Cheats and Culture Vultures

I can already predict some of the comments that shall be made before writing this, so in pre-empting them I shall say this: make them at your peril. On my return to Western Europe I shall not be below spitting in your fruit juice when you are not looking, or using my left hand to flick snot into your food with my left hand should we find ourselves dining together; and you do not want to know where my left hand has been while traversing the Indian sub-continent!! You have been warned.

My last post communicated the fact that we had taken buses only as far as fear of our safety allowed. I am afraid that that is not longer the case. Let me explain...

We set out from Kerman 3 days ago with the full intention of cycling the full way to Yazd, before striking westwards towards Esfahan, but the kindly intervention of an English speaking teacher appeared to lengthen our distance in our departure from the city centre. The term "cycling 3 sides of a rectangle" could be aptly used.

Having finally negotiated the incredibly complex American block style of city plan, we found ourselves on the road to Yazd. But road does not give it justice. Dual carriage-way comes close, but throw in 3-lanes in each direction, without proper hard shoulder, and you're just about there. Added to this was the slightest hint of a headwind and the fact that we hand't used our legs in about 6 days. We cycled just 24km before the brilliant thought struck us: Why? Why do this to ourselves? Why cycle along virtual motorways for 3 days, followed by probably another 4 days until we got to quiter and more scenic roads? So we talked ourselves into it.

We turned around, returned to Kerman, and caught an 8 hour bus to Shiraz which is to the West (and a little bit south). As far as I'm concerned, it's about equidistant from the Turkish border as Kerman is, and I'm sticking to that. I measured it with my eyes on the map.

It was a hellish journey and one which I did not think I would emerge intact. The aches in my legs I'd been feeling earlier turned out not to be from non-use for 6 days, but from the temperature and flu-like symptoms that developed almost as soon as I sat down. I was clammy and with about 3hrs to go, it started to feel like someone was twisting a knife in my abdomen. All I hoped was that the hostel we were aiming for was close to the bus station.

I have no real idea if the hostel was close to the bus station because we never reached there. Transpires that our "Shiraz Bus" was actually going to drop us 20km outside of Shiraz (at 10pm at night) before continuing on its pleasant journey to wherever it was it was headed (it was no longer a concern of mine).

So we cycled the 20km into town and eventually, at 11.30pm found a clean enough hotel where we haggled out a price that we were willing to pay. There we have stayed for the last 3 days. You may not want to know this, but I endeavour to reveal all the lows as equally as the highs on this trip, so I shall continue: "Pissing out my arse" is an apt description for my current situation, and apparantly my travelling companion is not faring much better.

So we are here to recouperate, but it is not progressing as rapidly as we would like and we are due to leave tomorrow to begin the 6-day cycle up towards Esfahan (nearly 500km). But we are not just lying in bed feeling sorry for ourselves (though that would probably have been a good idea). Today we went to visit the ancient city of Persepolis. It was constructed in the 5th Century BC and then burned to the ground whenever Alexander came rambling along this path. It lay buried and forgotten and now is reborn as a way to release hard currency from foreigners and locals alike. All the same, it is really incredibly impressive. I hope that the photos I choose to put up here do it some justice, but if not, go take a look at Wikipedia; I'm sure they have a lot better!


The entrance to one of the rooms for meeting dignatories


One of the many stone carvings (and even one of the less impressive!!)



Horsey






Guardians of Tomb



Tomb of Darius the Great (right) and some other famous guy (left). My ancient Persion history leaves an lot to be desired (as does just history in general)




I should note here that the entrance to Persepolis was extremely reasonable at about 30cents, but it was the taxi at 15euro that we have an issue with. It is possible to do it a lot cheaper using minibus to a local town, then a hired taxi to Persepolis, but our bowels did not lend ourselves for such an excursion, where haggling to such a tourist destination would surely have proved draining.