Saying goodbye has become a constant companion. After several weeks travelling in the Emirates and Oman, meeting great people and admiring breathtaking landscapes, we pedal towards the ferry terminal. We leave plenty great memories behind...... no, we take them with us. Our next destination is Iran. Upon arriving at the port we realize, saying hello has become a constant companion as well. Among many Iranians, the ferryboat is used by some internationals: There are two Italian couples on motorcycles, two Overlander trucks from Germany and a Mercedes Sprinter with a family from France. We always enjoy those meeting to chat, exchange information and experiences.
Everyone is in excellent mood and looking forward to Iran. Our first day leaves us no time to arrive – as soon as we reach Bandar Abbas, a car stops next to us to hand over some Take Away food he just bought in a restaurant. And some bottles of cold coke. We hardly manage to say thanks cause he rushes off so quickly. We just decided to eat sitting on the sidewalk, when a restaurant owner asks us inside and provides plates and salad... for free. This kind of hospitality feels so typical here and so untypical for Germans. When we reach the city centre all the exchange offices are closed until the evening. We are not sure what to do in the meantime, as a young man approaches us to ask whether we recognize him. We met him some weeks ago on Hormuz. Of course we do, and spend the afternoon in his air conditioned office of a travel agency. The perfect opportunity to check flight connections from Iran to Central Asia – as we still don’t have the visa for Turkmenistan. Later we leave the city as millionaires. On our way out, we meet two Iranian cycle tourists – who join us on our shopping tour and pay for our food supplies for the next days. What a day, exhausted but happy we lie in the evening in the tent and are glad to be back.
We worry about two things. First our visa for the next country is still pending. Turkmenistan rejects about 50% of the applications rigour rigorously. Even professional visa agencies cannot predict if an application will be successful, rumours say thy consulates roll the dice to decide. Because of this, many travellers decide for routes around the country, which became one of the least travelled countries in the world. This evokes our curiosity and we keep our fingers crossed for ourselves.
Our second issue is the route – if we push our luck with the Turkmene visa, we have to climb more than 10000m within the next 500 km. Once we have done this, the Dasht-el-Lut waits for us. For the next 500 km there will be little shops every 100 km. With headwinds that might mean we have to carry everything for up to three days. Normally no problem, however when we start in Bandar Abbas, temperatures raised already to over 40°C and we drink up to 10 liters every day. During summer temperatures of 60°C in the desert are normal, measurements performed in 2005 revealed even 70°C – among the top ten hottests spots on earth. However this was not in april but midsummer and in the deserts centre. Under these circumstances we don’t like to trust on our maps and are grateful for Beat Heims detailled roadbook and Dominic and Sivio remarks.
Our first destination was Kerman. The route is simple: Uphill, downhill, uhill, downhill, uphill, ... In a town close to the first big pass we get invited for lunch. This includes a shower and freshly washed clothes. As we are guests of a tailor, we also get some holes in our clothes repaired and leran how traditional stitching are performed. Our great mood could only be improved by a phone call from the Turkmene consulate, who after a nice chat promise to send an electronic invitation letter, which allows us to pick up the visa at the border. Incredible. This adjective also applies for the weather, which is a funny mix of heat and sub zero temperatures, rain and sandstorms. One of them surpised us, while we pitched our tent and we manage just in time to pack everything and escape to the university of Kahnuj. Here we met Jahan, an english lecturer who invites us to spend the night at his home – from an emergency situation to a perfect evening.
The next day when we started cycling uphill we got some melons – lightly packed everyone could do that climb... At 1500m a huge watermelon adds up, we manage to take only one! In addition, there were also bananas, apples, cucumbers, kiwis, bread and oranges – handed over from cars passing by.
The highway to Kerman is quite entertaining, lots of sculptures along the road and we meet some local bike groups. In Kerman, we spent two days to gather energy before starting to the Lut desert. Then we packed about ten liters of water per bike and food for two to three days.The Lut surprised with some unforgettable memories. More about that in the next blog article.
Kommentar schreiben