Mid-range · 6-hour walk · Baku
The Caspian and the Flame Towers in six hours
The seaside boulevard, the carpet museum, the funicular up to the towers and the martyrs' lane.
The three-hour route is inside the walls of the old city. This is everything Baku built with the oil money, old and new: an eight-kilometre seafront promenade begun in 1909, a museum shaped like a rolled carpet, and three glass towers on the ridge that are lit as flames every night. The funicular up Upland Park is the best-value ride in the Caucasus.
The route, stop by stop
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Baku Boulevard
The Caspian seafront, planted in 1909 with money from the first oil boom and still the city's main public space. Free, flat and about eight kilometres long if you let it be.
50 min here Walk here → -
Azerbaijan Carpet Museum
The building is a rolled carpet and the joke lands better than it should. Fourteen thousand pieces, and the top floor explains the knots well enough to ruin carpet shopping for you.
70 min here Walk here → -
Baku Funicular
Two minutes from the boulevard to the ridge. Runs from ten, closed Mondays, and the queue at sunset is long for a reason.
20 min here Walk here → -
Highland Park
Arrive by funicular from the previous stop
The terrace under the Flame Towers, with the whole bay below. Come back after dark when the towers are running fire across their facades.
40 min here Walk here → -
Martyrs' Lane
Graves of those killed by Soviet troops in January 1990 and in the Karabakh war. An eternal flame at the end and the most solemn place in the city.
35 min here Walk here → -
Heydar Aliyev Center
Arrive by taxi from the previous stop
Zaha Hadid's building, with no straight lines anywhere in it. Fifteen minutes by cab from the ridge and worth the trip even if you skip the exhibitions inside.
60 min here Walk here →
More in Baku
Every walking route in Baku, or the full Baku guide for where to stay and what a day costs.