Caspian Sea Tours in Baku

Baku is a Caspian city first and an oil capital second. The sea came before everything else — and it is still the reason the city looks the way it does.

For centuries, sailors from the Absheron Peninsula moved cargo across this water to Astrakhan, Anzali and Turkmenbashi. Then, in 1846, engineers sank the world's first mechanically drilled oil well at Bibi-Heybat, on the shoreline itself. Baku's oil boom followed within three decades, and oil rebuilt the fleet: steel tankers replaced sailing barges, and the Caspian Shipping Company — ASCO today — grew into the largest merchant fleet on an enclosed sea.

Nothing retires quietly here. Scrapping a merchant vessel is expensive, and Caspian scrapping capacity has never kept pace with the number of ships reaching retirement age — so retired hulls are commonly left moored at their last working port instead of being broken up. That is how the Bibi-Heybat ship graveyard formed: a rotating cast of Azerbaijani vessels rusting at their berths, year after year. The other half of the story is now preserved: a Caspian tanker converted into a walk-through museum, engine room included.

So there are two Caspians in Baku. One you sail. One you walk.

Two ways to meet the Caspian

• On the water — bay cruises and yacht charters leave from the Boulevard marina. No tides, and very little swell from April to October.
• On the coast — the ship museum, the first drilled oil well, Bibi-Heybat Mosque and the ship graveyard all sit on one road running south-west out of the city.

Baku's maritime timeline

• 13th century — Bibi-Heybat Mosque founded by Shirvanshah Farrukhzad II over the tomb of Ukeyma Khanum.
• 1846 — the world's first mechanically drilled oil well is sunk at Bibi-Heybat. Thirteen years before Pennsylvania.
• 1879 — the Nobel Brothers Petroleum Company forms in Baku and commissions the first purpose-built oil tankers.
• 1900 — the Absheron Peninsula produces roughly half the world's oil.
• 1936 — Soviet authorities dynamite Bibi-Heybat Mosque. It reopens in 1998 after a full reconstruction.
• 1949 — Neft Daşları (Oil Rocks) begins operating offshore: the world's first offshore oil platform city, built on trestles in the Caspian.
• Today — ASCO runs the largest merchant fleet on the Caspian, and retired hulls end their lives at Bibi-Heybat.

Getting around the Caspian coast

Everything sits on one axis. Baku Boulevard runs along the city-centre waterfront, and both the marina and the ship museum are there. From the Boulevard, the coastal highway heads south-west through Bayil, past Shikhov beach, toward Bibi-Heybat — roughly 10 km, around 20 to 25 minutes by car.

The oil well monument, the mosque and the ship graveyard all fall within the final 3 km of that road. Public transport reaches the mosque; it does not reach the graveyard shoreline, which is why these sites are almost always combined by vehicle.

Curious about the wrecks before you go? Read our guide to the Baku ship graveyard at Bibi-Heybat.