Day 9

Details

Created on Wednesday, 16 September 2015 21:16

09/13/2915 Dogubayazit (Turky) - Tabriz (Iran),  approx.  210 miles

On the descent from Dogubayazit, the Mountain Ararat (see Old testament) showed in the morning mist.

The entry into Iran was half as bad as expected, past a line of waiting trucks we reached the exit barrier from Turkey.

Immediately there was a tug who took us through the procedure. Without the tug the whole thing would have taken much longer, because nobody tells you when and where and in what order what documents need to be stamped. OK, in half an hour we went there through, then it was waiting before the roll-up door, which separates Turkey and Iran. This gate is always only open for a few minutes so that cars can drive over, then the border is tight again. And here again, immediately smugglers stood back, but without them it’s not possible, unless you speak fluently farsi… We already felt a little queasy when we saw passports and carnet for the cars in the hands of always someone new, sometimes a punch here, a signature there and then wait again until someone looked at the car, scribbled something on a pad and disappeared again.

Of course photography is strictly forbidden!

After about two hours we were finally allowed to enter Iran, once only in 'smuggling accompaniment' to the insurance office, because we needed an Iranian liability insurance. After three hours it was done, we were allowed to leave the customs area and were 'inside'. We have also changed money, we are currently all multimillionaires (current rate: $30  = 1 Million Rial).

Thanks in advance organized Navigationrouts from OpenStreetMap also the plan routs worked flawlessly and we started to Tabriz, our first destination in Iran. The enthusiasm for our DeLorean was simply unimaginable, almost every passing car honks, the inmates greet laughing, taking pictures like crazy or call 'Welcome to Iran', we would not have expected.

Hotels we had not booked in advance, Iran is not affiliated to any booking platform and we did not even know if the entry really works today. Klaus already picked out a few hotels with address, but either their telephone was unavailable or they were already booked out… We had already set out to search locally, but as luck would … 50 miles away from Tabriz we made a stop to let the DeLoreans cool down, as a car stopped and the two female and three male occupants got out to take pictures of our vehicles. We started talking and the five introduced themselves as architects, who were on the way to Tabriz. Spontaneously they offered to organize a hotel and eat dinner with us. Said and done, we followed the cargo to Tabriz, then there waiting for us another Iranian who proved to be a tourist guide and a friend of the architects. After dinner in the restaurant the tourist guide led us to the hotel, unfortunately a 0.5 to 1 Star Hotel.

Doesn’t matter, now it was after 10 p.m. and we didn’t had more energy to search for another hotel, it is anyway always only for one night. Dead tired from that day we fell into our bed.

Translation by DWT-Translation-Team