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| Tabriz - Teheran |
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Why a bicycle shop? Anything wrong?! Yes, my rear hub apparently got a little loose along the way. You can cycle quite some kilometer with that, without any big problems. But its far from healthy for your bicycle, and where are we without bicycles? A huge step closer to home, but that's all. Arriving in Sarab was just a matter of making 20km, which was the easy part, now to find an internet cafe and a bicycle shop. At the end of the day we had found both. One was of good quality and the other one, was scary as hell. The internet cafe was pretty ok, quite some people from NL actually helped us as far as possible. Seeing 3 bicycles outside Azer decided that we must have been tourists and that he wanted to host us. So we got a nice stay at his place. But the bicycle shop in Sarab was freaking me out. The guy almost charged my rear hub with hammer and screwdriver! Anyways, we fended the attack off, and went back to Azer his house. There we had a really nice stay, including a visit to the park, and a dinner outside the town. As always the dinner consisted of Kebab, rice raw union and some roasted tomatoes. It seems to be rather popular here. We spent the evening just talking and showing picture's of home etc. At the end we slept in their only 2 beds. They insisted on this. I felt less guilty after figuring out that I was better off sleeping on the ground on a thin mattress then in a bed (like Douwe and Aafke). The next morning it was quiet a hassle to actually leave. The family was rather insisting that we would stay. In the end we actually managed to leave around 10. Considering how persistent they where that we would stay, we didn't do too bad. At 2050m a car was waiting for us with some fruits. Its what happened quite some times along the road. These gifts are always a welcome change in our cycling rhythm. Our lunch break was at Nyr this time. Azer recommended this place, and it was indeed a nice park to stop. Just a bit strange to sit among all the Iranian people. Everybody is always looking at you in such circumstances. When we entered Sereyn later that afternoon, we were slightly shocked. This is the first really (local)touristic place we saw in Iran. And it involved many people stopping us on the road, almost pushing us towards a hotel etc. The general impression was not so fun anymore, neither of us felt comfortable at least. So after taking the Ashe-Doug(some special soup) we left Sereyn. It was getting late, so we where looking for a place to sleep. Ofcourse we couldn't find one till we entered Ardabil. Here we decided to try a trick. Sit down in a public place, eat something and hope that some english speaking person would talk to us. We did get a lot of attention and the usual photo session, but no english speaking person. So time to take the initiative. Walking around and asking we heard that we could camp at the park and that it was next to the police. It appeared to be the religious police. The Reli police is something like the secret service, but without being really secret. They just have to report to 1 person and that's the top guy in Iran. So they can do whatever they want. Which makes them not really nice people like the normal army and police. After playing some games of volleyball with students we put our tents up at the back end of the park. After a good night of rest we woke up. Today we would go to the coast, which meant a descend of about 1600 meters. This descend would be one looong way down, and according to Ingrid really beautiful. So after paying a quick visit to the tomb of the founder of the sjiet part of the Islam and meeting a German guy there, we took off. After going up and down for a 30 kilometers or so we got to the tunnel. There we stopped. We had received several warnings that it was a long tunnel, and not so fond of cyclists. So we turned our lights on, waited for a big gap in the traffic stream, and there we went. Apparently we've had lady luck with us. The big truck who caught up with us decided to stay behind us and block the rest of the cars. So the 2 km of tunnel where relatively easy. Also because it was going down, so we could cycle with 40km/h through it. At the end of the tunnel we stopped outside and waved at the truck driver, who waved and smiled back! In front of us, was an amazing landscape. Almost jungle like we started the descend from the mountains to the sub-tropic region of Iran. Taking over trucks and everything we had a really cool ride down. The one small surprise was at the end. Police officers told us to stop, and asked for our passports. Luckily it was just that and nothing else. With all those election fanatics etc around, you are a bit more careful with policemen etc. Now it was time to find a place to sleep. But to our surprise everything next to the road was either a building or the soaky ricefields. So after passing through Astara and turning down a disgusting and over pricy camping we cycled on and on. The attempts to find a spot somewhere turned out on nothing every time. So being desperate and tired, we all saw a big house, with a suitable garden for a tent or two. After asking the owner if we could sleep there, we got a yes. Of course this sounds easier then it is. Talking to locals like these means you got your hands, 5 words of Farsi(Persian/Iranian) and a nice point it book or something similar. In the end they served us the food we just wanted to add to the evening meal. Which was fine, but a little bit odd. The next morning we left again, after a good night of rest. During the stay there Douwe lost another bidon. It;s what happens in these countries, and you cannot really blame the people for it. After 20 km someone started to drive next to us in his car, and started to talk with us. His English was rather good and he invited us to his house for a stay and we could join a party that evening to celebrate the victory of Achmedinijad. As interesting this offer might sound, we decided to turn it down politely. Why? There are two simple reasons. The first being that we did not want to do another 20km day in a week and secondary: if the reli police sees you at such a party, you can pack your bags and go home. Yes, its that easy. Stay away from riots and all political stuff and you can travel safely in Iran. Get involved, and you are in for some serious trouble. So after we had a nice tea had his house we moved on to the next city. There we hoped to change some dollars into Tomam. When we finally found a bank meli (its the only bank where you can change money) we even got an invitation for a sleeping place. Looking forward for a good shower after cycling in ~40 degrees with very humid weather we agreed. The next day we got up and left at 7:45. Before noon we actually covered 75km and around 3 we arrived in Rasht. Here we called it a day. We had covered our 100km already. Finding a place to sleep seemed easy at first. The park wasn't very far. It was only then that the trouble began. First we where told to move to another part of the park. Which was only concrete and hence no option for us. Several student approached us and started to ask our political opinion about the Iranian elections. This was not yet the real trouble. The demonstrations 500m away where. So the first thing we did was turn around and walk away through the park, away from the demonstrations. Being rather uninformed about the situation here we took a hotel. The following morning we decided to take a quick bus to Tehran, to our friends there who could hopefully explain us about what to do and what not to do. |
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