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Travels in Turkey, Iran, Pakistan & Northern India

Newsletter 3:  27 May 2002

Part 3 : Iran-Pakistan

Date: Mon, 27 May 2002 12:12:15 +0100 (BST)

Location : Islamabad (capital of Pakistan)

Total ridden kilometers today : 11,200 kms

16 days in Turkey / 3,480 kms

18 days in Iran / 3,470 kms

Pakistan vs India

We're not sure which news of this region reaches the 8 o'clock news, but

surely they'll have mentioned the rising tension between Pakistan and India. Ever since we crossed into Pakistan, english language newspapers are readily available and we can watch BBC World. The British, German, French and American Embassies have reduced their staff here, and disadvise their citizens to travel to these regions. We have no idea what will or can happen. India seems to be fed up and willing to go to war; Pakistan wants a diplomatic solution but launches missile tests

nevertheless. It's a conflict originating in the Partition in 1947 and not an easy issue.

We are safe, and we presume they will prevent us from riding into a warzone just like that. As passersby, we don't feel the tension, but obviously not all is well here.

The day before yesterday, we were on the verge of applying for our Indian visas, but since they write it out in 1 day, we decided to wait and travel around Pakistan first. If war really breaks out, they will close the border, and the visas are a too expensive to waste.

Bikes and girls

The bikers amongst you might wonder how our bikes are coping, and which

special treatments they are getting.

The preparation details are on our website, but here's a bit more :

- TYRES : after the 11,200 kms they still have a useable profile - we guess for another 3 to 4,000kms. Thank you BMW-Rudi for pointing out this type to us !

We'll travel up north and replace them with the new ones after.

On the new tyres... : after trying to put the spare rear tyres somewhere on or around our fully laden bikes, we decided to have them sent instead. As we were already familiar with the Belgian Embassy in Islamabad, they accepted to be the receiver. We knew sending a parcel of 12 kgs was a very expensive matter (+/- 350 Euro) but we were confident we could avoid too high import taxes by putting "second hand tyres" on the invoice (we did indeed use them for a couple of 100 kms back

home to make sure they looked used). But some customs person barred "second hand" and replaced it by "new", quadrupling the original price, and hop... 3,500 Pakistani rupies (64 Euro) upon arrival here...

Indeed we didn't have the hassle of dragging around 12 kgs of tyres, but

surely these are GOLDEN tyres by now.

- PUNCTURES : none so far and what a bliss. But Iris did pick up a 8 cm

long iron pin horizontally through a knob of her rear tyre. No damage but what a weird surprise.

- FUEL CONSUMPTION : for some bizarre reason, my bike still uses about 0,8 liters / 100 kms more than Iris's. First cause was surely my double airfilter being oiled too thickly. But now I'm outof options. I'll get in touch with the DR-specialist to try to tackle this problem. I want to be able to ride 450-480 kms with one tank like before.

- BRAKE PADS : rear pads changed on both bikes; front pads on Iris's bike only (first time the brake pads are changed in both of the bike's lifes)

- OIL + OILFILTER CHANGE : first change here in Islamabad. We started with 10W-60 race-oil, but no chances to find this here. Filled now with fully synthetic Caltex 20W-50 oil, the very best available. Neither of the bikes uses one drop of oil. After having

travelled with the BMW and the XT's, this continues to surprise to me.

- TANK : readjusted tank position (touches an oiltube lightly on one spot)

- no damage, no problem.

- NUMBERPLATES : Iris's had started to break off because of extensive

vibration on the rough roads. We made extra fixations on both of the bikes.

- SCOTT-OILERS : keeping them topped up is easy enough, but Iris's

Scott-Oiler was never a good one. The dripping speed, even on the lowest grade, is far too high. Looks like there is a tiny airleak around the adjuster ring, consequently the oil dribbles out too fast and splashes on pannier and trousers. I have no solution; can only seal off the gap

underneath the sidepanel.

- SPROCKETS : last night we swapped the 15 teeth front sprockets by a 14 teeth - for the mountains and rougher (read slower) going.

- SIDEPANEL : after we worked on the bikes in Kerman, the screws on one of the panels wasn't tightened enough... Arriving in Bam, Iris's right sidepanel had simply disappeared without either of us noticing. Right side = main fuse + exhaust side. Then, just like last time in Bam, the

Bam-people had a solution ! Reza, the helper at the Akhbar's Guesthouse

where we stayed, modelled a new fiberglass panel after my plastic one, complete with innerside insulation for the exhaust,and painted white. From a distance there's nothing unusual about it !

- CRASHBARS : probably the best modification we ever made on bikes. We can easily lift the bikes,and they protect our legs in the BEST imaginable way.

Other 'motards'

We cross our first overlanders, all bikers so far.

- There were the Minskriders in Yazd : two young French guys travelling

from Hanoi to Paris on Vietnam-made two-stoke 125cc Minsks, without Carnets (= the import/export document required for travelling outside Europe with your own transport). Max speed is down to 60-70 kms/h. They have used already half of the spares they're carrying, including a carburettor. They said the bikes would go straight to the garbage IF they ever made it to Paris...

Have a look at their website : http://www.minsktour2002.com

- Then we met two Dutch guys in Quetta, one on a Transalp, the other on an Africa Twin, on their way from Cambodja to Holland. Having worked for 3 years in Cambodja, they considered shorts and T-shirts just fine for riding here. One of them made a giant tumble, not remembering anything the day before we met them. Yet they pressed on to the border the next day.

