Axel1

INDIEN 2000

Expedition

Länder-/Routeninfo

Indien2000@bigfoot.com

The Last Days...
2. Juni 2000

There was a certain tension palpable in the group, a sort of nervous excitement, during our last few days in Turkey, which grew as we approached the border crossing to Iran.

One reason was that we were waiting for a new heavy duty spring for the Landrover, and this for more than a week, since the spring had "missed the plane" in Brussels. It was to be forwarded to a hotel in Van, where we had pitched camp on the lakeside of this, the largest lake in Turkey. After a day of R & R for some (and fixing the Landy for Frieder), during which we were constantly bombarded by the camp`s same tape of Turkish music over and over and over, we decided to take some daytrips around the lake.

An afternoon was spent visiting the castle of Hoshab, a fortress somberly overlooking the old caravan route to Persia from a high rocky outcrop near a river. Quite impressive with its sheer cliffs, thick impenetrable walls and towering citadel, but the guard at the gendarmery nearby was less impressed with me for trying to take a picture from this vantage point, even though I pointed the camera towards the castle and not the baracks. He was close to intervening physically, to prevent the picture being taken. Imagine the poor fellow with a busload full of enthusiastic Japanese tourists wildly clicking away in every direction. But other than the rest of Turkey, the South-east is routinely avoided by mainstream tourism for fear of the Kurdish separatists.

One day was spent to explore Nemrut Dagi (=mountain) on the other side of Lake Van, a 2800 m high extinct volcano with a calderra of 5 to 8 km diameter surrounding a few crater lakes. The road snakes up the mountain side from Tatvan on the South-western corner of the lake in serpentines, reaching a small village after a few kilometers. Two tractors were just in the process of leaving, each pulling a wagon loaded with wrinkle-eyed grannys tugging at their head scarves and boisterous kiddies clambering up and down the wagon rails. The locals out on a weekend trip to Nemrud’s crater. We followed behind in convoy, pulling faces back at the kids.

A stop was made halfway for some impromptu road repairs, where rivulets from the melting snow field above had eroded the track. The kids scampered off in search of rocks to be packed into the cracks and gulleys. A youngster with an AK casually slung over one shoulder pointed at me and asked, smile beaming with blackened teeth, “what is my name?“ ...(well, let me guess, does ‘Achmed‘ ring a bell ?). Our favorite in this regard, also heard along the shores of Lake Van later on, was: “Where is my name?“... (well, let me guess Achmed, have you looked at your birth certificate yet?)

Reaching the crater brim, an amazing sight opened up in front of us. Snow-laden sheer cliffs dropped away to the deep blue main crater lake on the western side of the crater floor, two smaller lakes in varying shades of green lying to the East. We made our way around gray ash heaps and black mounds of volcanic boulders to the farthest lake to have lunch. Also in this North-eastern corner of the crater is a crack between the rocks, where Nemrut blows out his hot breath in the form of sulphuric steam, a reminder that deep down his belly may still hold redhot lava. The way down to Tatvan presented superb views of Lake Van in the late evening sun.

Near the island of Akdamar we enquired at a restaurant about camping possibilities. The friendly owner, Ibrahim, immediately offered us a campsite on the lawn behind the restaurant with an amazing view for free, really, no strings attached, “to get good opinion in Lonely Planet“. On hearing that we were from South Africa he even spoke a few sentences in Dutch, complete with the correct accent. Soon we were also presented with tea. We decided to repay his kindness by dining in his restaurant (no doubt what he had hoped for). Surprisingly fish caught in Lake Van was also on the menu, although we had never once noticed any fishing boats. “Oh yes,“ laughed Ibrahim,“that’s because fishing forbidden now, fish make eggs now, so fishermen fined by police. But I get fish from own fisherman, fish quietly at night. Police here no problem, everyone know. They come here to eat fish also.“ (No doubt for free.)The food turned out to be delicious Turkish traditional cuisine.

