Tag Archives: tea

Day 296 – The bear necessities

It was cold. Even with a real roof over our heads, the night was cold. Given that the temperature in Kars was shown as 9 degrees last evening, it might well have been below zero in the night. Without heating, that’s cold even in a house.

much better weather this morning

So we took our time in the morning, hoping for things to warm up a little before we left. Our hotel didn’t include breakfast so we ate bread with all sorts of remaining things (cream cheese, honey) in our room. The plan was to ride to Ani, the former Armenian capital, about 45km from Kars before heading further north and towards the Black Sea.

Kars, however, had charm when we stepped outside in the sunny morning. What looked grey and dreary in the rain and cold last night, now looked friendly and busy. Flo decided to fix our problem with mobile data right here and then so we searched for a Turkcel shop. Driving up and down one of the main roads, many honey and cheese (real cheese!) shops caught our eye. We just finished our pot of honey this morning and when was the last time we had real cheese? Not cream cheese, not feta, but the real thing? I sent Flo in one of the bigger shops where he purchased a 500g jar of honey and two different cheeses for all of NZ$10. He jumped out once to give me some cheese to try which was very nice and then suddenly, the owner looked out of the door, beckoned to me and said “çay!”. Again, we were invited to a glass of tea after a successful transaction. Slightly odd for the taste, we got more slices of cheese to try with our tea. Buying a fresh loaf of bread at the store on the opposite side, we were all set for a great lunch at Ani today. Continue reading →

Day 295 – Grenzerfahrung

Last bit of road in Iran

Writing the blog post from two days ago in the morning, with the thoughts on returning home at the end, left us in a bit of a low mood after breakfast. Thus, packing took extra long this morning. Not a big deal, though. We had only 130 km to go to the border.

Near lunch time we hit the border town of Maku. We filled up one last time with the obscenely cheap fuel and sat down along the main road through that narrow valley for lunch. It is always good to tackle a border with all primary functions tended to. Just as we were doing some last minutes preparations (I forgot to take proof of my German bike insurance which is valid and required in Turkey) Iran decided to give us a very Iranian parting gift. A guy jumped out of a taxi, shoved a melon and some bananas into my unsuspecting hands and jumped back into the taxi with a “welcome to Iran!”. Now we had bananas and a melon to declare as well – and another amazing memory of Irani hospitality.

Random gift of bananas and a honey melon. A melon?!?

We reached the border shortly thereafter. By the looks of it, it is only ever used by thousands of trucks or pedestrians. There is a lane for passenger vehicle crossing, but all booths are abandoned and no one was to be seen. It was relatively easy after all. Dodge the hawkers, find an official and then get led to the equivalent desk in the pedestrian terminal through back doors. Maybe 45 minutes later we stood in front of the two gates that separate Iran from Turkey with all the required stamps. Iran opened its gate for us and we called over to the Turkish guys …

… and waited. A long while. The Turkish border guards who saw us after one minute played manly man games with the Iranians and us. They left us hanging for about 20 minutes before pushing the the button that would open the gate. What a great start. Smile and wave …

Note the line of truck starting at least 6km before the actual border

We had to work around a similar way on the Turkish side. Passport immigration police guy was only available in the passenger terminal, so through some more back doors we went and met Mr. Grumpy Number two. I will never understand why some guys feel the need to underline their authority with outward rudeness. It did not get better when he saw our German passports. “Deutsche? …” sneer … then he only stamped one passport and got really annoyed when I remarked that I would like to get an entry stamp, too. Smile and wave …

Great light and dark due to the rain clouds

Luckily customs guy did not know what to do, really, so our workaround regarding the insurance remained untested. I helped him with the carnet and off we went, into thick storm clouds on the horizon. We put our full rain gear on, ducked down and headed into the Kurdish town of Doĝubayazit. This grey border town had nothing to offer, neither phone shop nor ATM in sight, so we pushed on northwards along the border.

Our first sight in Turkey was the former Armenian capital of Ani. To get there, all roads lead through Kars, the regional center. En route there, I felt the strong need to answer nature’s call and we stopped on the first pass. Right then a van pulled over and four soldier type guys came out. One was a sergeant and had this way about asking what we were up to that showed suspicion hidden behind mere curiosity. We moved along.

The world appeared to end at the horizon so I, wisely, packed the camera away

The rain started for real beyond the pass, with lightning and thunder hitting left and right. It was cold, too, and just kept on getting colder as we got closer to Kars. The last pass went over 2300m, we were soaked and shivering by this point. Looking around there were still patches of snow on the ground…no wonder it was cold! We had done another 200 km on the Turkish side by then and stopped at a petrol station maybe 5km before the longed after hotel. The guys there took pity on us and shouted us a hot çay (tea). That got us the rest of the way through freezing rain without frostbite.

