It is always hard to leave nice people who become friends so fast and after one or two days I have to say good-bye. Fanid was the first, she left to school and after another big breakfast, Javad and Shabnam both came down for a last photo.
Whenever I stay at someone’s home, the idea of being on the road again, exposed to everything what there is, like cars + noise, danger & stink and stress of finding ways, permanently controlling the surface of the road for traps, guessing what drivers will do, etc – so, the idea of being out in that real life has something uncomfortable, but meanwhile I know that I switch to to road-mode quickly.
First I went back to Azadi square where I had lost one glove when I was there with Nader. Of course, it was not too be found, but at least now I know and had tried my best.
well, if it is important for him to be on a pic of a stranger, I can live with it
Cities are not my speciality, and the less an oversized one with these grotesque pales and knots of roads where it is hard to find the correct fork when you cannot read the signs or simply do not know the street-names, it took ~20km to get out!
I feel great while driving outside, as it still is not too hot, the road is mostly flat and sometimes the wind is friendly to me. But this is not only advantage with my mindset: side-effect number one is, that just the simple presence of my average speed on the GPS-screen pushes me. I have reached 20km/h average, including the stop and go in Tehran and reduce breaks to a minimum for not losing that number. Well, at the moment, I don’t need more breaks, but what is the use of it? I wanted to go to Qom in 2 days and when I go on like this, I will have half of the way at 12 and what should I do then? And here comes side-effect two: I start thinking about going there in 1 day. I could stay there 2 nights, have more time for writing and editing and seeing the city.
While I thought about this and that and about my attitude of being on the run instead of a road trip, a car stops. The driver, Mohammad, switches to German as I say I am from Autriche and invites me to stay with him. He has a clinic in Qom and an extra room for guests. To stay reasonable, I say that I am not sure if I can make it to Qom in one day but if so, I guess to be there around 6pm. He gives me his business card and telephone number and we say good bye. But now it was clear to me that I would try to do all 150+ km today.
A Viennese collegue collect “working-man signs” all over the world. In Armenia, I had found one working from left to right and another working right to left. Here, I found one working normally and one working high-speed.
On the way I sometimes see people walking and one guy I saw three times! As I don’t believe in miracles I guess that drivers took him with them for a while. But why for a while? There is practically nothing between Tehran and Qom, so why could it happen that he always found people who could take him for a part of the way? The third time I saw him, he had a black flag with some writings on it and was singing/praying. This may answer one question and rising another. But maybe it was not the same guy?
On km85 was a station with shop. On a sign, I also had seen a symbol for a washing room but didn’t find it an so I bought 2l of water, filled most of it in my bottles and wanted to drink the rest. But it was so cold that it hurt, I had to be slow. Only half an hour later, I could not tell by temperature which was the bought water, and which was boiling in the heat since hours.
Most of the time, I didn’t suffer from the heat too much, only when I had to go uphill and produced less airstream and had to take more efforts to make progress it was obvious that I was going in Iran in September in the mid-day heat.
can you see the heat?
more heat, a salt lake and a shutter that doesn’t want to open
After the station, A car with two guys slowed down and they gave my thumbs up and asked if I would need anything. I was fresh equipped but as always it was so nice to have these contacts and good to know that in case of need someone what be happy to help.
Javad and Shabnam had given cookies and fruits to me and for my next “full-hour-eating break” at 3pm I wanted to sit down in a resting area announced few kilometres ahead. But then it was going downhill, I was fast and reaching the station would have meant to make a bigger detour so I decided to wait for the next shadow of one of those big advertisements along the road.
So I was nearly at full speed (today my record was 52km/h!), when I realized that a big dog was running diagonally towards me. It had the same speed and when I because of being startled accelerated, it did the same. It was the first dog that ran to me without barking and that made it appear more determined and frightening. Between us was the guard rail and the dog couldn’t jump over it as the street was on higher level in that area and when it tried to get through between the posts, it lost too much speed and gave up.
I still “wait” for the one dog that is not satisfied with angry barking as well as I “wait” for the one driver who finally is hitting me.
For me is clear, when I can meet the one driver who speaks German and invites me to his place, I also can meet the other one….
At the highway, from time to time, especially for crucial points, there are “sleepy-driver-awakening-structures in the road. I like the idea but i don’t like to go over them.
At the toll stop in the shadow of a tree I wanted to make my 4pm eating break. A man, and then his family approached me, inviting me for tea and some talking. I burned my tongue, but it was nice took talk with them. The man, his brother and his son all where around 2m tall and by no surprise playing basketball. The daughter showed me her violin, she practises since a year. As they were from Isfahan they could not help me with the way in Qom, but we exchanged numbers and they offered help in Isfahan, their home town.
only to shy to take photos of Mullahs in their natural habitat
On the business card of Mohammad, the address was only written in Farsi, so without help it was impossible to find it. First, I went on in direction of city center, seeing Mosques and Mullahs until you drop
only too shy to take photos of Mullahs in their natural habitat
then I asked some men who helped me to locate the address on what3words (something I should have done with Mohammad before!), they also gave me cool water and wanted to make photos.
Their Localization was so exact that the next helper (and the helper of the helper) only had to show me the building 20m ahead, but even when I was standing in front of it I couldn’t tell that this would be the right place. I tried to call Mohammad but only a voice on tape said something. But when I wanted to ask a man coming out the building to dial the number on his phone he apparently was informed of my arrival and helped me to the garage (3 levels underground) and then up to the clinic. Mohammad is a busy doctor, working until late evening but between patients, he always came back to his office, where I was waiting to continue conversation.
Mohammad is a kind of self-made couchsurfing host:
When he sees cyclists on the way to Qom, he invites them what happens more often as you would guess.
find the photo on the board! 🙂
He also took his time to show me an incredible room on the roof of the clinic with great view over Qom.
Later, he invited me to dinner and not before 22:30, he finally went home.