Planned for the following day, was a trip up through mountainous countryside to a small village called Baksisheray. Winding our way ever higher to close on 2500m, passing small rural villages with gaping women working the fields and staring men on donkeys, we at last reached a roadblock 20km short of our destination.

A discussion with the gendarmes ensued, helped on by a Turkish-German dictionary bought in a corner shop by Christoph somewhere along the way. We and the soldiers would alternatively look up some words, string them together and hope that the sentence thus formed would be intelligable to the other party, eg. “No proceed. Permission governor Van you get. Then back tomorrow.“ There was a lot of talking, laughing and gesturing, and finally, to show us their good will, tea was driven up from a nearby village for the traditional tea ceremony. During this time a patrol of Turkish soldiers walked by up the road, looking more like a bunch of resistance fighters or semi-Rambo Foreign Legion types, some turbaned, some with sleeveless t-shirts, tanned skin, muscles bulging, ammo belts strung around waists and shoulders. Not the type one messes with.

In the end no amount of pleading worked for us and we turned back, somewhat disappointed, reaching our old campsite at Edremit by nightfall.

At last the spring for the Landrover arrived at the hotel in Van late the next afternoon, and was fitted by Frieder and Bernhard, Marzena offering moral support. Meanwhile Christoph, Sibylle, Ute and I had promised an English language course teacher to hold a discussion with his pupils. They turned out to be students at the local University of Van, as well as thirty-somethings engaged in various jobs and professions, from biochemists to environmentalists and of course the inevitable carpet dealer (“you interesting carpet?... come see my Kilims...“).

Hearing us speak in German about the PKK, the Kurdish resistance movement, someone remarked, “oh, don’t worry PKK, no problem in Van, only in Baksisheray, the village we were turned back from the previous day, as we registered with not a slight bit of shock!

Border Crossing...

With the new spring fitted, cars checked and stocked, we left Van and drove directly towards Dogubayazit, the town near the Iranian border. A great experience to turn the corner on a mountain pass and suddenly be confronted by the view of Mt. Ararat, snowcap high above the clouds at 5200m.

Guide books written 10 years ago were full of warning, recommending a type of gunrun: “drive through fast to avoid stray bullets and border banditry“. Now, all that remains of these wild days is evidence of the large-scale smuggle of fuel from Iran: informal filling stations lining the road into town. A typical “filling station“ consists of a shack, in front of which are lined up several barrels of petrol/diesel and a handpainted sign next to the road. The fuel is pumped from the barrels with a handpump, that is rotated from one barrel to the next. And sorry, they don’t wash your windscreen. We found the village quite pleasant for a border town with friendly people and a wonderful campsite just below the fortress of Isak Pashaseray, high on a cliff above Dogubayazit. We strolled round the 18^th century castle and harem in the golden afternoon sunlight, the atmosphere charged by dark clouds of a brewing storm.

As usual in border camping sites, we met other travellers: Nigel on his way to Iran, on his own in a Defender 110; Pierre (8 years old) and his mom in a Mercedes light delivery van, on their way from India to France to see Pierre’s dad; Nicole and Harald on 650 BMW’s also travelling to Iran, but wanting to spend some more time in Dogubayazit. Travel tips, stories and even Abayas (the black covering garment to be worn by women in Iran) were passed around and exchanged.

Everywhere we had been so far and told Turks of our plan to travel to Iran, we had met with incredulity, awe and a type of silent empathetic respect, as though we were heroes, inevitably heading towards the meeting with our executioners. The very first shephard we had told in the Anatolyan hills, had exclaimed with eyes bulging : “Iran ?.....iye dejil !“ which translated in our dictionary to : Iran ....very bad ! Feeling slightly tense therefore, we headed towards the border, four cars in convoy (with Nigel’s Defender), as Ararat looked on sternly from above.

