Baku to Ganja & the panic of a lost passport!

A minor drama before finally catching the bus from Baku to Ganja! Second cities can be more down to earth than the capital, and this chilled city in the west of Azerbaijan was no exception.

Dragging ourselves away from Baku

After an excellent 14 nights in total in Baku, we knew it was time to see more of this incredible country. It turned out that friends from our 2010-2011 Trans Africa trip were actually living in Baku, and they invited us around on our last night for a delicious BBQ and to catch up over a drink or two.

The importance of knowing where you’ve put your passport!

The next morning they offered to drop us at the bus station for our bus to Ganja, but whilst packing I realised I no longer had my passport!

That’s always a frightening realisation in a foreign country, especially as I knew there wasn’t a New Zealand embassy in Baku.

My mind was racing as to where and when I could have lost it. Was it when I shifted things into my backpack in the metro station? Had I left it on a bus? Had I been pick-pocketed, and if so – how on earth did they manage to struggle through 5 layers of “maybe I’ll need it” items in my bag to find it? I was baffled as to where the damn thing could be!

After unpacking and repacking everything, we decided to go back to our excellent hostel and start the search from there. Much to my great relief we discovered that my passport had fallen between the mattress and the bed frame!

Introducing our new Final Check protocol!

This has prompted us to finally implement a final check when we leave anywhere.

When we’re ready to walk out the door, we ask the other one if they have their

passport
money belt
mobile phone

As long as we have those 3 things, we’re good to go!

We discussed heading to the bus station but were both feeling the effects of our late night and socialising, so took this as a sign to stay one last night in Baku and spent the day in bed watching Netflix 😉

Baku to Ganja

The next morning we took the metro from Ícəri Şəhər to Avtovağzal, changing at 28 May then at Me’mar Əcəmi.

Baku Metro tickets are only 0.30 AZN, and we used the remaining balance on our BakíKARTs.

Where is the Baku bus station?

The Avtovağzal is clearly marked on Maps.Me and Google Maps.

What isn’t made clear is the fact that this bus station is located on the 3rd floor of a shopping centre!

A local took pity on us and took us up to the top floor, past numerous clothes stalls all selling the same thing.

There are signs everywhere stating no photos or videos – a stark reminder of the fact that if an invasion ever occurred, the bus station and metro would be important targets.

Get there early to get a good seat

We bought the tickets from the Ganja ticket window. It was 8.40 AZN each for the 10:30am bus and seats are allocated.

Unfortunately we were among the last people to buy tickets so were stuck near the back with a strange raised platform under our feet.

I tried to change seats but the conductor said the others had all been booked.

At least it was only 4 hours from Baku to Ganja. We listened to podcasts, ate popcorn (0.50 AZN per bag) and enjoyed looking out the window.

Only 1 stop for refreshments

We had the obligatory refreshment stop halfway through the journey. This was also the only opportunity to use the toilet, which was free and clean.

We bought a bottle of soft drink and stood in the shade with the locals to drink it.

Arriving in Ganja

We drove past the Avtovağzal, and everyone disembarked at the roundabout 1 km east. This made it easy to jump on one of the many marshrutka heading to the city centre. Google Maps is excellent for helping work out local public transport. We had a list of buses we could take to Ganja Mall and knew it was only 20 qəpik per ride.

We hadn’t booked accommodation as we weren’t too sure how long we’d be staying in Ganja, but ended up at the excellent Ganja Hostel. It is conveniently located close to Ganja Mall and the main square, and the owner speaks some English. We stayed in a double room.

Would we recommend visiting Ganja?

I would recommend visiting Ganja if you have the time and want to see another part of Azerbaijan. The main square is impressive, as is the Philharmonia and the Heydar Aliev memorial near the amusement park. The journey from Baku to Ganja is easy, once you locate the bus station upstairs, and it’s always great to see other less-touristy parts of a country!

We also visited the Orthodox church, where we met a group of musicians from Baku who were performing that night at the EU-sponsored 2019 Music Festival, Imagine. Claudio Franco, Diana Hajiyeva, Ali Nasib and the rest of the band were so friendly. It’s the first time we’d ever met a Eurovision contestant, and they were the loveliest people! We saw them after the show and they invited us to go out for post-show drinks with them. It was also the first time I’d ever heard bossa nova performed live and Brasilidade were excellent!

This was a reminder to us that amazing things can happen when you least expect them, and that it’s important to allow a degree of flexibility in our travels and see where things take us sometimes!