World Tour - Europe, Asia, North and South America - Entries for: Iran

At the border exit from Azerbaijan we found some old German buses. Believe it or not they still had Munich license plates on them. We could not resist taking a couple of pictures. Exiting Azerbaijan was easy and with high hopes we set off to Iran. The last checkpoint mentioned to us that we should hurry because the Iranian border would take a lunch brake soon. Sadly the machine on the exit gate could not recognize Fabis bar code which is why we arrived at the Iranian border just in time for the break.

While Fabi was waiting for the machine to accept his bar code, Denis and Basti managed to get some Iranian guy from the border involved in our entry. We were extremely lucky, he knew exactly what corners to cut and who to bribe to get us across as quickly as possible. He even managed to get all the Carnet de Passage papers filled out for the bikes during lunch brake. We tried to follow him as much as we could but his walking paste was incredibly fast. Denis even took him for a couple of rides across the border on his rear duffel bag. In the end we paid him 150$ for his job but it was well worth it. We all agreed that we would have spent the whole day at the border if we wouldn't have met him.

The feeling we had when we left the border was difficult to explain. A mixture of excitement and curiosity arose when we pulled up to the hotel where Anastasia was waiting for us. We had not eaten since breakfast and so the first stop was at a local diner where we got some Kebab. Little did we know at that time that we would soon grow tired of Kebab just like we did with Köfte in Turkey :). We all still felt tired from the chaotic border so we decided to ride a bit into the mountains and set up camp. We rode longer than planned because the mountains where unexpectedly inhabited. In the end we found a spot near a restaurant where we set up our tents and had our next Kebab for dinner.

When we arrived in Teheran our first order was to try to find an ATM. We stopped at one and soon found ourselves surrounded by a bunch of people. Everyone was incredibly friendly and wanted to take pictures and help us out. Arman a very friendly biker stopped and helped us to find a mall for some food and drinks and also to change Dollar into Rial, since it turned out that our Visa and Mastercard really did not work in Iran. Arman also assured me that he would spend the day looking for new brake pads for me and fixing the broken O-Ring. He accompanied us to a hotel. The price was high but apparently quite cheap for Teheran. After all the trouble with the brake and and still exhausted from the day before we were just glad to have found a place to sleep and a working shower. At night Arman mentioned to us that he would try to get us into a race as VIP guests on Friday and we were quite eager to accept the offer.

Still disappointed that neither Facebook nor YouTube or Twitter work in Iran, we started into the second day in Teheran. It was the first time in seven weeks that we split up. Basti and Denis met up with Esam to have a sightseeing trip through Teheran and Fabi set out to fix his rear brake with Arman. We have split the text in to parts to better explain what took place that day.

Fabi: At 12 o'clock Arman arrived at the hotel. He told me to get my helmet and leave my jacket, since he would take me to a friend of his, a mechanic, who would help me get the rear brake pads. I was not 100% sold on the fact of riding with Arman through the traffic and since I knew that not only new brake pads would do the trick I convinced him that I would need to bring my bike as well. It was easy to show the mechanic the problem. After pressing a couple of time on the brake there was visible brake fluid exiting the rear cylinder. The very friendly and interested mechanic opened up the brake, but also managed to get a lot of air into the brake system even though I tried telling him that he had to refill the overflow tank. They managed to find the broken O-ring nonetheless and Arman set off to Porsche to try and get original Brembo O-rings. The fact that Porsche brakes are completely different than Motorcycle brakes did not stop him from trying. After some time (2 hours) he returned quite exhausted because he had been searching for the right part all this time. Luckily he managed to make some very similar looking O-Rings out of a rubber sheet. And luckily on the second try it really did keep the oil from coming out. Sadly he was not able to find some brake pads but it was a start. In the evening Arman took me on his bike to see Denis and Basti and from that point on we where back together.

Denis & Basti:
At 11 o'clock we were picked up by Esam. The first stop was the palace of Shach Ahmed. We left our bikes and took the subway. On the first two trains were large yellow signs with big letters "women only". It did not stop Esam, at first we were very uncertain if we were about to get our hands chopped off or even hung but the feeling faded after a while. One does hear the weirdest stories about Iran but once you have been there you realize it is only half as bad.
The palace was quite interesting, but even more worth mentioning was what happened right afterwards. We had tried without success getting money from an ATM the day before. Luckily Basti had gotten a number for a bank employee from a bystander. He told us that it was possible to get Dollars from him and so we asked Esam to call him and try to figure out if it was possible. Couple of minutes later we found ourselves in a car trying to get from the south of Teheran to the outer North. (Teherean has 14 million inhabitants, it is very chaotic, which resulted in over an hours drive) We met at the house of our contact and after a bit of Smalltalk he got out a little envelope with the much desired amount of dollars. To give you a better overview of the conversation here is a small excerpt:
Basti: We are not sure if we are able to transfer the money in Iran because of the internet limitations.
He: No problem just transfer the money when you get back to Germany.
Denis (amused): This will take almost two years.
He: Ok, just transfer it in two years.
We were very surprised by the amount of faith he had put in us after just a couple of minutes. He was talking about 1000$ and we were very relieved when we successfully transfered the amount via online Banking in his local Wifi. Because of the chaotic traffic and the large city we cut our sightseeing tour short to meet up with Fabi and Arman.

We spent the evening in the north of Teheran close to the mountains smoking some water pipes and enjoying our day off with Esam, his sister, Arman and some other friends. Later we took a cab ride home and spent the whole ride discussing what we experienced that day.

After a sleepless night this day had held a little highlight for us. We discovered a fast food restaurant at the side of the road. It is hard to believe how excited we got over some burger with fries after just 8 weeks of traveling. After lunch we said our goodbyes to Anastasia and readied ourselves mentally for the long awaited dip into the Caspian sea.

In the evening we arrived at the beach. Of course we did not pass on the opportunity to get some meters of beach under our Heidenau tires. We set up camp at about one meter above sea level. Basti had been in the Caspian sea already but for Denis and Fabi it was the first time in 8 weeks and it felt incredible. The water temperature was perfect, not to cold but still enough to cool you down from the hot temperature outside. After 10.000 kilometers it was the first time it felt like a real holiday :).

On our way to the Turkmenistan border we meet a very nice and friendly family that invited us to another traditional meal. The conversation with them was very interesting, because we learned a lot about the country, the people that live in it and also about the religion. In the end we got to take the two little twin boys on the back of our motorcycles which they enjoyed very much. It also made us very happy.

Shortly thereafter we left Iran with a lot of great experiences and some new thoughts on our minds. It was the first country were we did not know what we had to expect and maybe even were biased against because of the media. In our short time we gathered a completely different picture about the country and the people. We are certain that it will not be the last time we will visit Iran and we are looking forward to our next stay there.