Martyrs' Lane and Highland Park

You ride up on the Maritime Boulevard funicular —a carriage that costs 1 manat and takes barely two minutes— and when you step out at the top the first thing that changes is the noise: the city stays below, muffled. To the left, the rows of dark granite headstones of Martyrs' Lane begin, nearly all bearing the same engraved date: 20 yanvar, 20 January 1990. Many carry the oval photograph of the deceased, and looking at them you notice how young they were. The silence weighs, broken at intervals by the wind rising off the Caspian Sea.

The central walkway leads to the Eternal Flame, an octagonal monument with golden columns and a glass dome. The flame is large — you genuinely feel the heat a couple of metres away. From that terrace, Baku unfolds in its entirety: the bay, the Maritime Boulevard, the walled Old City, and turning your head, the Flame Towers so close they seem touchable. At sunset the light over the Caspian turns copper and the towers begin to glow with their LED panels.

This is not a park for carefree selfies. Bakuvians treat it with visible respect: young couples leave flowers, veterans sit in silence on the benches. It is worth coming with that mindset, but also staying afterwards to stroll through the gardens of Highland Park, which has shaded benches, a café serving Azerbaijani çay and a long staircase for descending on foot if you prefer to the funicular. Entry to the memorial and park is free around the clock.

This hilltop ground was first a Muslim cemetery after the ethnic clashes of March 1918 in Baku. The Bolsheviks razed the graves, installed a statue of Kirov and turned the site into a Soviet amusement park. In January 1990, when the USSR army entered Baku crushing the Azerbaijani independence movement —known as Qara Yanvar, Black January— more than one hundred and thirty civilians died in a single night. The Soviet park was dismantled and the hill became what it had once been: a place of burial. Later, the graves of those killed in the Nagorno-Karabakh war were added. Today some fifteen thousand people are buried in Martyrs' Lane.

• Eternal Flame Monument At the end of the central avenue, atop an eight-pointed star. The flame is powerful; at night it illuminates the entire esplanade and the flickers reflect off the golden dome. It is the visual landmark of Martyrs' Lane.
• Black January graves The first rows on entering from the funicular. The shared grave of Fariza and Ilham Allahverdiyev —the couple who died on the same night of Qara Yanvar— has become a symbol of fidelity for young people in Baku.
• Turkish Martyrs' Memorial A hexagonal block of red granite with white marble crescents, dedicated to the Ottoman soldiers killed in the Battle of Baku in 1918. Beside it stands the Martyrs' Mosque, closed to worship since 2009.
• Highland Park viewpoint Turning left at the end of the lane leads to the panoramic terrace with views over the Maritime Boulevard, the Old City and the Caspian bay.
• British Memorial A discreet wall commemorating British soldiers killed in the 1918 conflict, easy to miss if you are not specifically looking for it.

Photo gallery

The lower station of the funicular is next to the Carpet Museum on the Maritime Boulevard. The ride costs 1 manat and takes about two minutes. You can also climb on foot from Içərişəhər metro station via a long, steep staircase — hard going in summer. Buses 18 and 39 stop near the upper entrance, by the Parliament building. Access to the memorial and park is free around the clock.

Spring (April–June) and autumn (September–October) offer the best conditions: between 18 and 26 degrees and good visibility over the Caspian bay. In July and August the heat exceeds 35 degrees and the hill has little shade; it is better to come early in the morning or at sunset. Winter is mild —temperatures rarely drop below zero in Baku— but the Caspian wind cuts. To see the Flame Towers illuminated, any clear night of the year will do.