Border towns of the same name on both sides of the Iran-Azerbaijan border ... not much to do here except cross immigration controls ... be careful of your visa ... although you can get visas on arrival at Baku airport and short tourist ones in several Iranian airports for several nationalities, you must have these in advance when you cross by land ... and make sure they are in proper order ... I had a Pakistani co-traveller in my coach who had gone to Azerbaijan via Iran from Pakistan and was now returning via the same route ... he had single entry visas for both countries ... he got his exit stamp at Astara, Azerbaijan, then we walked to the Iranian side, but they stopped him as he had already used his single entry going from Iran to Azerbaijan ... further he could not return back to the Azerbaijan side, to contact the embassy at Baku or similar, as he had already crossed it and his visa was single-entry ... he was stuck in the no-man's land in Astara, with not much money on him, no knowledge of the language and no contacts... we pleaded a lot with the immigration authorities on his behalf as he was not aware of the error ... but no go ... we eventually had to leave him to catch the coach on the other side ... I just hope he got around someway ... else he may still be in Astara ...
