Gobustan is a rocky, windswept plateau about sixty kilometres south of Baku, where outcrops of limestone and sandstone rise out of a plain of dry grass, and the Caspian Sea glints on the horizon. Boyukdash, the Big Rock, is one of the boulders that make up this open-air gallery, and its sides are covered with carvings called petroglyphs made by people who lived and hunted here over thousands of years, some of them tens of thousands. UNESCO listed the area in 2007.
The images are vivid and direct: bulls, deer, horses and goats, hunters with bows, dancing figures and lines of boats with rowers. The sea level of the Caspian has changed many times, so the shore that these people knew is now far away. The Norwegian explorer Thor Heyerdahl visited in the 1960s and found that the boat carvings resembled the reed ships he knew, and he used that to support a theory of ancient links between the Caspian and Scandinavia, a theory that scholars have not widely accepted. Near the main site is Gaval Dash, a stone that rings like a drum when struck.
The landscape has another peculiarity. Nearby are mud volcanoes, small cones that bubble with grey mud and gas, among the most active in the world, and the road passes areas of strange, moonlike terrain. The ride from Baku follows a fast, modern highway south along the coast, with oil pumps nodding in the fields, and then turns inland. Wind is a constant, strong enough to push a bike, and summers are very hot with dust. Spring and autumn are better, when the plateau is green or golden.
Qobustan town, a few kilometres away, has fuel and simple cafes, and Baku offers every service you might want. Carry water, sun protection and a camera. A modern museum at the entrance shows the history, and guides explain the carvings in English. Try a cup of black tea with sweet pastries, such as pakhlava, after the walk, and allow a couple of hours for the site.