Top 10 Things to Do in Baku

Baku's UNESCO-listed walled inner city is a fascinating labyrinth of medieval mosques, caravanserais, bath houses, and residential quarters that have been continuously inhabited since the 12th century. The Maiden Tower, a mysterious cylindrical fortress of unknown origin that has never been conclusively explained, is its most iconic and haunting landmark.

Zaha Hadid's swooping, curveless masterpiece of white concrete is one of the most photographed and architecturally celebrated buildings of the 21st century, housing a museum, conference facilities, and exhibition halls in a continuous flowing interior. The building's rejection of straight lines and sharp angles is both visually astonishing and architecturally revolutionary.

Housed in a building shaped like a rolled carpet on the Caspian waterfront, this dedicated museum traces the history and artistry of Azerbaijani carpet weaving — one of the country's most treasured cultural traditions — through thousands of antique and contemporary examples. The collection is the largest and most comprehensive of its kind in the world.

About 60 kilometers from Baku, the Gobustan plateau is home to one of the world's most surreal landscapes — hundreds of active mud volcanoes bubbling and erupting cold mud across an alien-looking terrain. The adjacent Gobustan National Park also contains over 6,000 rock carvings spanning 40,000 years of human presence in the Caucasus.

The Baku Boulevard stretching along the Caspian Sea waterfront is the city's great outdoor promenade — lined with cafes, fountains, a Ferris wheel, and manicured gardens — with the Flame Towers glowing above and the flat expanse of the Caspian stretching to the horizon. The 3.75-kilometer promenade is at its most beautiful on warm evenings.

This fascinating 18th-century fire temple built by Hindu and Zoroastrian pilgrims around a naturally burning gas vent has been a place of pilgrimage for centuries and is a remarkable testament to Azerbaijan's ancient identity as the "Land of Fire." Though the natural gas vents were extinguished in the 1960s, the flame now burns with piped gas and the atmosphere remains powerful.

A naturally burning hillside where gas seeping from the earth has been continuously on fire for centuries, Yanar Dag is one of Azerbaijan's most extraordinary natural phenomena and has become one of its most visited sites. Ancient Arab traveler Ibn Battuta mentioned seeing this eternal flame in the 14th century — it burns exactly as he described.

Baku's most elegant pedestrian shopping street, known as the "Arbat of the Caucasus," is lined with designer boutiques, grand historic buildings, outdoor cafes, and the Art Nouveau masterpieces of the oil boom era. The street leads to the beautiful Fountain Square, the social heart of modern Baku, surrounded by beautiful 19th-century mansions.

This 15th-century royal palace complex within the Old City walls is Azerbaijan's most important medieval monument — a serene ensemble of pavilions, a mosque, a bath house, and a mausoleum built by the Shirvanshah dynasty. The palace's restrained stone architecture is a world away from the flamboyance of the modern city outside its walls.

Baku's UNESCO-listed walled inner city is a fascinating labyrinth of medieval mosques, caravanserais, bath houses, and residential quarters that have been continuously inhabited since the 12th century. The Maiden Tower, a mysterious cylindrical fortress of unknown origin that has never been conclusively explained, is its most iconic and haunting landmark.

Zaha Hadid's swooping, curveless masterpiece of white concrete is one of the most photographed and architecturally celebrated buildings of the 21st century, housing a museum, conference facilities, and exhibition halls in a continuous flowing interior. The building's rejection of straight lines and sharp angles is both visually astonishing and architecturally revolutionary.

Housed in a building shaped like a rolled carpet on the Caspian waterfront, this dedicated museum traces the history and artistry of Azerbaijani carpet weaving — one of the country's most treasured cultural traditions — through thousands of antique and contemporary examples. The collection is the largest and most comprehensive of its kind in the world.

About 60 kilometers from Baku, the Gobustan plateau is home to one of the world's most surreal landscapes — hundreds of active mud volcanoes bubbling and erupting cold mud across an alien-looking terrain. The adjacent Gobustan National Park also contains over 6,000 rock carvings spanning 40,000 years of human presence in the Caucasus.

The Baku Boulevard stretching along the Caspian Sea waterfront is the city's great outdoor promenade — lined with cafes, fountains, a Ferris wheel, and manicured gardens — with the Flame Towers glowing above and the flat expanse of the Caspian stretching to the horizon. The 3.75-kilometer promenade is at its most beautiful on warm evenings.

This fascinating 18th-century fire temple built by Hindu and Zoroastrian pilgrims around a naturally burning gas vent has been a place of pilgrimage for centuries and is a remarkable testament to Azerbaijan's ancient identity as the "Land of Fire." Though the natural gas vents were extinguished in the 1960s, the flame now burns with piped gas and the atmosphere remains powerful.

A naturally burning hillside where gas seeping from the earth has been continuously on fire for centuries, Yanar Dag is one of Azerbaijan's most extraordinary natural phenomena and has become one of its most visited sites. Ancient Arab traveler Ibn Battuta mentioned seeing this eternal flame in the 14th century — it burns exactly as he described.

Baku's most elegant pedestrian shopping street, known as the "Arbat of the Caucasus," is lined with designer boutiques, grand historic buildings, outdoor cafes, and the Art Nouveau masterpieces of the oil boom era. The street leads to the beautiful Fountain Square, the social heart of modern Baku, surrounded by beautiful 19th-century mansions.

This 15th-century royal palace complex within the Old City walls is Azerbaijan's most important medieval monument — a serene ensemble of pavilions, a mosque, a bath house, and a mausoleum built by the Shirvanshah dynasty. The palace's restrained stone architecture is a world away from the flamboyance of the modern city outside its walls.