The hotel was cheap, which was the best to say about it, really. To make up for it, we went out that night to a really nice restaurant. What a treat – tablecloth, fresh bread and really good not-kebab food. Just what we needed to get the spirits back up again!

: Last bit of road in Iran

: Arriving in Maku, the town before the border

: Random gift of bananas and a honey melon. A melon?!?

: The smaller peak of Mt Ararat seen from the Iranian side

: Note the line of truck starting at least 6km before the actual border

: Looking back towards the border post. So glad to be through!

: The smaller cone of Ararat seen from the Turkish side

: The whole Mt Ararat in the distance

: The road led through a vast landscape of nothingness

: Great light and dark due to the rain clouds

: Glimpses of the river canyons from the road

: The world appeared to end at the horizon so I, wisely, packed the camera away

: Going out for really good food: Vegetarian plate with grilled seasonal veggies and chicken in special sauce for Flo

Day 288 – Being a hipster in Tehran

A young Polish couple was traveling with this one.

After all the quiet times in the mountains, Tehran came as a bit of a shock. It’s a big city with lots of option of how to spend your time. Do you go shopping in the bazaar? Do you look at the Royal Palace? Do you visit the Museum of Iran to see more of the ancient artefacts that have been dug out throughout the country? To be honest, we were out of energy. Instead of trying to cramp in as much as we could, we decided to try and see contemporary Iran and experience city life in the capital.

Nina with nice organic tea

So we took it slow this morning, sleeping in, have a longer breakfast and using the internet after two days of abstinence. At about 11.30 we went out with the plan of having lunch in a tea house. The Lonely Planet recommends going to one of the parks to watch people which sounded like a good idea. Park-e Shahr is the one closest to our hotel so we could walk there. Right before we go to the entrance, we stumbled into a tiny market full of stalls. One stall sold freshly baked pastries, most of them vegetarian, another stall sold sweets. Two buy options and we were set for lunch on a park bench in Park-e Shahr. 🙂 A lady at the stall next door offered us to test the tea they are selling. They are the first company that has gained the organic label in Iran. She had a little cheat sheet which she used to read the information to us in English.

bird watching, Tehran style

The park was quite big and to our surprise, it had bird cages in it as well. Once we had eaten and wandered around for a bit, we were ready for more exploration. Flo wanted to see the old embassy of the United States now named US Den of Espionage which was too far to walk there. Thus, we took the metro for a couple of stations to get there. Always a bit of an adventure to figure out how public transport works in other cities. The train was crowded but a lovely lady got me a seat before telling me about her three years in Vienna 30 years ago.

True face?

The US Den of Espionage is closed to the public most of the times but you can walk around it and look at the murals on the wall around the area. Such a weird experience. We continued from here to the Park-e Honar Mandan for some more people watching. The park sports a trim-dich-pfad as well as some sculptures. More strolling around before settling down for a café for some lovely tea, coffee and chocolate cake. Mmmmh, chocolate cake. 🙂

Others were more into it

The café we chose was in the Iranian Artists’ forum building. We had snobbed the forum yesterday … but not today. The exhibition is for free and as a way of experiencing contemporary Iran, it was perfect. Taking our time, we made our way through three level of art. It was great. We especially liked the room dedicated to the caricaturist Hadi. The artist was actually present to take some pictures in the exhibition room so Flo and I ended up on a couple of “look here is the public looking at the works” shots, we think.

Public display of logo design suggestions for an event. Pretty cool.

One room was lined with the entries to a design competition. Flo particularly enjoyed this as you could make out differences in the quality already. Another room showed photos of theatre plays which were incredibly interesting but we are lacking any knowledge of the plays which is a shame really.

Going back home we passed the market stalls again. Not wanting to have another round of kebab for dinner, we bought more vegetarian pastries as well as olives in a spicy paste that go very well with bread and cheese. Dinner was had in the hotel room before we met up with Joris and Noor who stayed next door. Going for some tea, it was lovely to talk to fellow travellers; we spent two hours just doing that and then made to ride with Joris tomorrow. Noor took a flight back to the Netherlands this night as her holiday of visiting was over.

: A young Polish couple was traveling with this one.

: Four stories of auto parts, one building after the other. Madness …

: Nina with nice organic tea

: The caramel blocks were divine

: At Shahr’s park

: This park also had a couple of birds on display

: Never seen one of those. The signs were in Persian, unfortunately

: bird watching, Tehran style

: Not many pictures from our ride, we got told off pretty soon

: famous mural on the US Den of Espionage

: Recent symbols of nationalism

: True face?

