Lənkəran and Astara

(really hard to insert a schwa!)

Lankaran train station

Lənkəran and Astara, the southernmost cities of Azerbaijan, are both larger than I had expected, especially Astara, half of which is, we learned, on the other side of the river that forms the border between Az and Iran. Both cities have more of a town feel, few buildings over 4 stories, fairly wide streets with wide sidewalks (compared to Baku anyway) and lined with narrow but deep open ditches—watch it!  Broad plaza parks, obligatory statues.  Mostly all male tea houses (tea, cigarettes, backgammon) as elsewhere in Az, but we happen to pass by the back of different sort of tea place, selling pastries, with women as well as men at tables. From the street, as we pass by the kitchen in the back some women wave and smile--nice!  Having spent the night on the train and longingly passed a number of all-male tea places (T was going to have us crash one of them but I was reluctant), we were especially happy to find this place and get some tea.  Tea and pastries set us back 1.40 manat (~$2), where "tea" alone in Baku, served with lemon and jam whether you want it or not, can be 7 manat (~$10).

We discover, more than a year and a half into our stay here, that if you don't want a Lipton tea bag you have to ask for samovar chai. Simply "chai" gets you Lipton's.

Wandering Astara, on a wide street lined with shops selling mostly blankets and packaged goods, I vaguely wondered if this was the bulk purchase/wholesale part of the market.  We see a small crowd of people at the end of the street. We are curious and walk past a modest barricade that prevents cars from entering. A man says "Drasvitye," Russian for hello, to which we don't respond, and then "Good Morning", which we answer in kind.  We stay at the edge of the crowd, which contains both men and women, some in heels, trying to see what they are looking at.  All we can see is a long metal cage, maybe 30 feet long and 10 feet high, empty. Are we waiting for a livestock auction?  We move away, back through the market, and come to realize that this was an entrance to Az from Iran. There were no signs. Why a cage-like structure, metal on all sides? 

Down another street an artist painting sweet Novruz (Spring celebration) designs on a store front. He is happy to pose painting for me.

Back in Lankaran, the next day we pick a village to bus to and, hopefully, do a little hiking from. Score!  T had selected Haftoni, which turned out to be an excellent choice.  We waited close to an hour for a minibus with empty seats, traveled half an hour to the village terminus, then walked through a village and up onto the nearby hills to a lovely view of snow topped mountains on  the left and the Caspian Sea to the right.

At the bus station we noted the same ancient (50s?), orange Soviet buses we had seen in enemy territory. There they sport numerous tanks of LPG on their roofs.  Here in oil land, no.

Here is T on the shore of the Caspian, Elliot Azerbaijan book in hand, later that day.

We stopped in a shop and bought some great looking Iranian halvah (on the left).   The sesame seeds are not crushed as in other halvah.  The pastry on the right is also called halvah but bears no resemblance to the more widely known type and is from Sheki, Azerbaijan. Sticky and yum.