From diverse climatic zones to exquisite landscapes and mind-boggling diversity, take a trip to the Gobustan National Park and enjoy nature’s amazing wonders. Azerbaijan, also called the Land of Fire, is a powerful country with a deep and intriguing history. You may not find this fantastic place in many tourist maps, but this once-neglected region is now a hot spot tourist destination. Every year, thousands travel to Azerbaijan to explore, the unusual combo of mountainous landscapes, splendid creations, and a rich throwback storey about the first years of humanity.
Located on the borders on the borders of Asia and Europe, this weird and fascinating country has so much to offer, one of which is Gobustan Azerbaijan. Gobustan is home to an array of rock petroglyphs, relics, carvings, and mud volcanoes. Researchers call Gobustan, a throwback to the post-apocalyptic era. So, if you want to enjoy nature at the edge of the earth, here’s everything you should know about Gobustan Azerbaijan.

Walk to Azerbaijan’s Heartthrob

The Gobustan Azerbaijan is a small settlement in Baku, Azerbaijan. To the west, you will find the  Gobustan National Park. You can find this state reserve at 40 miles (64 km) to the southwest of the centre of Baku on the west bank of the Caspian Sea. It is a mountain and hill site occupying the southeast end of the Big Caucasian Ridge in Azerbaijan between the rivers Sumgait and Pirsagat, within the Jeyrankechmaz River

Welcome to Gobustan National Park

The Gobustan National Park is known as a Gobustan Rock Art Cultural Landscape. It is one of the most visited national parks in Azerbaijan, and for lots of fantastic reasons. Gobustan National Park is home to Azerbaijan’s famous rock arts, mud volcanoes, ancient carvings and gas stones in the region. They declared Gobustan a national historic landmark in 1966 to preserve its beautiful works of art. Gobustan covers three rocky highlands in the semi-desert territory of central Azerbaijan.

Embrace the spectacular history

For centuries, there were impacts of wind, seismic activity, wind, blocks of stones, and atmospheric precipitation on blocks of rocks over a vast limestone layer.  This action formed over 20 big and small caves and canopies, which were the natural shelter to the inhabitants within the region at a particular time in history.
In 1930, a group of men discovered these archaeological sites when they went to mine for gravel in this location. The region is abundant in boulders, stone formations, sacred carvings, and many more human-made caves.

The famous Norwegian explorer and traveller, Thor Heyerdahl has repeatedly also travelled to the region. He recognized the cave images of the boats in some archaeological sites as one of the oldest known boat images in the world. After the reconstruction in 2012, the Gobustan Museum opened with a surprising collection of over 100,000 archaeological materials

Fall in love with the Stone Age

The Gobustan National Park denotes the rich history of humanity dating as far back as the Middle Ages, precisely the Upper Paleolithic era in Eurasia. You can find over 6000 rock engravings on over 1,000 surfaces of rocks. These fascinating pictures can provide a glimpse into more than 40,000 decades of history of rock art. Over 4,000 of these pictures show, in full details, the evolution of humans, animals, natural life experiences, hunting, and dance. Apart from these petroglyphs, you can find pottery artifacts, unearthed stone implements, axes, arrowhead, and the bones of ancient animals. These pictures provide an extensive view of history from over 10,000 years ago. Many of these petroglyphs in the Gobustan National Park are on massive cliffs. They are divided among ancient residences, and in some of them, you can find carvings over older images.

Discover Gobustan National Park’s famous mud volcanoes

Unlike traditional volcanoes, mud volcanoes spew only mud, water, and gases. There are 850 mud volcanoes in the world, but you can find over 300 of them in Azerbaijan. Mud volcanoes are not dangerous, aside for the strong smell of methane, but they can occasionally erupt in toxic gas or flame. Some you can find in Absheron and around Baku. Over 100 are near the Gobustan National Park. The mud volcanoes in this location are so diverse. You can find dormant, buried, subsea, and even active mud volcanoes in the region. The Goturdag Volcano which you can find in the Gobustan National Park is only one of a kind. It has been issuing mud for over 100 years and is still very active. Lots of people use the mud from the volcanoes for their healing properties. Many foreigners and local people alike bath and make masks out of this mud. Gobustan’s weather is salt-crusted and windy. Although you can see slow drizzles of wet mud from time to time, it can dry up quickly, cracking and changing colour instantly. read more…

Untouched, Unravelled… Gobustan mountains

The Jinghirdag Moutain-Yazylytepe hill and the Kichikdash Mountain is one of the most remote and undisturbed landscapes in the world. Aside from these two regions, you can also find mountains like Chirgirdag, Songardag, Boyukdash, and Shinagawa. You can’t fully embrace history without seeing them. The mountains are home for the ancient rock art and reflect over 15,000 years of history. You can find drawings of primitive men in all positions, bullfights, camel caravans, and so on. Images of animals on these rocks vary depending on the hunting targets during that period. One famous spot is the Latin Inscription belonging to the period of Roman Emperor Domitian’s reign in 81 -96 AD. It shows that the 12th Roman Legion led by Fuminate must have settled temporarily on the Caspian shores.

Listen to Gobustan’s musical tones

Care to visit one of the oldest native musical instruments? Then you must see the Gaval Dash. The Gaval Dash produces a tambourine like sound when you hit it in different points with a small stone. It is a big flat stone formed out of three supports. You can find it among the stone books. The Gaval Dash was created from a combination of oil, gas, and Azerbaijan’s unique climate. Most experts assume that the people in the region used this stone to play ritual melodies in ancient times. You will see illustrations of these activities in some petroglyphs at Gobustan. The people of Gobustan perform some of these melodies in Azerbaijan to date. Many other rocks in the region can also produce musical notes, so a lot of Azeri musicians use these rocks to create pieces of music.

Dive into the local culture

At first glance via aerial view, it looks like a dead zone. But over 14,000 people live in Gobustan. There are over 34 villages around here. The people of this region embrace agriculture and produce grain as the primary product. Other major farm produce here include tomato, cabbage, potato, sunflower, pea, melon, grape, and sunflower. Here you will also find the world’s oldest oil barons, strolling families, cyclists, joggers and many more. The people of Gobustan are friendly, receptive, and excited to share their history with the world.

Explore Gobustan’s diverse Fauna and Flora

Azerbaijan is a tiny country, but you can find 9 out of 11 climate zones here. Gobustan has mild winters and hot summers. Because of the climate, Gobustan has over 470 plant species and over diverse fauna. Gobustan has attributes of a desert and semi-desert. Aside from the heaps of stone, you can also find the wild rose, dwarfish cherry, Hibernian honeysuckle, wild pear, wild fig, grapes. You can also find other kinds of bushes and trees; you can commonly find in stern landscapes like this. Gobustan is home to over 110 wild birds species, 28 mammal species and 20 reptile species in the region. Gobustan is also home to rare jackals, foxes, hares, feral cats, mountain chickens, larks, wild pigeons, lizards, and a variety of snakes.

Check our Gobustan Tour and witness the history of humanity from the edge of the earth.