Nakhchivan travel tips thread

[Adrian]

I recently spent a day and a half in Nakhchivan. There is limited information online about visiting this autonomous republic of Azerbaijan so I thought I’d share a few pieces of information for anyone planning to visit.

Border Crossing & Changing Money
I crossed from Iran at Julfa with an e-visa for Azarbaijan (I had hitch-hiked from Kaleybar along the Aras Valley to get to Julfa, alternate approach would be direct from Tabriz). You do not need any separate visa or paperwork to visit Nakhchivan- a single-entry Azerbaijan Visa will suffice for both Nakhchivan and the rest of Azerbaijan. Hoards of Azeris cross the border to stock up on cheaper Iranian goods in the free trade zone and there is a strip of shops running along a pedestrianised street to the border. I changed rials to manat at an exchange shop on the right hand side about 3 shops before you enter the border area. The rate was the same as that published on xe.com

Exiting Iran brought a few questions from the Iranian border authorities, probably more then when I entered. You then walk across the bridge spanning the Aras River to the Azeri border crossing. The border authorities gave me a very warm welcome and seemed delighted to have a solo traveller turn up. The manager of the border post escorted me through the entire process keen to practice his (already good) English and took me all the way to the taxi area!

Getting to Nakhchivan
The manager of the border crossing told me minibuses do run to the border until 2 or 3pm, after which they stop. I crossed at around 5pm. Share taxi (4 people) into Nakhchivan is 3 manat per person. The border is quite busy in the late afternoon with returning Azeri shoppers so not a problem for me to split the ride with others. It’s only about 20 minutes into the city

Hotel
I had planned to stay at Togrul Hotel but it was being refurbished. Locals waved me away from Hotel Ukranya (not sure if still operating or not) and I eventually settled on the Grand Hotel Nakhchivan. 30 manat per night without breakfast (I opted for this); 40 manat per night with. Very, very big, clean rooms. Can recommend this place. My share taxi from the border dropped me at the hotel

Nakhchivan
The sites in Nakhchivan City are all walking distance and can be ticked off in a leisurely half / three-quarter day. Entrance to all the sites and museums is free and at at least three places the staff on duty gave me a brief guided tour/overview (twice in English, once in French). For eating, there is a restaurant to the right of the Tabriz Hotel that does decent, cheap food and is full of locals at lunchtime. There is a medium sized supermarket on the Main Street near the Heydar Aliyev Museum.

Around Nakhchivan
Whilst taxi drivers may tell you differently, it’s perfectly possible to take the local buses to visit towns in the province. I did this to visit the Alinja Castle and saw a bus going to the Duzdag Salt spa/hotel, although I took a taxi to the later for 10 manat return with waiting time (student taxi driver wanted to practice his English and gave me slightly cheaper fare than I expected). Buses go to other destinations as well, such as Qarabaglar. For my bus to Alinja Castle, locals were paying 1 manat to the driver on leaving, however the driver refused to accept money from me and dropped me right at the entrance (a 2km addition to his normal route). Fair to say, not many tourists take the local buses! The bus station in Nakhchivan is walking distance on the north side of town - head for the giant Azerbaijan flag that dominates that part of town - it’s across the street. If you do take local buses, maybe check return times as buses fade out in late afternoon. I hitchhiked back from Alinja Castle (was planning to) but I know that’s not what everyone likes to do

Exiting Nakhchivan
Onwards to the rest of Azerbaijan is either the long bus route via Iran or a short flight to Baku. I took the flight with the local airline. No complaints whatsoever - all very smooth. On arrival, an Airport Express bus does the run from Baku Airport to Baku train station from where you can connect into the metro

[steven]

Thanks, Adrian! Nakchivan is still on my list.

[brynpickering]

Just visited Nakhchivan in early September for 4 days and thought I'd add/update on Adrian's post, especially since tourist information is still woefully lacking for the region. Sorry for the wall of text, but hopefully it will be of use to someone.

TL;DR: definitely worth visiting, stay at Vügar's place in Nakhchivan city (PM me for his number), and everything can be seen without much stress by minibus and/or hitchhiking.

First off: I would highly recommend a visit! There is quite a relaxed atmosphere, everyone is incredibly welcoming and helpful, there are several (free) museums, and Nakhchivan city can be used as a base for several day trips to interesting locations.


Getting to/from Nakhchivan
We didn't want to, but we ended up flying there. The prices from Baku have been fixed at 35 manat each way for several years now. Flights leave from terminal 2 (the first terminal the bus from the centre of Baku stops at) and because it's basically the only destination, the process is quick. At Nakhchivan airport, you might wait a while for your luggage since everyone brings A LOT of things with them (and even more for their return journey).

We had hoped to take a bus into the city, and there is a bus stop clearly signposted beyond the car park. However, we were told that one wouldn't come and so we went by shared taxi for 2 manat each. Usually this is a taxi driver ploy to get us to go with them, but this time they may have been truthful. On returning to the airport at the end of our stay, we took the bus and it left us a 5-10 minute walk from the airport, on the main road junction leading to the airport. I wouldn't advise taking this bus to be honest, it takes ~45 minutes to/from the city centre becausfe of the route it takes (~15 minutes by taxi), supposedly only comes once an hour, and doesn't actually stop directly at the airport. If you do opt for it, I can tell you that we took the number 6 bus from outside Sizin market at 12:30 and arrived at the airport (including walking time) around 13:20.


Hotel/guesthouse
We couldn't afford a hotel, especially as it has the added cost of needing to always eat out. There was one non-hotel option on Booking.com and one on Airbnb in September 2022. Sadly, neither of them worked out as they both cancelled our bookings for some "technical" reasons (ok, one said their place had burnt down...). Thankfully, one of them helped us find someone else. This was the biggest stroke of luck ever and I would highly recommend you stay at Vügar's if you go.

