The stroll back to base camp was pleasant. I repack the trailer, change into cycling attire and head down around midday. The track is dry enough but it's been rutted to hell. It would be fast and fun on a mountain bike. I'm on the brakes hard trying not to beat the trailer to death. I'm also trying to beat the weather. Thunder clouds gather and start to rumble around the top. I keep on the edge of it as it fills downwards, and only get a few cold drops. Same timing as yesterday. And two days before.
Back on the seal is slow too. All the rain has washed sand and grit all over the road. I take it slow through the corners. I roll through Reyneh without stopping. Ducking my head slightly as I pass the teahouse. As if that makes a flourescent yellow guy on a bike less conspicuous.
It's six km to a little village called Ab Garm. In a piece of brilliant naming, it translates literally as Hot Water. I get a room, then set about rehydrating and refueling myself with a vengeance. Then I wash and dry everything. All my rancid clothes. And the trailer. I soak in one of the thermal pools. I can't take it for long. I buy a few supplies for the road. Eat more food. A lot more. A whole fish, two plates of rice, a stack of bread, yoghurt, an onion, tomatoes. The great thing about eating sitting on the carpet is that no matter how stuffed you are, when you stop eating and lean back on the cushion, you feel better. I soak more. And have the best sleep.
Ab Garm
Mountain villages across the valley
I wake up with my alarm at 5 as usual for cycling days. I wake up again at 9. I packed last night so I'm on the road at 9:30. I'm going to go North 40km. Further down the valley, towards the Caspian. Into the green on my map. The scale is on the other half, so I don't know what it means exactly, but it's heading back to sea level. Then I'm going to go West, up a river valley through the heart of the Alborz Mountains. It looks like 55km to Baladeh, the only significant town, then another 65km to join the highway below the summit of Kandovan Pass. From there I close the loop South back into Tehran, maybe 70km. I have 2 days to do it. The km's aren't so big. But like I said before: in the mountain stages it's about altitude.
Stage 1 was Tehran to Reyneh. I had a three day interlude. Now, for Stage 2, I want to get to the summit of Kandovan. Leave myself a relatively easy day for tomorrow.
There's some huge steep downhill for the 40km. There's too much traffic. Too much slow traffic. I'm more than fast enough to carve out my own piece of road on downhills like this. But I keep getting jammed up in lines of cars behind slow trucks. And there's enough climbing to make my legs feel. Somehow it takes almost 2 hours to descend 1500m.
Would be a better cycle if more cars were following these road signs.
There's no English sign at my turn off. But there's no other roads. I refill my water bottles from a hose. When I get on again my left knee clicks. With every down stroke of the pedal a click from my kneecap. Every different angle of foot, ankle, thigh, a different click. I stop. Eat. Massage my thigh just above the kneecap. Pushing the tendon to the outside.
When I ride again there's no click. But I feel fragile. I soon forget the knee. I climb up through a steep river gorge. It's narrow, so I have to go up and over every spur. The place is filled with quarries. And quarry trucks. Above and below there's hammering. There's no wind and the heat comes off the rocks like a blast furnace. When I look down sweat drips off my helmet rim, temples, eyebrows, cheeks, nose and chin. I'm going so slow some drops hit my shoes and they change from light to dark blue. I'm glad the speedo isn't working. It would make me cry.
I've been at altitude. The oxygen should be so thick down here my lungs don't know what to do with it all. But I'm breathing hard. My legs burn.
When I get a short downhill, it takes me to river level. I've climbed, but so has the river. That's altitude in the bank.
It's not a deep gorge anymore, but still narrow. I don't get far from the river, but I'm still up and down every spur. I stop for lunch at two. When I start riding again after half an hour it's cooler. Clouds cover the sun. Then there's a spit. A band of dark clouds behind me. I keep ahead of it for a while. I think about stopping to put on my jacket, but I'm keeping ahead. There's thunder behind too.
The blue that I'm aiming for gets cloudy too. I still think I'm keeping ahead, but every time the spits catch me they get heavier. Eventually I'm just riding in the rain. On the uphills I generate enough heat to not be cold. On the downhills I shiver. I try not to. It's like hiccups. You can suppress them for a while but then when one comes it's violent. I almost shiver myself right off the bike. Water streams across the road, and the spray from the tyres hoses my legs and back.
The rain eases as I ride up into a village. I've ridden an hour since lunch. With the extra climbing clothes, I don't have room for the 6 litres of water I was carrying on the trailer previously. So I stop at the shop for more water. I've just stopped shivering but I eat ice cream anyway. It freezes my brain. I get a heap of eclair toffees. He counts them out. 200 rial each. I take 30. Is this Baladeh? I can't even hope it is. Baladeh is 20km. That means I've done 35 kilometres since the turn off. I turned off at 11:30, so... I can't continue the maths. It's too depressing.