: We have yet to see a single Irani use these public health facilities 😉

: Well, I had to try, hadn’t I?

: One of the artworks in the artists’ park

: Some respite from the hot day

: Tea and chocolate cake and we were good to go again

: We did like the abstract paintings

: Ha, I have used that color palette before. It is also Nina and I hugging …

: We were less intrigued by the creepy bone phase of his oeuvre

: Others were more into it

: We liked the execution on this one a lot

: Public display of logo design suggestions for an event. Pretty cool.

: Cool caricatures; we immediately had to think of the Caricatura in Frankfurt

: Just epic … 😀

: detail in the park

: interesting mix of style and message

: The former Embassy pretty-fied.

: On point, but a slight weakness on the grammar

: It is hard to capture the insanity on the road, since most of it is about movement

Day 278 – Seeing Esfahan on foot

Our blog needed some love and attention; it’s not that we are tired of writing but a combination of bad internet connections, long and full days and thus not enough time to write the appropriately long entries had led to the biggest backlog we had so far. Thus, the whole morning was spent on posting blog entries to catch up. Even if we have pre-written the entries, uploading photos and then commenting every single one takes time.

We left the hostel for lunch, mostly because Flo was hangry. As always, vegetarian choices were severely limited so I was stuck with soup, salad and dessert. The dessert Khoresht mast was a new thing I tried and it did not convince me. Looking it up on the net also revealed that while it is a dessert, it is not vegetarian…

Two mosques, one enormous gate bazaar entrance. This square has it all.

Afterwards, we strolled down one of the bigger streets until we found Naqsh-e Jahan Imam Square which is the center of Esfahan, really. The name means “pattern of the world”. The square is a rectangle and it is enclosed by the low buildings that house part of the bazaar with the main entrance of the bazaar to one (short) side and the entrance to the Masjed-e Shah (Royal Mosque) on the exact opposite. A second mosque, Masjed-e Sheikh Lotfollah, has its entrance at the middle of one of the long sides. From its dimensions, the square is impressive but unfortunately, there is a construction site right on the square and the dome of Masjed-e Shah is also clad in a scaffold; this takes away from the impression quite a bit. Continue reading →

Day 277 – Guardian angels

Of course, we don’t believe in supernatural beings, faith or such like. But sometimes these ideas are a good shorthand to deal with the weirdness that occurs when a single observer gazes at an overwhelmingly complex and often random world. Why did we stop right there for food? How come Mohammad had to drop of two of his guest at that exact same moment? As much as these moments can neither be influenced actively nor explained with some sort of directed external force, there is a part of ourselves in them nonetheless. By opening up to the world, traveling as we are, and being open to be swept up by what may come, I believe that we “spike the deck” ever so slightly in our favour.

Saying good-bye to Mohammad

Whatever it may be, we consider ourselves supremely lucky to have ended up here. The Tak-Taku Homestay is an amazing place to the point of being surreally so. We spend the rest of the morning lounging and catching up on the blog a bit more (a reoccurring theme at the moment, it seems). When it was time to tackle the last 100km to Esfahan, we packed our gear once more and got ready. All that was left was to give a huge thank you to Mohammad, his family and the lovely other guests we had the pleasure to meet.

The GPS was set, we had just wiggled our hindquarters into position and turned back onto the main highway, when I noticed something ahead. The road was freshly sealed here, without markings yet. I saw a dust cloud 500m ahead and closed my visor, thinking maybe a digger or some other machine was at work next to the road. When we got there, I was first confused, then realisation dawned. There was a wrecked car, on its roof and facing the wrong way maybe 10m off the road in the dust. Terrible, blood freezing confirmation came when we stopped and saw a little girl, maybe 6 years old, crawling out of the wreck, screaming.

Nina was terrified, especially when we both saw the foot sticking out of the former driver’s side window at an odd angle, unmoving. I was sure someone must have died or at least sustained horrible injuries. I handed Nina the phone and the number of Mohammad and grabbed the first aid kit. By the time I got to the car, miraculously, all four members of the family had crawled out of the wreck on their own. Maybe 1 minute has passed since the crash. More people stopped and came over and I had a look at the four. No obvious broken bones, no bleeding, heck almost no abrasions either! They were all walking, obviously in shock and covered in dust, but pretty much unharmed.

For a minute or two, I could not quite believe their luck – and ours for that matter. They were certainly not buckled up and the Iranian cars are usually at the safety levels of 1985. For all of them to walk within a minute, no one showing signs of injury, is like winning the lottery. Or as a short hand, their guardian angels were doing overtime today.

