Shamakhi, Azerbaijan
When I had planned to do the overnight trip to Sheki instead of the day trip, Gunel had mentioned we can stop in Gabala and Shamakhi along the way to see sights. I looked up on google maps and images what there was to do and saw some archaeological sites which is what I thought she meant.
Yesterday we has stopped at the mountain resort in Gabala, not the site of the ruins. Similar in Shamakhi we only went to the Jummah Mosque and not the nearby tombs. I asked if we could stop on the way back. We agreed to only the Shamakhi tombs as the Gabala ruins were too out of the way.
After an hour in Sheki this morning we drove slightly further north to the Village of Kish. This is the site of a Caucasian Albanian Church. Don't ask me to explain the difference between Caucasian Albania and the country of Albania. The two are entirely different but they couldn't think of an original names for themselves.
Entrance to the church was 4 Az ($2.80). Outside and inside were glass cases in the ground with medieval skeletal remains.
Inside was a small museum. There were quite a lot of crypts around the site.
The streets and houses are made from cobble stones and slow to drive thru. I wanted some lunch as I hadnt had breakfast and didnt want a big fancy meal like yesterday. We stopped at a shawarma place back in Sheki. Prices were cheap only 2.20 Az ($1.60).
We were then going to do the road trip in reverse back to Baku going thru all the same weather pockets of sun, rain, hail, as well as wildly differing terrains, and grazing cattle.
Another stop we had talked about was the village of Lahic. It was 50km each way and Gunel said it would be an extra 50 Az ($35) charge. Initially I said yes since I would never be coming to this region again. But after visiting the cobbled streets in Kish and seeing the handcrafts in Sheki I decided not too as it would be too tiring, too much driving, and not much new to see.
It was interesting seeing local life in these outbacks. Locals would stand like hitch hikers holding out there wares on the roadside to stop passing cars.
Most bizarre were the flower sellers holding out bouquets as though marriage proposals. As well boys would hold ferrets by the neck. I didnt know if this was for food but Gunel said it was for pets.
The stop we were going to make was to the Yeddi Gumbaz tombs. This was almost on the main highway so no long driving detours.
Originally there were 7 tombs of the local rulers. 3 have since collapsed, one is partially collapsed, only 3 are intact.
There were coloured headstones inside the surviving tombs. The paint was still quite rich.
The grounds had many headstones all falling over at different angles. It was so strange I named it 'tomb henge' and it was so interesting seeing the patterns across the landscape of all the falling stones at angles.
We continued our drive back to Baku. Once we hit the city traffic was very thick due to all the road closures for the Formula 1 which we had bypassed with our out of town trip.
Eventually we made it back to my apartment after a long two days on the road and I thanked Gunel and the driver that had the same name as me.
In the apartment the tv hadnt been working. I thought the guy would have fixed it in the two days I was gone but it still wouldnt work. I messaged him it was 3 days now and it didnt work. I needed a log in and password to sign in to the system.
He came over and got it hooked up. More signs that nobody had been staying in this apartment previously along with the trash that hadnt been cleaned when I arrived the first day in the morning.
Now I had a tv I thought I could sleep on the sofabed in the living room since the bedroom lights didnt work properly. The bed just collapsed into three pieces with nails and wood pieces sticking out. So much for that idea.
see also vlog of todays trip - https://youtu.be/g3-7y_gLcas
2025-05-22