ozstamps,

I was in Baku for a couple of days (holidays) in 2003. It's a weird place but definitely worth visiting - and 2 days should be enough to get a good idea of the city.

As for your questions, I hope the info below will help you at least somewhat:

(i) Hotels
As you noted, the hotels tend to be expensive (at least those geared for the oil industry). I recall we paid somewhere around 100USD for a double room in a Soviet type hotel - perfectly acceptable, although not great value for money by any means.

I know people who have stayed in Hotel Absheron:
http://www.allrussiahotels.com/cis/h...256C68004B6BA9
- I think it is as good as it gets w/ tourist hotels in Baku. I visited the place, and it appeared to be ok - I would probably try that one.

(ii) Baku / Bina a/p
I had a 6am departure w/ British Mediterranean (BA franchise). I decided not to pay for a room, and stayed out pretty late instead. I had a couple of drinks in the lobby of Hotel Absheron (above), and took a cab from there. Obviously getting a reliable cab is much easier from the hotel.

The a/p is a pretty grim place - it was quiet at night though, and a couple of hours there is easily done if you want to save some money.

(iii) Check-in, security
Check-in (for BA) started 1.5 hours before departure - rather late in any case. IIRC, checking in for onward connections was not possible; they had this sticker system in place if I'm not totally mistaken.

Security was done twice - the 2nd time was at gate. They rolled out a red carpet, and everybody had to take their shoes off! Even the transfer pax from Almaty had to go through this. It wasn't a big hassle though.

(iv) Upgrades
Just a quick note regarding this. I remember one of our guys being downgraded on BA (he had used miles to UG) because of oversold C. I'm hardly an expert on this, but I wouldn't be surprised if the presence of oil industry means that C class availability is not very good on flights to BAK if you try to upgrade at the last minute.

(v) Scams
For some reason there were all kinds of strange incidents during my two days in Azerbaijan. Nothing major happened, but it was annoying nevertheless.
a) taxi scams - obvious, ALWAYS agree on the price before you step in (typical fares were ca. 2USD IIRC)
b) fake police officers - carry a photocopy of your id just in case, shouldn't be a big problem if you don't carry large amounts of cash with you
c) immigration - as I was getting out of the country, the lady at passport control started complaining about the visa. Didn't realise I should have paid a bribe, and it took ca. 10 minutes before I got my passport stamped (didn't have to pay anything "extra" though)
d) a/p scams - not sure how common this is, but before check-in there were some blokes trying to "help you fill in the customs declaration form" (not needed) for a small sum. Just ignore them.

(vi) Sights
This is a bit tricky, can't seem to recall too many places of interest.
a) Old town
This is next to the centre, and worth having a look - the area is quite small.
b) Centre - restaurants etc.
The centre appeared to be a very small area. There are some reasonably good restaurants and a pub where all the oil workers from Aberdeen appear to meet up.
c) Night club on a ship
This is again one weird place - but if you stay in Hotel Absheron, you could check this shady ferry out.

(vii) Other
a) getting around - never seen so many idle taxis anywhere, finding a cab is never a problem in Baku
b) language - Azeri is quite close to Turkish, so it's time you brush up your Turkish before going.
c) Visa - do check if you can buy a tourist visa upon arrival at Bina a/p. It used to be possible, although I got my visa from the Azeri embassy in London.

hope this helps
okko