There were plenty of people here now to help, no one needed first aid and we don’t speak Farsi. To avoid any misunderstandings, especially once the authorities show up, we decided to move on. A moment later we stopped again briefly to call Mohammad anyway and asked him to double check with the ambulance service just in case.

A great setting for a tea house

Shaken but relieved we rode the 100km in relative silence, all the way to our next hostel in Esfahan. Mohammad had suggested a place with a great price and even called ahead for us to make a reservation. All worked out smoothly. The room is just what we need, maybe even a bit more, and the bathrooms are clean. Best of all, there is proper safe parking for the motorcycle.

We lay low for a couple of hours. Nina was enjoying the chance to recuperate a bit more and I was just chilling. When sunset drew closer, we thought we might still want to go out to see at least one thing or two.

The Lonely Planet suggests the Tea House of the Abbasi Hotel. Part of a luxury hotel set up in a magnificent old caravansary, this place serves snacks good enough for a dinner for us. The courtyard has been transformed into a beautiful garden, with the seating lightly sprinkled around. It is hugely popular, especially around that time, and it took a moment for us to find a spot. The ash was creamy and filling, the tea excellent. We thoroughly enjoyed the “date night” feel of it.

: Our space, basic but comfortable

: Packing away our camping gear in the morning

: Saying good-bye to Mohammad

: A great setting for a tea house

: Ah, the sophisticated look =P

: The only veg dish in Iran

: Great tea with little sweet treats

: I got fereni! Rice pudding with a sugary sauce

: The hustle and bustle of an evening crowd

: Impression of the waterway

: All lights went on when we were about to leave

: A portrait with the fancy hotel

Day 272 – City of poets and gardens

The pavilion over the grave

A whole day to explore Shiraz lay in front of us, with local tour guides. Punctually at 9.30 am, Ali and Tannaz, Hamid’s nephew and niece, picked us up from the hotel. Since we didn’t have any plans, the tomb of Hafez, a famous poet, was our first stop.

We all hopped into their car and while we were still on the way, we were invited for lunch by Ali’s and Tannaz’ mother Mozhgan via phone call. Such a lovely invitation! Trying to avoid awkward situations later, I immediately asked if it’s something I can eat as a vegetarian. The promised Shirazi food would be rice with vegetables and an optional addition of meatballs which sounded perfect and delicious. 🙂

The tomb of Hafez is an alabaster tomb stone inscribed with one of his poems in a pagoda set in a beautiful garden. Since it is spring, every flower was in bloom which gave the whole thing a colourful touch. Everyone learned something about weird flower names: Snapdragon is called the Farsi equivalent of “monkey”, while in German it is “baby lion’s mouth”. Continue reading →

Day 174 – Ban Krut temple visit

We had obviously needed a day to simply crash so we extended our stay in Thap Sakae for another night to see at least a bit of the surrounding attractions. After a yummy breakfast (Flo had bought me Nutella and Thomas bakes his own bread!), we slowly got into our motorcycle gear. Despite it being 10.30am, you could feel that it would be a scorcher of a day.

Iconic, isn’t it?

The Ban Krut temple is only about 25km away but the ride was long enough to get quite hot. The first thing to notice on the temple hill is a giant buddha statue. It looks out over the land in the calm fashion of all buddhas. Around it, there are smaller statues to which you can apply leaf gold and thus do your bit for the temple (and for improving you standing regarding this life and the next). This practise results in a very patchy look of the statues though.

Walking up the hill, we first passed two big warriors or guardians, one of each side of the road. A big, well frequented staircase, then, leads up to the top of the hill with the temple on it.

Dragon stairway

As always, removing your shoes is expected but apart from this fact, Flo and I are lacking the knowledge of rules for proper behaviour in a Thai temple. For example, I wasn’t sure if it’s okay to take photos at all. Though I asked a staff member, I was sure I wasn’t understood when I got a “yes” answer…so really I wasn’t any wiser afterwards. So I quietly took some picture, not disturbing any people who were there for prayer and not zooming in on the devotional statues too much.

Soon, we were too hot again and went back our “flat” with just a short lunch stop on the road. The pool beckoned so we jumped in to cool down before using the afternoon for some administration and reading up on the next countries. Apparently, landmines are still an issue in Cambodia so no going off the roads at all…

Sweet concoction – but yummy.

Dui and Thomas invited us to a home-cooked dinner. Dui makes this vegetable dish out of Thai zucchini with some scrambled eggs with a sauce and it is so y.u.m.m.y! NOM! In capital letters! Then, we actually drove into town again to have the rich tea one last time. Unfortunately, we didn’t take a single picture of Thomas and Dui… 🙁

: Iconic, isn’t it?

