The Road to Qebela

The original plan was to drive up to Quba last month but my severe little case of Baku Belly put the kibosh on that idea. We decided to go once I had recovered but then Ali found out that a good stretch of the Quba road is down to one lane so he came up with an alternative. We'd go to Qebela which is on the west side of mountains, where Quba is on the east. He assured us it was a very beautiful place, lots of green, lots of fresh air and lots of sunshine.....he didn't mention the lots of mother's brother's children part till we got there. Nope, nothing about the cousins.

We got up early and left at 7:30 AM. I don't think I've seen Baku from the early bird's perspective before and there were definitely fewer cars on the streets which might be worth getting up for if there actually was someplace to go before 10:00 o'clock. This is not a divided highway. This is a pretty typical arrangement of the vehicles on the road out of Baku, except closer to the city there are a lot more cars.....some of which want to drive on your side of the road....facing you.



Love the open back trucks full of bricks. Makes those uphill climbs through the mountains WAY more interesting! We only had about 5 close calls.....each way. About one per hour of road time, not too bad. The terrain around Baku allows for a lot of visibility....couple that with a 3.8 liter engine Pajero (gas is still very cheap in Azerbaijan) and you've got the makings of a nice fairly safe ride. Once you get used to it.

Carolyn didn't get used to the skinning of sheep on the side of the road, though I was doing okay with that aspect of our trip by the second or third one. This is a little less graphic than most......but you get the idea.



I think I saw more sheep on the hoof and on the hook than I have ever seen in my life. My main goal that day, however, was to avoid getting any on my lunch plate.....no matter how good someone swore the kebabs tasted.

The distance from Baku to Qebela is 200 kilometers. A trip like that should take about two and a half hours, but since the road is a teeny tiny thing full of humps, bumps and switchbacks......


.......not to mention various and sundry forms of domestic wildlife, it took us five hours.


We made a few pit stops along the way, the first one for breakfast at this place that looked like a picnic park but was really a restaurant.


You just park by your table, a few guys come over, talk to you in a foreign language but get the idea that since this is a restaurant, you want something to eat. They bring you a nice table cloth, some cutlery and dishes, and a pot of tea with lemon. Pretty soon some fried eggs show up in a cast iron pan, as do warm loves of bread.....you've got breakfast. They keep the warm bread coming which is one of the very best things about Azerbaijan.....warm, stone-baked-over-a-wood-fire, bread. When you get up to go they come and tell you how much, you pass them a few bills, and you're done. It was actually quite lovely and the smell of the meat cooking on their big barbecues was amazing...though I knew damn well it was a sheep who had gotten up that morning thinking about nothing more than a little grazing time on the hillside...but such is life in the mutton belt. Ali judges the quality of a restaurant by how many sheep they slaughter, on premises, in the morning. I guess the more sheep, the more popular the place. Simple math.

Somewhere along the way, I'm not sure how far up the road we were but it couldn't have been more than an hour out of Baku, Ali pulled the car over to the side of the road and jumped out. He said he'd explain when he got back. We were sitting next to a green building with a garden and there were other cars parked along the road with us. In the garden there were families taking photos and people seemed to be quite dressed up. Carolyn and I looked at each other in total bewilderment...."Why are we stopping?" We looked at John, from whom we expect an answer....he shrugged. When Ali returned he didn't exactly fess up the reason for the sudden stop until I pressed him for an answer. Apparently, this was the house of a relative of Mohamed and he stopped there to pray. I guess those wrong side of the road drivers are even more scary from the front seat.

I took these photos along the way. It was hard to believe the transition from arid steppe - practically desert - into beautiful lush, green mountain sides. Things were growing! Lots of things. See the little tiny sheep way over yonder?



This is a winery but I think a little vodka first, before the passing of the corkscrew, might improve the vintage. Of course, alcohol would kill anything.....and I'll call this a vintage winery. Go look for it at Kroger's.


Can't fault the scenery, though.





Sometimes it's hard to imagine that there are still large areas of this world mostly undiscovered. The tourist traffic is very light over here, though I think there is a move on to change all that. Resorts are being built. I'm glad I've been able to see these places as the really are......in a real people living their lives kind of way. The other day Carolyn said it was a privilege to see these things before the commercialism hits and it changes forever. Well......I'm going to confess to wishing there were enough tourists and sufficient commercial demand to create a need for toilets with bowls and seats. Those would be nice despite the fact that I now know exactly what the liquid capacity, and the relative strength of my bladder is.

Knowing that I wasn't going to find a regular, or as Ali says "normal," toilet anywhere outside of Baku, I kept a close eye on the fluid intake once I'd left the comforts of home. Not having a Tim's or a Starbucks along the way helps but having tea with relatives doesn't. This is the sign that announces you've made it to the Qebela Region.


There is a sign for juice a few hundred meters beyond it. That pomegranate juice pictured on the right? I highly recommend it, next time you're in the neighborhood.


There was no sign of the relatives until we stopped at a construction site along the highway. Since there is no word for cousin.....we met Ali's mother's brother's son. He owns a restaurant. (I wish I had a picture.) In the spirit of Azeri hospitality, he wanted us to come to his restaurant but since we had only eaten an hour and a half before, and we could sense that we would soon make it to the town of Qebela we begged off. Well, we actually made our apologies to Ali, who we assumed made our apologies to his mother's brother's son. After the exchange of few pleasantries and handshakes we were all off in our respective vehicles. In a few minutes, it became apparent that we were following Ali's mother's brother's son's red Lada. I quietly tapped John on the shoulder, flicked him a quizzical eyebrow, at the same time responding to Carolyn's quizzical eyebrow with a shrug.

