What to Expect on a Gobustan Tour from Baku
Why Gobustan is worth the trip, what you will see and how a private day combines rock art with Azerbaijan’s mud volcano landscape.
Gobustan is about 60 km south-west of Baku, roughly an hour by car along the Caspian coast. It combines two very different sights in one easy half-day: some of the oldest art in the region and a field of bubbling mud volcanoes.
The rock art
The Gobustan Rock Art Cultural Landscape was added to the UNESCO World Heritage List in 2007. Thousands of petroglyphs are carved into the boulders here: hunters, boats with oarsmen, dancing figures and animals. Start in the small museum, which explains what you are looking at, then follow the trail between the rocks. Allow about an hour and a half.
The mud volcanoes
A short drive away is one of Azerbaijan’s mud volcano fields. Azerbaijan has hundreds of them, a large share of all mud volcanoes in the world. Small cones gurgle and push up cold grey mud; it looks like another planet and makes for unusual photos.
Good to know
- Wear closed shoes. The mud area can be dusty in summer and sticky after rain.
- Entry is paid on site: about 15 AZN for the museum and reserve and about 5 AZN for the mud volcano area.
- Mornings are cooler and quieter, especially from May to September.
- On the way back you can stop at the Bibi-Heybat Mosque on the coast road.
See our Gobustan & Mud Volcanoes tour for times and prices per group.