I head out of the village and maybe it's the icecream. Maybe it's the eclairs that I'm chewing non-stop, but my legs feel fine now. I'm doing better speeds. it's not a painstaking crawl. The scenery changes faster. It's taken me this long to get warmed up. At the pace I was going it could be 2 hours to Baladeh, then I should get a couple more hours in before finding a spot to camp. The weather seems to have finished it's outburst. I won't make it to the top of Kandovan, but maybe I'll get to the head of this valley.
After half an hour the sky goes black. There's thunder from every direction and I'm getting hosed with hail.
It's taken me an hour for the 20km to Baladeh. I rid through the long main street, but there's nothing that looks like a hotel. I want to keep riding. My legs have just settled into their work. Ready for a few more hours. If I don't get a hotel here, I'm camping. I don't think the tent will keep out much of this water. I'm shivering again. I go into a restaurant to ask where there is a hotel. Here. How much? 10. Can I look. The man gives a key to a boy and I follow him outside, through a doorway and up steep narrow stairs. The boy has turned the key in the lock but the door won't open. He goes back down and I wait dripping. The man comes. He tries the key. He pushes the door but it won't move. He shoulders the door hard and it crashes open. Double bed. Bathroom. No AC. Won't need that anyway. It'll do. The man leaves me. I carry up the trailer first. Then the bike. Don't know why I bothered washing the mud off the trailer and bag.
I run the shower and take off my shoes. The water's still not warm. Crap. I go down and ask the man. Hot water? What time? He does the eyebrow thing. At home when you nod your head upwards and raise your eyebrows it's a greeting. Here, I encountered it at a lot of bikeshops. From context I've worked out that it means either "I don't have any," "get real" or "get lost."
The bathroom is dark, so I flip on the switch. No light. I wash the road spray and grit off my arms and legs under the cold tap. The floor doesn't drain. I dry myself and turn on the light in the bedroom. Nothing. I take the working bulb from the hall and put it in my room. Still nothing. 10. I should have negotiated.
By the time I've done all this the thunder has stopped. It's clear outside. Blue sky. I could have done another three hours, and be camping by the river in a grassy meadow with wildflowers. Instead I'm in this dump with no power, a scum pond in the bathroom, and probably bed bugs.
The short day today has left me a long day tomorrow. I pore over the different maps. I have about 6 that cover various parts of tomorrow's ride. No matter how much I look, it still looks like a big day.
I stroll the length of town. The bread smells good, but I can't be bothered with the queue. I buy sugar to mix in my water, and biscuits. I'm going to need a lot of sugar. I go back to my restaurant for dinner. There aren't any others. Well, kebab it is then. Lord of the Rings starts on TV. I watch the soaring opening sequence through the mountains and feel a little bit homesick. Frodo sounds funny talking Farsi. I don't stay to hear what Gollum sounds like. I have an early start tomorrow.
Back on the seal is slow too. All the rain has washed sand and grit all over the road. I take it slow through the corners. I roll through Reyneh without stopping. Ducking my head slightly as I pass the teahouse. As if that makes a flourescent yellow guy on a bike less conspicuous.
It's six km to a little village called Ab Garm. In a piece of brilliant naming, it translates literally as Hot Water. I get a room, then set about rehydrating and refueling myself with a vengeance. Then I wash and dry everything. All my rancid clothes. And the trailer. I soak in one of the thermal pools. I can't take it for long. I buy a few supplies for the road. Eat more food. A lot more. A whole fish, two plates of rice, a stack of bread, yoghurt, an onion, tomatoes. The great thing about eating sitting on the carpet is that no matter how stuffed you are, when you stop eating and lean back on the cushion, you feel better. I soak more. And have the best sleep.
Ab Garm
Mountain villages across the valleyI wake up with my alarm at 5 as usual for cycling days. I wake up again at 9. I packed last night so I'm on the road at 9:30. I'm going to go North 40km. Further down the valley, towards the Caspian. Into the green on my map. The scale is on the other half, so I don't know what it means exactly, but it's heading back to sea level. Then I'm going to go West, up a river valley through the heart of the Alborz Mountains. It looks like 55km to Baladeh, the only significant town, then another 65km to join the highway below the summit of Kandovan Pass. From there I close the loop South back into Tehran, maybe 70km. I have 2 days to do it. The km's aren't so big. But like I said before: in the mountain stages it's about altitude.
Stage 1 was Tehran to Reyneh. I had a three day interlude. Now, for Stage 2, I want to get to the summit of Kandovan. Leave myself a relatively easy day for tomorrow.
There's some huge steep downhill for the 40km. There's too much traffic. Too much slow traffic. I'm more than fast enough to carve out my own piece of road on downhills like this. But I keep getting jammed up in lines of cars behind slow trucks. And there's enough climbing to make my legs feel. Somehow it takes almost 2 hours to descend 1500m.
Would be a better cycle if more cars were following these road signs.There's no English sign at my turn off. But there's no other roads. I refill my water bottles from a hose. When I get on again my left knee clicks. With every down stroke of the pedal a click from my kneecap. Every different angle of foot, ankle, thigh, a different click. I stop. Eat. Massage my thigh just above the kneecap. Pushing the tendon to the outside.