I think you have to get used to the not knowing. Turned out that plans had been made for us to detour to Ali's mother's brother's son's village which was just a short way from Qebela. There would be a very nice river there and good places to take pictures. Sounded good. Before we left the main road, however, the red Lada pulled over and we pulled in behind it. More quizzical eyebrows are passed around the backseat while Ali got out and conversed with the son of his mother's brother. The plans had changed and we were getting a rain check, the MBS couldn't make it after all, he had something to do......but son of mother's brother's son (who was driving the red Lada) would lead us to the village. We followed him down a tiny dirt road spotted with chickens, littered with goats, and owned by a herd of cows. I'm thinking this is going to be a very cool village.

I was a little perplexed when the red Lada pulled up to a large pair of solid steel gates and we pulled up behind him. There was a bend in the road just beyond the driveway with the solid steel gates and the son of the son pointed, out the window of his car, in that general direction. I assumed that meant the village was that-a way....and he was done with us and going home for his lunch. But no, we drove inside the gates and Ali explained that this was the village of his relatives. There were a few houses surrounded by walls and connected with gates between them. Carolyn gave me the "what are we doing here?" look, John was totally enjoying himself and I flipped through the latest edition of "Go with the Flow for Dummies". I noticed there was a turkey tied by his leg to a tree. There was a barn with a real live hayloft....


and something I had read about and heard about in fairy tales, but never seen in real life.....a haystack.


And then I saw the outhouse....


"Go with the Flow for Dummies" had no reference on what to do when faced with a hole in the ground outdoor facility. I had to revert to Plan A which was curtail all fluids. This, at the same time a table was being moved out of the house to a nice shady spot under the trees. I knew in my bladder of bladders.....er.....heart of hearts that this meant tea. It would be a great insult to refuse, an embarrassment to Ali ,and a dishonor to his family. We had tea....and fruit....and cakes....and cheeses.....and cookies.....and jam.....and juices....and Coke & Sprite. Yep, Coke & Sprite. All set under a big old tree in the yard with the turkey kept at bay by the rope on his leg. The table was set with a white lace cloth and the cups were made of fine porcelain.

Other relatives came out of their houses to meet us. A small group of grandsons peeked at us from a distance but scampered off giggling when we spoke to them. We met several women who magically appeared out of nowhere. (I think a cell phone alert had gone out.) None of them came out to join us for tea but I think the presence of so many hands was the reason it was set up in minutes. I don't THINK they were expecting us....but maybe they were.

Ali, John, Carolyn and I sat down to the table and our afternoon feast. We weren't there long when Ali's mother's brother's son showed up after all. He was the only member of the family to sit with us for tea. I think he is the head of the household village. I managed to sip on a cup of tea, eat a few cakes for absorption purposes, and after a little bit of group picture taking we were on our way. Following the red Lada.....to the river. This is the river.....

The rivers in the mountains in Azerbaijan only fill with water when the spring run off fills them. During other months they are rocky bedded streams. It took us another half an hour of driving to get to the river.....that was supposed to be just around the bend. On the way we passed shepherds dressed in the traditional shepherd's costume......the suit.


And since a whole half hour had passed since we had anything to eat or drink, it was decided that we needed to have something more. The river destination was the restaurant of mother's brother's son but I knew I couldn't even have so much as another spot of tea, and I was wondering why we had up and changed venues......except for the fact that the view was downright amazing. But tea is liquid, and should not be consumed in mass quantities on road trips.....especially within earshot of a waterfall. That much was in "Go with the Flow for Dummies." It was in the Chapter "When You Really Have No Way to Deal with the Flow." I got out of there without having anymore tea. But it sure is hard to just say, "No."

When we finally get back on the main road, and I think we are just about to finally get to Qebela, I find out that we had passed through Qebela before we stopped at the "village." I remembered a market, and some mini-marts but I didn't exactly see anything historic....but so be it. I was pushing the limit and still had five hours drive to go. We turned around and headed back to Baku, making only one major stop on the way.

I wanted to buy fruit and in doing so met three of the most charming women ever.


I've never had as much fun buying produce as I had that day. They sell fruits and nuts and homemade preserves, and their fingers and hands are stained black from the dye in the nutshells they have been handling all of their lives. The woman on the left offered me berries from the bag and, not knowing what they were or why her hands were as black as coal, I didn't want to take any. She kept trying and Ali kept trying to encourage me saying, "gift." And then it hit her.....I wouldn't take the berries because I thought her hands were dirty. She wiped them on her skirt and her sweater to demonstrate that they were clean, and Ali explained to me about the dye from the nuts. Ya learn something new everyday they say. That day I learned that my smiley little poker face isn't as good as I thought it was.

We bought some nuts and tomatoes and apricots. I took lots of pictures. Carolyn being younger and braver tried all of the samples offered.


I have no idea what half of this stuff is.


Sometime in the early evening we made it back home safe and sound. I did a fair bit of complaining about the suspension in the Pajero both up and back. I think every bone in my body was rearranged and during the 12 hours we were gone. But "Go with the Flow" says to take that experience and translate it into a lucrative bull riding career. There are things out there with a less comfortable ride I'm sure.


And they come with a driver, too.


Love the suit.