Azerbaijani, they switched to Russian. When I tried to explain I was just a tourist from Europe three of them lost interest and walked on. The fourth cop was blurting out some more words and then followed the rest of the rozzers out of the street.

I've heard many tales of over-inquisitive Azerbaijani police, but this would be the only time I would have a small run-in with them.

After the encounter with the Azerbaijani police I decided to go for some tea, having spotted a gorgeous tea house in the street. As they had some nargilah too, I decided to take it very easy for the next hour.



I even managed to make new friends at the tea house!



Fully rested, I continued my walk towards the river which bisects the city in two. Because the river was dammed, one part of the river had water in it, while more upstream the riverbed was entirely dry weirdly enough.









Apart from a small amusement park, there wasn't much to see along the riverbank.



I found a Turkish fast food style family restaurant, where I sat down for dinner. The Iskender kebab and a drink was 2 EUR and tasted fine.



I had no accommodation booked for the night. My plan was to take the overnight train to Baku and just sleep in my private compartment on board. The rest of the evening I spend in a cafe reading a book, only to be persuaded by a group of Azeri students to join them for some more nargilah as they wanted to practice their English and were genuinely surprised and pleased to welcome a tourist in town. I had an extremely fun time talking to them, but the second time smoking the day was not very good for my stomach. By the time I took a local marshrutka to the bus station I was feeling quite nauseous.

Gandja to Baku by train
Private compartment/spalny vagon. Price: 9 EUR
STD 11:25pm - STA 06:30am (travel time 6h55m)

The train was this time a decade newer, but still felt rather old and Soviet. It had ghastly golden curtains while also the bed linen had just seemingly random colours. The compartment was again clean and the bed comfortable, and that is basically all you can ask for.





Unfortunately, the travel time was already an hour or two shorter than my previous train ride in Azerbaijan. Coupled with my nauseous feeling, I perhaps managed to sleep only for one or two hours when the conductor knocked on the door to announce that in half an hour we would arrive in Baku. Whatever I would decide to do next, I knew I was in for a hard day!