Baku Salvation

So we are hanging around in Baku. Our chums at Warr's Harley Davidson in Mottingham have sent a new clutch via UPS to Baku. Our issue is whether it arrives in time so that we can get it fitted, buy tickets to cross the Caspian Sea, allow some contingency  and get in and out of Turkmenistan by the time our Turkmenistan visa expires on the 25th March. 

In the meantime we are visiting Baku and here is our visitor's guide to Baku.

 

1. Baku has London taxis.

 2. It also has a metro built in Soviet times. It has very deep tunnels and you are not allowed to wear high heels on it. There are not many stop, but it is worth taking even for one stop. Ticket price is @ 10p. Beware Metro maps, there might only be two lines, but the map is often printed the wrong way down and sometimes upside down. 

3. You need to do this because there are no tourist maps in Baku. People don't walk because there are more potholes in the pavements than in the roads.  The kerbs are very high as there is no drainage; it also stops people from parking cars on the kerb.

4. Only people in big black cars go fast, as there are an awful lot of Police about.

 We visited the Old Town a number of times for afternoon tea. The Carpet museum is excellent, the Contemporary Art Museum is wacky, over-crowded with stuff, but lacking a cafe whilst the Heydar Aliyev Centre, a Zaha Building is simply magnificent - shame that they put a pretty grim and grey conference centre next to it. 

The Azeri's are lovely people and incredibly polite and intrigued to see us here - despite Baku currently holding the 4th Islamic Solidarity Games there are not many people here. But we have been leafletted about those blighters from Armenia. The weather is very pleasant with nearly always a cooling wind. We imagine it could get very hot in the summer.

The F1 season is about to descend on Baku; it is a street race with concrete road blocks everywhere, making crossing the road even more difficult. It will be something to watch on TV.