Bloop Bloop Blip Bloop: Outta Baku Is Where the Real Adventures Happen, or Don't Part I

PART I
In most places I've traveled, municipalities are pretty good at building up its hotspots to get the most out of its tourists' bucks. Well, considering that Azerbaijan issued a whopping 27 tourist visas in the entire year of 2007, I wasn't really surprised when investigating ways to get out into the countryside of Baku, no one really knew how to get there or what was even there. Uncertainly aside, Jill, Molly and I left our friend Evan to Fulbright his day away while we took off to discover the mud volcanoes and petroglyphs of the country.

We hired an unofficial cabbie at a decent rate to take us about 100 kilometers north to the region of Gobastan. I think we were saved from getting ripped off on the price not because he wasn't a licensed driver, but because he was the friend of the nephew of the guy who sold me some postcards from USSR... Of course, we're were so pleased!!

So for 80 manat, we packed into the back of a BMW sedan from about 1980.

This car was a champ and its driver decided that I in fact did speak German after I responded "Nien!" to the question if I knew the language. In fact, the extent of my Duetch is exclusive to only vital vocabulary. For example, ente, beugal party, bier and the ever helpful phrase: "Ich bin Berliner" (thanks to Rex and JFK for that very practical language knowledge on ducks, gang bangs, beer, and I am a donut). Even if our languages weren't common, we got along just fine over paved highways passing defunct oil fields, miles of pipeline, and some scrubby landscape.

As we began to edge out of the city into the doggie outskirts, our cabbie pulled over at a dank shop, exchange some words, and stuffed his pocket full with a wad of cash. Then, just twenty minutes down the highway, we pull off again, he has some words, stuffs a hand in his pocket, and off we go. Twice more ten minutes down the road, but now it's exclusively gas stations. Hmm, mafia? Oil change? Not quite sure, but when we pulled over to talk to the midget sitting in his heap of a car, we decided between the three of us that this guy had no idea where he was going. Our hypothesis was confirmed once we cruised four-wheel style into the countryside: no roads! just sheep and peasants!

After a good twenty minutes of hard core driving suited only for off-road vehicles and some advice from the locals, we spot a plateau that seems like there might be something there. (I know many of you are asking, "Why didn't you just follow the signs to the mud volcanos?? The answer is simple, there aren't any signs. Please...) Although the elevation and angle would have been a challenge for a Jeep, Azeri cranked the wagon down to third gear and huffed and puffed our way up the dirt path. What a good German auto, we made it, despite all the backwards slipping and sliding.

And so the tremendous sight greeted us!

If anything can be said about the less than magnificent but ridiculous mud volcanoes, it is delightful. There's nothing quite like standing around watching the earth ooze out some bubbly grey fart. Check out this action.