Mud Volcanoes and Candy Cane Mountains: Detlef Palm

Azerbaijan may not be at the top of your bucket list. UNICEF began closing its office in September 2025 - but I am sure that Azerbaijani parents will continue to love their children as much as any other parents in the world love theirs. Earlier, UNDP, UNHCR and the ICRC had been told to leave. You may therefore not be able to think of a reason to visit anytime soon. But if you go, don't miss Xinaliq, the mud volcanoes and the candy cane mountains.

Gabi and I went twice to Azerbaijan, early in 2013 and late in 2014, to help the UNICEF office pondering the future of its programmes. It took us some time and determination to warm up to the country, not least because of the cold season.

Baku

Baku is the largest city on the Caspian Sea and in the Caucasus region. It lies 29 meters below sea level, making it the lowest-lying capital of any country. That the city is not underwater is because the Caspian Sea is not a sea, but the world's largest landlocked body of water. Baku is Azerbaijan's only metropolis and home to a third of its population.

The old city, with the flame towers as a backdrop. Some say that only one of the towers is actually occupied - check out whether it's true, when you are there. 

Baku, formerly known as the "Paris of the East," is considered a city where Eastern and Western cultural traditions coexist, blending old and new. Indeed, Nizami Street and Neftchilar Street are among the most expensive streets in the world, and UN officials and retirees can mingle with the nouveau riche, stocking up on brands like Gucci, Dolce & Gabbana, and Burberry.

Baku also has its charm. The Old City, containing the Palace of the Shirvanshahs, was designated as a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 2000.

Baku's most famous landmark and symbol of Azerbaijan's identity: The 12th-century Maiden Tower (Azerbaijani: Qız qalası) in the old city. 

The Tower is shrouded in mystery and dozens of different legends, most of which - like anywhere in the world - involve loathsome kings, angry lovers, foreign armies, and a beautiful girl who throws herself over the balustrades.

On our first visit, we wanted to buy the rug in our modest hotel room, but the owner refused. On our second visit, we found the carpet bazaar.

 

The carpet museum, unmistakably. 

In 2010, Azerbaijan held the world record for the tallest flagpole. Soon after, it was dwarfed by Tajikistan (see travel report here). Since 2021, Egypt holds the world record with a height of 202 meter. So far, no one has told me what motivates them to compete in the erection of the tallest flagpole; I have my suspicions, which I won't share here.

Meanwhile, Azerbaijan built a new flagpole, 192 meter high, which since November 2024 flies the largest flag in the world by square meters (2,564 sqm). This is an area larger than seven times the average plot size for new builds (with garden) in the UK.

For the last 15 years, Baku and Azerbaijan have been hard at work to win international recognition and strengthen ties to the rest of the world, notably through hosting the Eurovision song contest, the Formula One Circuit and the UN Climate Change Conference. 

Petrol-Industry

Azerbaijan is one birthplace of the oil industry. More than 700 years ago, Marco Polo wrote that "... there is a spring from which gushes a stream of oil, in such abundance that a hundred ships may load there at once. This oil is not good to eat; but it is good for burning". Early oil extraction was mainly through hand-dug surface wells. Not to ruin any romantic ideas, but new research seems to indicate that the Maiden Tower was nothing more than an antique oil refining tower.

As the center of the first commercial oil production, Baku became one of the most magnificent cities in Europe. Between 1898 and 1901, Baku produced half of the world's oil from wells located within 6 square miles of the city. The Nobel Brothers and the Rothschilds got involved, next to all big names in the industry. In those early days, Baku's population grew faster than that of London, Paris, New York, or Tokyo. 

Offshore exploration in the Caspian Sea started in the 1960. (Click on any picture to enlarge). Here, on a flight from Istanbul to Dushanbe, oil extraction can be seen in the Caspian Sea just south of Baku. Oil and gas account for two-thirds of Azerbaijan’s GDP. The State Oil Company of Azerbaijan is said to be run in an opaque manner, and is often associated with widespread corruption.

In 1999, perhaps trying to emulate the Norwegian Pension Fund, the Azerbaijan government founded the State Oil Fund of the Republic of Azerbaijan (SOFAZ). It is a sovereign wealth fund where surplus revenues of the oil industry are saved and invested. Critics say that SOFAZ is funding useless vanity projects, and that contracts have been awarded to companies owned by the ruling Aliyev family and political elites. 

At the time of our visit in 2014, surveys showed that most young Azerbaijanis aspired to careers in the well-oiled public service, similar to young people in Turkmenistan (click: The Door to Hell)

Xinaliq 

As always, Gabi and I had allocated extra time to independently explore our destination. On the advice of Mark Hereward, that time UNICEF representative in Azerbaijan, we first went to Xinaliq. Xinaliq sits in the Caucasus mountains, bordering the Republik of Dagestan, which is part of Russia. 