: I think that is some important monk guy here in Thailand

: These guys are a thing here – Ogre I think.

: Not many people, but always in the way 😛

: Dragon stairway

: At the gates

: this seems to be the cheese – we unfortunately have no idea.

: Nope, your eye does not deceive you, the doors are … crooked.

: More gold … we need more gold!

: One of two beaches in Ban Krut. This is the northern one.

: Interesting to see stained glass in a non-christian context

: I think they are having an argument …

: Detail of the roofs

: white flowers in bloom at the temple stairs

: They were made from glazed porcelain. Pretty cool.

: So good – and veggie!

: Sweet concoction – but yummy.

Day 165 – Jaded, faded

To understand today’s post, one needs to know that I’ve been having an “identity crisis” for the last couple of days. Five and a half months into the journey, the honeymoon phase is well and truly over. And our time off in Thailand as well as our stay in Kuala Lumpur freed up time to think. Do I really want to go back to sleeping in moldy rooms? Is this still what I want to be doing? Are we doing something wrong? Do we still enjoy it? For a while now, there hasn’t been one of these “WOW” moments on the motorcycle. Yes, we loved KL but this is hardly a place where you need to go on a bike…a regular plane takes you right into the heart of it.

Today, we woke up in the Cameron Highlands. This place has made it onto the cover of the Lonely Planet edition for Malaysia…and we were totally underwhelmed. All I could think of is “Sumatra’s tea plantations are nicer”. Is that what comes with travelling extensively? You’re just filled up with experiences and landscapes and can’t appreciate what is in front of you anymore? Are we even doing the countries justice anymore?

To not be a total, depressed spoilsport, we started on the whole Cameron Highlands thing: First, see a tea plantation from up close. We decided to go for the one that is especially recommended. Still not as nice as Sumatra’s.

Different products: Grade 1 and 2 teas, tiny particles for teabags and the last row is only used for fertilization

The tour through the factory was cool but only took 5 minutes and basically, you don’t need any humans for the whole process. We tried some of Boh’s own tea in the cafe which I liked but even the strawberry cake didn’t get me out of my low. It was too sweet anyway.

By this point, I have probably depressed you enough. To quote Flo who quoted Hugh Laurie: “I realized that I must be depressed when not even exploding monster trucks could excite me”. Is that what was happening?

Standing amidst tea

One the way back from the Boh tea plantation, we stopped at Cameron Bharat’s tea house because it had a nice view. The tea was not as good as Boh’s but the views were nicer.

Defeated, we went back to the hostel. To put our heads into the sand or under a blanket. But we still had a high tea planned for the afternoon so we needed to have lunch in order to make everything happen. Quick lunch in one of the local food stalls before returning to our room. Lunch turned out to be our turning point. I ordered food at this stall run by an older couple who turned out to be deaf-mute. Not only was the food excellent but the couple was amazingly lovely. Interested in where we came from, they kept asking us questions. Neither Flo nor I are able to sign so we improvised gestures or, if everything failed, wrote questions and answers down. As soon as both of them heard that we came from NZ, they opened up completely. Both of their children live in Auckland and they had been to NZ recently to visit them. We were shown pictures of them at Matamata, on the sky tower and in Rotorua. It just made for such an awesome encounter. This is why we are on this trip…not all the tourist attractions. When we left, they even got out one of their own souvenirs from NZ to give to us…which we had to refuse as we have such limited space on the bike. What a sweet gesture though!

To further remind us of the “why”, we watched “Terra Circa”. It is really helpful every once in a while to get inspired again. Reading, listening or watching other travellers is something we highly recommend. Although, just to be clear, we have no aspirations to rough it like those guys. They are insane. 🙂

The high tea and us

At 3pm, we went to our high tea at Cameron Highland Resort. And enjoyed it! Yes, it was not as fancy or delicious as the Hippopotamus one (thank you brain for reminding me) but it was a solid high tea with time to try sweet pastries and another pot of Cameron Highland tea.

There was just enough time to finish “Terra Circa” and write some postcards before we headed off to dinner in an Indian restaurant. Most of the Indians in Malaysia who we encounter are from the southern part, as is the food they prepare. For us, this is amazing as southern India is not currently along the route we have planned but this way, we get to experience the food here. My paneer Masala with naan was delicious.

Ending the day on a food high was exactly what it needed. While I finished commenting photos for the latest blog entry, Flo oiled the bike’s chain on his own. And then the bike fell…tbc…