A cue of 300 trucks stood waiting along the road, lined up for 4km in front of the border gates, the drivers brewing tea in Samovars next to the road. Luckily passenger cars form their own cue and we completed the customs formalities on the Turkish side swiftly. More problematic was the immigration-cum-vehicle-clearance building, where one had to report at various offices, none signposted, nobody quite sure where to go, unshaven officials trying in vain to bring some order into the maelstrom of bus and truck passengers, veiled women clutching dilapidated suitcases, crying kids with sticky hands and arguing men. We were back in our cars about to cross the border when we discovered that not all passports had been stamped. So back again, try to jump the long row of returning Iranian bus passengers unobtrusively, beg the irratable official for some more magic rubber stamps, elbow and push through crowd back to car, try to cross border a second time,......no ? ......oh, some more stamps, vehicle clearance ? .... ok, out of car, through crowd, which office?, thanks, barge through door.... what?, ...oh wait in front until called? The single-person-closed-door-office probably indicating not-so-official-fees changing hands. Third time lucky to try and cross ? Not so, only drivers drive through. All others have to cross through aforementioned dreaded building again. So Sibylle, Marzena, Ute and I found ourselves in a cue to a small green metal door, padlocked and guarded by the Holder Of The Key, a stern-looking Turkish official. At short intervals a few persons at a time would be let into the Hall Of No-mans-land between the borders and a few lucky Iranians (returning Turks are rare) would be let out. Behold, we were let in and immediately had to mill through a crowd, pushing from the other side. We crossed the poorly lit hall, dodging the dark Chadors and Abayas like so many ghosts in the shadows, to wait at the small door on the other end leading to Iran. Here too, a Holder Of The Key would open the door at intervals, mostly when the knocking of the Damned on the inside rose to a crescendo. The difference to the Turkish side was that the guard would take a certain number of passports, lock the door, open it after 5 – 10 minutes, call out some names of The Lucky Ones to step forward, or just hand back a pile of stamped passports for the owners to sort out amongst themselves and come through. So it came that Marzena and Sibylle’s names were called out, while I was able to grab Ute’s from a pile and they all disappeared through the door. Crowds of passengers came and went as I waited in vain for my passport, the realization that it had been taken from some pile for blackmarket sale growing to conviction. With every opening of the door I asked the Holder Of The Key for my passport, but he just shrugged his shoulders and motioned for me to wait. Clank went the door. I remembered the lonely planet entry: “Passports in Iran are a prized commodity, due to their high blackmarket value, never hand yours over to anyone, except an official.“ Trapped in no-mans-land indefinitely, begging for water and morsels from the hooded ghosts, no soul able to speak English, no phone call to some embassy, this was surely going to be my fate. Then suddenly, the door opened, my name was called out, I tumbled through the door into the Promised Land mightily relieved.

The customs and vehicle clearance formalities on the Iranian side turned out to be a mere formality, we were given the thumbs up in no time.

In the first town at the border we bought third party insurance and were overcharged with 20$ per car, as we later discovered. No wonder the broker was all smiles, bubbling with advice and tips for the road. Unfortunately we could hardly help it, since all numerals and words were from now on written in Farsi, using the Arabian numerals and alphabet. In Turkey some signs had at least been readable or pronouncable, even if we were clueless as to the meaning. Now a road sign would read: “poised cobra spitting at small harp – 240 km“.

We drove on to Maku, the next larger town and, after a sightseeing trip of two rundown guesthouses and one hotel with strange asylum-types for guests, we found suitable accomodation in a hotel. Bargaining was prolonged and hard, but our irritation was soothed by a friendly Iranian teacher, who suddenly appeared out of nowhere and invited us for tea at the local park. He then recommended a restaurant to us, where we had delicious kebabs with nan and yoghurt, an interesting combination. On the way back to our hotel, we were able to establish at a universal bike-cum-carspares-cum-hardwarestore that Landrover spares were widely available, a fact that also became immediately obvious on the road, where hundreds of Series III Landys, probably still in production in Iran, were driving around. And so the border had been crossed with little hassle and we were in possession of a comfortable hotel room, a warm shower and a somewhat expensive third party insurance.

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