For 30 manat a night, he has a self-contained apartment available that could fit 3 people (one double + one single bed in the same room). It has a living and dining area, WiFi (albeit often not working), kitchen, and bathroom. It is a 10 minute walk to the central bus station in one direction and to the 24/7 supermarket and city centre in the other. Vügar is also very sweet. He invited us for non-stop tea every evening as well as to join us in celebrating his son's birthday one night. His English is non-existent (though he can speak Russian) and he can only manage voice notes on WhatsApp which are impossible to translate. However, his sons and his niece can manage google translate well enough to help.

Nakhchivan city
Agreed with Adrian, it is all walkable in the city. I'd say you want a full day and perhaps more, though. There are loads of museums (maybe as many as 10? They're not all on Google maps). The topics are often a bit random (e.g., the state flag museum), but they're nice to walk around and some do have English speaking staff who will guide you around. There's also the castle, which has a perfectly located cafe where you could sit facing out over the ramparts towards the Iranian border (not open on a Sunday morning when we went, sadly). The medium sized supermarket mentioned by Adrian, Sizin Market, is open 24/7 and had everything we needed to prepare all our meals. There are also a few other slightly smaller supermarkets dotted around the city, including Lemon supermarket next to the central bus station.

Around Nakhchivan
We didn't take a taxi to visit any sites in Nakhchivan. They can all be visited by minibus or by hitchhiking. However, getting correct bus times from anyone is dificult. We tried very hard (albeit with our lack of Russian/Azerbaijani) to find out bus times from drivers at the bus station. They happily gave us times for departures to various locations, which we found out over the following days were largely incorrect. It seems the drivers can only be trusted for their specific route AND time (other drivers might do the same route at different times). If you turn up between 8 and 9, you'll probably find the bus you need or at least reasonably reliable information about when the next one will leave that day.
Hitchhiking is incredibly easy, because all destinations are on/near the main roads leaving Nakhchivan. Just get yourself part way down any of these roads and start waving down cars and you'll get yourself to where you need to be with only a change or two at junctions. The term ("hitchhiking"/"avtostop") might not mean much to locals, but they are more than happy to stop and help. We never waited longer than about 10 minutes for a ride and never felt unsafe. Below is a breakdown of the places we visited and how we got there/back.

Alinja castle
Highly recommended. Take binoculars to see the Eurasian Griffons that fly around up there. We visited Alinja castle by minibus (get on one heading to Alinja village, where they will detour the 2km to the castle if you tell them you're going there, or get on the one bound for Qazançı or Milax, which goes right past the entrance). The museum staff at Alinja castle knew the times for returning by minibus (2pm, in our case).

Ashab-i Kehf (Əshabi-Kehf)
We read there are buses that go here, but this was news to the staff on site, so maybe they no longer run. Take any minibus heading south from Nakhchivan (e.g. Ordubad or Alinja, but there are many others) and ask to get off at the turning to Ashab-i Kehf. We actually got off at this junction on the way back from Alinja castle. All cars on this side road are going to this one destination and we were picked up within minutes of hitchhiking on a weekday afternoon. The return took a bit longer, but the staff said they would ask around for us and you can sit in the shade drinking tea right by the car park (nicer than it sounds) and keep an eye for someone leaving with space. We were offered a ride after about 15-20 minutes.

Qarabağlar
There is a very nice mausoleum here with attached museum in a former mosque. They forgot to unlock the outside gate on the day we were there, but you can easily hop the 30cm high fence next to it. The museum staff unlocked the mausoleum for us to look into (underwhelming) and led us up a stairwell to the old minaret for a 360 degree view of the surroundings (recommended). The direct minibus leaves late in the day (12:30 or 13:30) and supposedly returns shortly after, meaning a visit would need to be quick. We hitchhiked there instead. You can start from the road on the opposite side of the roundabout from the Nakhchivan bus station.

Duzdağ salt mines
If you don't plan to stay in the salt mine hotel, you can walk up the 200m salty tunnel and back quite quickly (we stayed max 20 minutes). Maybe there's more to the place than we saw, happy to be corrected! Anyway, a short stay works out well as there is a city bus that leaves Nakhchivan to go there about 8 times a day, sticking around for about 20-30 minutes at the mine before coming back. We got on the 8:30 outbound and returned on the same bus at 9:30. This bus doesn't leave from the bus station, I don't know where it leaves from, but you can catch it on the road leading out of the city (same one as for hitchhiking to Qarabağlar)

Ordubad
Some museums were closed and the large Friday mosque was under reconstruction when we were there, but Ordubad still makes for a nice enough hour or two. Saying that, if you're going to skip anywhere, this should probably be it. There are several minibuses a day going here, most going on the hour. The bus station in Ordubad has a list of return times that you can use once there.

Lake Batabat
It's worth getting out here for the scenery. Go on a weekend to increase chances of getting a ride there. Sundays are supposedly THE picnic day for locals. You can get part way there, to Shahbuz, by relatively regular minibus starting as early as 8am. Then you're on the main road leading to Batabat and can hitchhike from there, which is what we did. We were told that we could take a taxi from here, too, which would likely be cheaper than from Nakhchivan. If you're happy to leave later in the day, there is a ~13:00 minibus that goes further up the valley to Bichanak. Still, you would need to then walk/hitch/taxi the last 11km to reach the lakes. To hitch back, go to/near the spring on the north eastern edge of the uppermost lake (visible on openstreetmap) as that is where everyone was flocking on the Saturday we were there. The spring water is supposedly curative and everyone was filling large bottles with it.

[Schraverus124]

Did anyone end up getting vügar's number, I'm looking to stay there but it seems brynpickering has become inactive or is atleast not seeing dm's as of right now. Would love to stay at his