Qazvin

Originally, our plans for today were different: we intended to go hiking in the supposedly beautiful hotspot of the Alamut valley. We decided differently - here is why and what we did instead :-)

We arrived awefully late yesterday (23:30) and had the first bad experience with Iranian bus travel: the bus was quite expensive (more than 2x what we expected...), the driver smoked inside the bus AND stopped about 4 times during the 6 hour journey to smoke some more. Then they objected to us leaving the bus to pee while they smoked. And the best part: the bus did not stop in Qazvin bus terminal but somewhere along the northern highway... it was really a shame. Luckily, we had experienced far better service and hospitality so far in Iran that we brush this aside as a one time thing.

After hearing from other travellers and reading the tourist bible called Lonely Planet that going into the Alamut valley costs about 30 USD one way and takes 2.5 hours we were quite discouraged. Another day in the car for most of the day, only getting out for a couple of short stops and maybe a 2-3 hour hike? No thanks! We have great mountains that are accessible in Germany/Austria and we will do so once we get home :-)

Thus, we visited Qazvin, a booming town 2.5 hours northwest of Tehran. We liked the old church and the park where men held chess competitions. But we especially fell in love with the old restored caravanserai: where camels 🐫 and their drivers loaded and unloaded goods for transport along the ancient Silk Road there was now a fine building with coffee shops and art and design shops. Very nice to spend the day. We also met Ali, a theology student and had interesting discussions about Islam and religion in general. The best thing was that he accompanied us to the neighboring mosque 🕌 and helped to decipher the kufiq script - see annotated picture.

We finished the afternoon off with yoga (first Anna on her own, then Anna teaching Bertram) and had nice dinner nearby.

Tomorrow, we will move to Karaj and meet Iranian friends from an earlier part of the trip.Read more