Azerbaijan

Fixed Group Departure BAKU (Azerbaijan)

• Hotel: Excelsior Hotel – 5*
• Dates: 04-07 August, 2022
• Duration: 3 Night and 4 days

Package Includes:

• Return Air Tickets on Air Arabia
• Hotel Accommodation in Excelsior Hotel-5*
• 03 days assistance of professional English-speaking guide on tour days only
• *Private bus on tours days and AHA transfers in Baku as well.
• *Entrance tickets: Maiden Tower, Shirvanshah palace, Gala Ethnographic Museum, Ateshgah and Yanardag Combo Ticket, Cable car In Tufandag Mountain Resort

Day 1: (4 Aug) Onward Flight from Abu Dhabi – Baku (Air Arabia) 10:00 -13:05

Arrival to Baku, meeting at the airport and transfer to the Hotel. Check-in.

Want to have a close look at the Baku`s most popular landmark? Baku business and hotel complex Flame Towers Baku is composed of 3 buildings. The surface of the Towers is fully covered with LED screens reflecting different visual characters in motion, easily visible from the far corners of the city in the evening. Walk along the Alley of Martyrs which is usually being included in the protocol visits of the foreign officials. Enjoy the panoramic view of the city and its bay from Baku’s Highland Park (also called Upland Park), the highest point in the Azerbaijani capital.

Walk down to Baku Boulevard to view the International Mugham Center (without entering) created in order to widely promote Azerbaijani ‘mugham’ (folk musical composition) in the world and shaped as the national musical instrument – ‘tar’. Here you will also see Azerbaijan National Carpet Museum, designed by Austrian architect Franz Janz and looking like a rolled carpet.

Wander between the decorative stone bridges of so-called Little Venice, a small town on the water and one of the jewels of Baku. It has two large and several small islands and its gondolas are travelling in the channels full of still and clean water.

Cross the street and enter Icherisheher (Inner City), known as a “Fortress� or “Old City�, a unique historical and architectural conservation area in the center of Baku. This is one of the most ancient places of the country where archaeological excavations revealed burial vaults of the Bronze Age. Maiden Tower (12th century) and The Palace of Shirvanshahs (13th-16th centuries) are the best-known historical monuments located in the Old City. Besides them there are a lot of other unique monuments such as mosques, minarets, the remnants of caravanserais “Multani� and “Bukhara�, ancient baths, etc. Stroll down the paved streets of this ancient city and drop to some of the numerous souvenir shops where you can buy national clothes, kerchiefs, scarves and caps, dishes and handmade carpets.

After leaving Old City move to the modern downtown, straight to the Fountain Square, the most popular public place with many restaurants and shops, main location for public festivals, shows and celebrations and pedestrian Nizami street, old trading zone with lots of shops and boutiques.

Overnight in Baku.

Day 2: ( 5 AUG) GABALA TOUR. Breakfast at the Hotel.

Gabala is one of the most beautiful provinces of Azerbaijan with rich and ancient history. For 600 years the city named Kabala used to be the capital of Caucasian Albania, an ancient state that used to exist on the territory of modern Azerbaijan back in the days. The ruins of the ancient city and the main gate of Caucasian Albania had survived until today

Later we will spend some time in Nohur Lake which has a fabulous location with a spectacular view to the Caucasus Mountains.

Later we will spend some time in Tufandag Winter-Summer Tourism Complex. It provides skiing in winter, going up to the mountains by cable cars in summer, as well as many other types of entertainment like mountain climbing by ATV quad bikes, mountain biking, horse riding, etc.

Seven Beauties (or Yeddi Gozel) Waterfall is situated in Vandam village. The name of the waterfall comes from the name of seven roads that should lead to the waterfall. During the spring and summer there are operating tea houses which operate on every mountain road, where guests can enjoy a tea set with traditional varieties of local jams in Gabala (for example, walnut and white cherry jam).

At Gabala Shooting Club in the village of Bum you can improve your aim and enjoy its beautiful natural surroundings (optional). It is a multi-purpose and world-class shooting facility that can serve both as a recreational and entertainment center.

Overnight in Baku

Day 3: (6 Aug) ABSHERON & SHOPPING TOUR. Breakfast at the Hotel.

Your excursion will start with visiting Heydar Aliyev Centre designed by world-famous architect Zaha Hadid. It is vast and jaw-droppingly majestic statement of fluid 21st-century architecture forming abstract waves and peaks that seem to melt together. The real delight is simply pondering and photographing the extraordinary exterior from ever-changing angles. Make a stop next to the popular “I love Baku� sign to take some photos.

Let`s continue our interesting tour around “Land of Fire�! Our excursion will start with visiting Gala village (40 min drive from Baku), which today is the State Historical Ethnographic Reserve and Open Air Museum offering the opportunity to see the original lifestyle of Azerbaijani people dated back to 10th19th centuries. It is a unique place where you can not only make a tour into the past, but also try to bake bread in ancient oven “tandir�, weave a carpet, smear with clay in a pottery workshop or feed camels and horses.

Our next stop is Ateshgah Fire Temple in the village of Surakhani that for centuries has been attracting crowds of thrill seekers. Built in the 17th–18th centuries around naturally burning flames which were previously worshipped by Zoroastrians, the site then had become an important place of pilgrimage for fire-worshipping Hindus until the 1880s. Today it houses a well-designed open air museum.

And the final stop of our “fiery tour� is State Historical, Cultural and Natural Reserve Yanardag (literary “Burning Mountain�), a complex built around the hill located on the top of the natural gas pocket causing continuous flame eruption. Most probably the fire has been burning in Yanardag for over 20,000 years. These natural flames were described by Marco Polo in the 13th century and continue to mesmerize those who visit the site.

Spending time in local bazaar “Sharg Bazaar�: here guests will have opportunity to buy local products which are typical for our country like

• Narsharab which is good to eat with fish and meat
• Pomegranates which is one of the symbol of prosperity and richness in Azerbaijan
• Local jams from white cherry, walnut and many other versions
• Caviar and so on

Visiting one of the shopping malls like 28 Mall, Ganjlik Mall or Daniz Mall.

Overnight in Baku

Day 4: (7 Aug) DEPARTURE Breakfast at the Hotel. Check out and Transfer to the Airport

Return Flight from Baku – Abu Dhabi (Air Arabia) 14:05- 17:05