Apsheron Hotel Baku

... shouting and thumping of tables. I was delegated to go in to the Customs office and try to remove Pete before the guns came out! After more shouting and tearing of various triplicate forms, the Customs guys eventually processed the paperwork, demanded the usual seemingly random amounts of Dollars and let us through, complete with yet another wad of undecipherable stamped forms.<br><br>It wasn't over ...

... to stop her sliding off the oily deck into the sea. Fantastic. I have met a Russian lorry driver called Alexander, who has taught me to play Kazio. He thinks the crossing will take 3 days. I hope he's wrong but he has apparently done this journey many times.

... lost on the metro, but eventually got back to the Gordons. They had a few friends over and we spent all evening outside chatting and barbequeing. It was fantastic and we will all be reluctant to leave the land of real food, showers and beds.

Spent the day in Baku and met up with the Gordons in the early evening. We had showers! I was disappointed to find that most of my tan was ingrained dirt. Graeme took us out for a curry and few beers and we returned to sleep in beds! Chris and I shared a double bed, but he only hugged me once in his sleep. It was a special moment.

Hi all (Salem!) Arrived in Azerbaijan....been an amazing experience, see my blog entry below, however unfortunately we are still here...yes we supposed to have left on the ferry yesterday from Baku to Turkmenbasi in Turkmenistan....and were at the port for 10 hours to then find out it has been cancelled. The ferry here doesnt really run on a timetable, it leaves when it is full. Unfortunately it fills up with train cargo but due to the Georgian war not many trains have made it to ...

When we saw that the tour went to Azerbaijan, we had no idea what to expect, as we knew just about nothing about it. After doing some reading, we learnt that from the 6th century BC it was part of the Persian Empire. Around AD325 it adopted Christianity, and Islam became the major religion from the 7th century. A classic era of Azeri culture bloomed in the 12th century, however in the 13th century the cities were destroyed by the ...

... Baku herum gibt es recht viele Oelpumpen und teilweise fliesst das Oel auch aus dem Boden. Das Meer hier (und auch die Erde) scheint recht oelverschmutzt zu sein. Benzin ist mit 0,40Euro/liter recht teuer fuer ein Oelland. Morgen geht es gen Westen in die Berge, hoffentlich bekomme ich einen Platz im Bus. Ich plane noch zwei Tage in Azerbaidjan und am Donnerstag dann nach Georgien, back ins Christenland:-) Gruss Ralf

... over 20 people. They just don't seem to exist. Equally scarce is the English language here. I ended up settling on a semi accurate tourist rout map after tracking down a bookstore &amp; headed out into the countryside towards Armenia. I saw an ideal camping spot in a field by a river. There was 70 yr old man carrying a stack of firewood over his shoulder walking along the road so I asked him if it was ok to sleep in my tent there for the night. He broke into a massive ...

... con un vecchio Antonov AN24 che faceva un casino infernale che nemmeno le cuffie a palla del mio MP3 riuscivano a coprire. Beh, poco male mi ero detto, pensando: "dormiro' in albergo". Ancora una volta: SBAGLIATO.... Arrivati sopra Baku l'aereo ha cominciato a girare sopra la citta', una, due, tre, quattro...non so quante volte, finche' il comandante non ha annunciato: "non si puo' atterrare per il vento, si ritorna ad Aktau (in Kazakhstan) per fare rifornimento ed ...

... looking almost like a huge roman theater. I walked down the sea side boardwalk and headed for the old city. The old city, where one could walk through the city as it was hundreds of years ago, reminded me of Jerusalem with it's old crumbling doors, cobble stone streets and medieval feel. The highlight of the old city, and debatably, Baku, was the Maiden's tower, a strangely shaped thick walled tower looking over the city and dating back to 7000BC. Old... Many theories surrounded ...