- And the 3rd encounter was again with a French biker, on a Transalp, also in Quetta, travelling alone. A sensible biker, just like us (I hope ;-), with --amongst other journeys-- a lap of the Mediterranean on his record. We spent two days talking. His website = http://www.ifrance.com/christian65

Mister is a she

Now I AM used that some elderly people in Belgium address me as a boy or a man, but travelling further afield, where people are not at all used to see short hair on women (and no make-up), Ihave to cope with a real male-to-male attitude - though not in Iran obviously. This includes being offered the bills, salesmen who pat me on the shoulder, or even grab my entire arm. Only people who have had lots of contacts with foreigners or who lived abroad, immediately know I'm a woman. Iris is usually identified as a woman immediately, because she wears T-shirts and has more of a female shape then I have. But it's the first time in my life someone curiously asks why I don't grow a moustache.

The route in Iran, part 2

From Shiraz we head straight to Yazd. 3 years ago Iris suffered from a

heatstroke here and we hardly looked around. Now the average temperature is 10 degrees less (30 instead of 40) and we enjoy every bit of it. Yazd is a real desert town, made entirely of mud. The inhabitants

developed clever methods for keeping the heat out and bringing fresh air

in : the 'badgir's' or windtowers, a kind of airco-avant-la-lettre. They also provide everyone with water via an underground canal system from the mountains through the desert, to fields and settlements : these

are called 'qanat's'.

Yazd also strikes us as much more conservative : all women wear the black shador, and men again have beards. No more fashionable city wear. Lots of Pakistanis and Afghanis too.

Twice at dawn the zoroastrian "Towers of Silence" impress us very much.

It's a lonely site at the outskirts of town, with two large towers on hills and a number of small adobe buildings in between. The zoroastrians, the oldest surviving monotheist religion, don't

want to pollute any of the four elements, and thus left their death on the towers to be eaten by vultures. Nowadays they

are buried in leaden coffins.

Sitting at sunset in the city centre on top of an unused mosque, is 1001

nights come alive.

In Kerman, another 380 km further east, we have our second rendez-vous of this journey : my niece Tine is backpacking through Iran with her new husband Tom, on honeymoon. How great to meet someone familiar so far away from home. Odd to see each other in headscarfs, and very odd for us to have "a man" in our compamy. As it happens, we're around the mosques on a public holiday : the death of prophet Reza, the 8th imam for the Shi'its. Just like on Ashura, when mourning, men dressed in

black walk around the mosques, singing rhythmically and beating their heads and chests either loudly by hand, or by whip with short chains. The bloodshed variety is not practised here – thank you very much.

People remain very friendly and invite us into the mosques to sit besides the (convincingly weeping) women. A few men also cry their heads off, but there's no tension whatsoever, and noone bats an eyelid when we take pictures.

After Kerman, we move on to Bam. From now on, up to Dera Gazi Khan in

Pakistan, we travel on a stretch we travelled three years ago.

Tine and Tom had left a much-needed parcel with spares at Akbar's

Guesthouse. The retired English teacher welcomes us so heartily we immediately feel at home. He installs us in a room instead of the dorm, and wants to hear all the details about my accident 3 years ago. The bikes meanwhile stand fully laden in a burning midday sun on his central courtyard. As I remove my watch-annex-thermometer, the temperature reading has gone blank, which it only does at 60 degrees and above...

Here we meet another exceptional traveller : a very interesting Hungarian woman, speaking 6 languages fluently. The last one she learned was Persian (= Farsi, the main language in Iran), which she learned all by herself from books at home for over 10 years. This was her first time in Iran, and she was extremely pleased to discover she could understand and talk about almost anything. Reading and writing was equally no problem. Coincidentally, she bumped into a group of Iranian university researchers, women, making an extensive study about regional handicrafts, especially the masks women wear in the area of Bander

Abbas and Minab (Southeastern Iran). She got an old mask as a present.

Putting this on gives a tiny glimpse of what some women's lives look like...

After Bam, we reluctantly said goodbye to an Iran we had enjoyed very much. From last time we knew Pakistan would make a rupture, not a smooth transition. Iris adjusted quickly; I didn't feel comfortable for a while. However the Pakistani's did everything to make us feel very welcome. At the border we received food and drinks for free, and on our stop-over for the night in Nok Kundi (tiny village), we were fed and taken care off, and a gunman was assigned to sleep next to our

tent. Further north, towards Islamabad, there was an entire day we didn't pay for a single coke.

People come to us to talk, in a friendly and polite way. But Pakistan's tough reality is never far away : towns are filthy, sewage and electricity systems work badly, traffic is literally of the "close contact" variety. We overtake WFO-trucks on their way to Afghanistan --we travel at 9 kms from the border at one point-- and ride along masses of Afghan refugee tents. Water and food are unreliable everywhere. Pakistan is no easy country to travel in.

The stretches Bam to Quetta (2 days / 1,100 kms) and Quetta to Islamabad (3 days / 1,200 kms) were to be the toughest of our journey so far : extremely hot (40-50 degrees), unpredictable roads and traffic, long rides. We organised them well, split them in chewable parts with reliable stop-overs, and made it safely without being totally knackered. We're proud - we were up to the challenges.

In Islamabad we treat ourselves to a luxurious hotel (with aircon

obviously), instead of the camping where all overlanders meet. Sleeping in a tent at 45 degrees is not our idea of fun.

We drink a cup of real coffee at the Belgian Embassy (heaven!), look around in big bookstores, do necessary chores on the bikes, and... have a highly enjoyable meal with dr. Aly Khokhar and his family, the surgeon treating me here in 99.

Once north from Islamabad, all is new, but at least the temperatures will drop... or so we hope !

Iris and Trui