Once in northern Azerbaijan, we swapped our somewhat dated rental Mercedes for a tried-and-tested Lada. 

Here is the eastern end of the Greater Caucasus, seen from the air. The red dot marks the location of Xinaliq, and the arrow to the left points at Bazardüzü dağı, the highest mountain of both Azerbaijan and Dagestan. 

Xınalıq, or Khinalug, is an ancient Caucasian village reputedly 5,000 years old. Its origins date back to the period of Caucasian Albania, about which little is known before the 6th century BC. Caucasian Albania ceased to exist in the 4th century and was not - as falsely implied by Trump - at war with Azerbaijan in 2025.

Xinaliq was, and probably still is, a touristic draw for those wishing to see more than Baku. The village was included in the Cultural Landscape of Khinalug People and "Köç Yolu" Transhumance Route UNESCO World Heritage Site in 2023.

The village in itself is worth the trip, and becomes the more fascinating the more one learns about its history and present lifestyle. Reviewing my official notes from the trip, rural development was not topping the government list of priorities. Looking at the updated images on the web, it does not seem to be a priority even today, as very little seem to have changed.

Laundry day on a cloudy day in Xinaliq. 

The residents speak Khinalug, a language that is an isolate within the Northeast Caucasian language family, although you will have no problem conversing with villagers in Azerbaijani.

Households use fuel made from manure. This type of bio-fuel was once widely used throughout Azerbaijan. The manure is gathered, mixed with hay, shaped into specific forms, and then pressed. There appear to be three variants. Brick-shaped kukwa and round wall-pressed !kd both use cow poo, while gomra is from sheep and is reckoned to burn best.

We undertook a minor hike. Prayer flags at a cave and viewpoint overlooking Xinaliq.

The Xinaliq guesthouse, where we stayed the night. Several home-stays are said to be available during the summer months. We haven't checked them, but they can't be anything but an improvement over the guesthouse.

Having a meal in a private home before we leave from Xinaliq.

Mud Volcanoes

Azerbaijan has the most mud volcanoes, spread broadly across the country. 350 of the 700 mud volcanoes of the world are in Azerbaijan.

Many of the Azerbaijan mud volcanoes are in the Qobustan National Park. There are also underground mud volcanoes in the Caspian Sea.

We confirm what M. Elliott said in his incomparable guidebook: "Like cows, mud volcanoes constantly fart flammable gases. They also like throwing gobs of mud and streaming forth watery flows with a vigor that varies seasonally. This behavior is gently amusing rather than life threatening".

Rich oil and gas fields are found in the proximity of mud volcanoes. NASA geologists concluded that Azerbaijan's mud volcanoes have a similar structure to the uplands of Mars.

Natural gas (mostly methane) generated by pressure on organic materials produces the volcano's flatulence. There are two types of vents, and "each has its own lovable character (Eliott)".  Here is a so called salse, a sort of watery pool throwing bubbles of mud.

A salse waiting for the bubble to form.

And here a so called gryphon.

Even the most indolent UN bureaucrat can get muddy boots in Qobustan. 

Candy Cane Mountains

The Candy Cane Mountains are a short drive from Gilazi on the main road connecting Baku and Quba.

The other-wordly scenery is probably best observed and photographed in the rainy season (when the grass is green) and when the sky is overcast (for better colors).

Candy Cane Mountains. 

The rose and white stripes and swirls are produced by ground waters that have altered the oxidation state of the iron compounds in the earth.

The mountains are littered with small conical fossils.

A few years after our trip, an agent from the renowned German publishing house Suhrkamp asked me to use one of my photos of the Candy Cane Mountains that I had posted on my private website - in exchange for 300 Euro and two copies of the 750-page tome. According to the publishing house, Azerbaijan-born Alexander Ilitschewski "unfolds the kaleidoscope of a lost Garden of Eden, a historical landscape where the world's religions once met, and a geopolitically, socially and ecologically highly sensitive zone whose future is beginning to slip away from the West". The almost encyclopedic novel is available in Russian and German. It's a very difficult read, and I had to start over three times before reaching its somewhat upsetting ending.

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Other photo-stories by Detlef:

• Lunae Montes - a journey to the source of the Nile, in 1980
• Pirates, Penguins, Patagonia (Voyage around Cap Horn)
• Operation Lifeline Sudan, the first years in pictures
• Duruusta Soomaaliya - The Somali Experience
• New York - A Walk on the Wild Side
• Into the Midnight Sun (Journey to the North Cape)
• The Door to Hell and the Path to Health (Turkmenistan)
• Magic South (Southern Africa)
• Azhdahak (from Germany to Armenia, by road)
• Top of Mexico
• East Coast - West Coast, across the USA
• At the edge of the bog - where we live
• Rudaki, a Wedding and Proto-Urban Sarazm (Tajikistan)

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More Insights from Outside the Bubble, by Detlef Palm

Detlef can be contacted via detlefpalm55@gmail.com