I pull up at a benzin station on the outskirts of town. The smile game car pulls up beside me and the whole family jumps out….“hello…welcome...where are you from?” Australia. The mother’s face lights up even more, her cousin moved to Australia. “You are invited to have a picnic lunch with us, there is a special park near here” the teenage daughter translates for me. I have some kilometres to cover today, but I think why not…this is the part of Iran I love, the wonderfully kind people. Ok…so I follow them through the back streets of Hamedan and up a hill which is covered in picnicking Iranians (it’s a Friday - the day off work) we find a shady spot in the centre of the park. Smile game boy takes it upon himself to guard Ginger. If anyone comes close he goes over to ‘protect her’. Hot BBQ chicken, fresh bread and amazingly soft dates are gobbled down thankfully. I’m off back down the hill while talking with a car full of 40 something women, their funky music blaring and giving me the thumbs up for being a lady and riding a motorcycle.
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| Benzin station in Hamedan |
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| Smile game boy and Ginger guardian |
I’m heading off the tourist road again, but I cleared the rest of my planned route with the police the day before…pointing to where I wanted to go and saying..Ok?? Ok???…making sure I got nods of approval. The major difference with these back roads is the English signage I had lazily grown accustomed to is limited. There is usually enough to give you the direction but heading through anything but a very small town and I generally had to ask for help. I can get the feel for whether a town will be friendly from the benzin stations. If I’m given formal, stiff service at the station, I know the town wont be much better. The small town I was stopped in had petrol attendants who were laughing and smiling along with me. One even pointed to the picture of Khomeini on the money and me and shook his head with a smile…I don’t think he would approve of you his eyes said. The land around the town was flat highlands where sheppards moved their flocks in the hope of feeding them from the sparse grey green tuffs of grass. Mud brick villages blended into their surroundings and on the plains lonely, square farm houses had dirt piled up the walls to act as insulation.
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| What happens when you want two storeys and your neighbour doesn't |
After several hours of riding I see a brilliant blue mosque dome acting like a beacon drawing me into a town. I stop to take a photo and a car stops beside me, did I want to see inside the mosque?…ok! A young couple lead me through the building, pointing out little things that I wouldn’t have known, like the geometric shapes on one of the walls is actually the name Ali repeated over and over again. I spend the night in Zanjan.
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| A large blue Mosque appears in a small town |
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| Showing me the word 'Ali' |
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| View from the roof of the Mosque |
The next day I get to head a little bit into the dessert. I didn’t do my dessert run so I thought this might give me a taste. The road follows a valley floor where orchards and rice paddies squeeze into narrow strips of land close to a snow feed river. There are dry creamy hills disappearing off into the horizon, even in this semi dessert the air is hot, but there is no wind so the day is clear. The road is edged in bright yellow paint that keep me on the path as it fades into the surrounding dirt.
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| Rice paddy fields, the desert and my finger |
Tall mountains are burrowed by dark tunnels with no lighting and I find myself almost riding blind as Ginger’s lights offer little guidance. It’s like diving in the ocean at night, your torch giving you a narrow beam of visibility but there is just a black void everywhere else and sharks, there has to be sharks, especially in the Iranian desert. I wait to be nibbled but I’m not. I emerge from one tunnel to find I'd been thrown out from the barren rocks onto the fertile plans - reds and ochres turn to green and grey mountains with slivers of white snow yet to be melted in the summer sun.
It is hot and dusty so I spend lunch in the park by myself under the shade of a tree - no one comes up to me here…maybe a little too off the beaten track, I don’t think they would see many tourists. Two men come over as soon as I stop but leave without saying a word when they see I am female. So I ride straight through to Khoy for my last night in Iran...back to where it all started.
Total kilometres travelled: 6804
Where am I: Zanjan and Khoy, Iran
Freaky shark invested tunnels traversed: 8
Families I’ve picnicked with: 2
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