When I ride again there's no click. But I feel fragile. I soon forget the knee. I climb up through a steep river gorge. It's narrow, so I have to go up and over every spur. The place is filled with quarries. And quarry trucks. Above and below there's hammering. There's no wind and the heat comes off the rocks like a blast furnace. When I look down sweat drips off my helmet rim, temples, eyebrows, cheeks, nose and chin. I'm going so slow some drops hit my shoes and they change from light to dark blue. I'm glad the speedo isn't working. It would make me cry.
I've been at altitude. The oxygen should be so thick down here my lungs don't know what to do with it all. But I'm breathing hard. My legs burn.
When I get a short downhill, it takes me to river level. I've climbed, but so has the river. That's altitude in the bank.
It's not a deep gorge anymore, but still narrow. I don't get far from the river, but I'm still up and down every spur. I stop for lunch at two. When I start riding again after half an hour it's cooler. Clouds cover the sun. Then there's a spit. A band of dark clouds behind me. I keep ahead of it for a while. I think about stopping to put on my jacket, but I'm keeping ahead. There's thunder behind too.
The blue that I'm aiming for gets cloudy too. I still think I'm keeping ahead, but every time the spits catch me they get heavier. Eventually I'm just riding in the rain. On the uphills I generate enough heat to not be cold. On the downhills I shiver. I try not to. It's like hiccups. You can suppress them for a while but then when one comes it's violent. I almost shiver myself right off the bike. Water streams across the road, and the spray from the tyres hoses my legs and back.
The rain eases as I ride up into a village. I've ridden an hour since lunch. With the extra climbing clothes, I don't have room for the 6 litres of water I was carrying on the trailer previously. So I stop at the shop for more water. I've just stopped shivering but I eat ice cream anyway. It freezes my brain. I get a heap of eclair toffees. He counts them out. 200 rial each. I take 30. Is this Baladeh? I can't even hope it is. Baladeh is 20km. That means I've done 35 kilometres since the turn off. I turned off at 11:30, so... I can't continue the maths. It's too depressing.
I head out of the village and maybe it's the icecream. Maybe it's the eclairs that I'm chewing non-stop, but my legs feel fine now. I'm doing better speeds. it's not a painstaking crawl. The scenery changes faster. It's taken me this long to get warmed up. At the pace I was going it could be 2 hours to Baladeh, then I should get a couple more hours in before finding a spot to camp. The weather seems to have finished it's outburst. I won't make it to the top of Kandovan, but maybe I'll get to the head of this valley.
After half an hour the sky goes black. There's thunder from every direction and I'm getting hosed with hail.
It's taken me an hour for the 20km to Baladeh. I rid through the long main street, but there's nothing that looks like a hotel. I want to keep riding. My legs have just settled into their work. Ready for a few more hours. If I don't get a hotel here, I'm camping. I don't think the tent will keep out much of this water. I'm shivering again. I go into a restaurant to ask where there is a hotel. Here. How much? 10. Can I look. The man gives a key to a boy and I follow him outside, through a doorway and up steep narrow stairs. The boy has turned the key in the lock but the door won't open. He goes back down and I wait dripping. The man comes. He tries the key. He pushes the door but it won't move. He shoulders the door hard and it crashes open. Double bed. Bathroom. No AC. Won't need that anyway. It'll do. The man leaves me. I carry up the trailer first. Then the bike. Don't know why I bothered washing the mud off the trailer and bag.
I run the shower and take off my shoes. The water's still not warm. Crap. I go down and ask the man. Hot water? What time? He does the eyebrow thing. At home when you nod your head upwards and raise your eyebrows it's a greeting. Here, I encountered it at a lot of bikeshops. From context I've worked out that it means either "I don't have any," "get real" or "get lost."
The bathroom is dark, so I flip on the switch. No light. I wash the road spray and grit off my arms and legs under the cold tap. The floor doesn't drain. I dry myself and turn on the light in the bedroom. Nothing. I take the working bulb from the hall and put it in my room. Still nothing. 10. I should have negotiated.
By the time I've done all this the thunder has stopped. It's clear outside. Blue sky. I could have done another three hours, and be camping by the river in a grassy meadow with wildflowers. Instead I'm in this dump with no power, a scum pond in the bathroom, and probably bed bugs.
The short day today has left me a long day tomorrow. I pore over the different maps. I have about 6 that cover various parts of tomorrow's ride. No matter how much I look, it still looks like a big day.
I stroll the length of town. The bread smells good, but I can't be bothered with the queue. I buy sugar to mix in my water, and biscuits. I'm going to need a lot of sugar. I go back to my restaurant for dinner. There aren't any others. Well, kebab it is then. Lord of the Rings starts on TV. I watch the soaring opening sequence through the mountains and feel a little bit homesick. Frodo sounds funny talking Farsi. I don't stay to hear what Gollum sounds like. I have an early start tomorrow.
That hotel makes the Bates motel seem civilised! Sounds more like a nightmare than a holiday you're having, Dan. Take care. Love, Mum
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