What to See in Ganja and Lake Goygol in Azerbaijan, Ganja, Azerbaijan

Ganja is not often on most tourists’ itineraries and admittedly, there aren’t a lot of big sites to see. It’s a nice city though, and we found it interesting to experience life in a typical Azerbaijani community. Here are some of the things you’ll see when you visit the city of Ganja, including the nearby Goygol Lake.

Like many cities in this region, Ganja was the site of many battles. As a result, they had a variety of foreign rulers, including the Arabs, Persians and Turks. Javad Khan, ruler of a Turkic tribe, was the leader of Ganja when the city was conquered by the Russian Empire in the early 1800s. On the battlefield, Khan apparently said to the Russians, ‘You will only win Ganja by stepping over my dead body’. Unfortunately, his prediction came true. Javad Khan was killed in the battle, and the Russians were victorious. As a result, Azerbaijan’s last khan has become a hero to the city. Later, Ganja was included in the Soviet Union’s realm.

With this long history though, most of the buildings in the small historic centre only date back as far as the Russian era, but we still enjoyed exploring it. ...... (follow the instructions below for accessing the rest of this article).