We leave town in the morning and do a small hunt for fuel, as per the normal to ensure we always have at least 1 full tank just in case we struggle to find fuel, The fuel line is long, but the guys are very friendly, 1 guy, a little to friendly, for the truckers that give us fuel we give them a few treats and a sticker, well 1 other guy approached for a sticker, I gave him one cause why not, and in the best English he knows, yells straight at me “I LOVE YOU” then ran away while I was still trying to process what had just happened. But we leave laughing and with fuel. Our goal for today and tomorrow is to reach Asareh’s parents in Isfahan so we can clean the car, restock, dry the tent and prepare to head back out again.
We wind through the mountains with views that are almost unreal before finally arriving near Hamedan for the night, it’s been a big drive and we are quite tired, we find a campsite on google maps, but its closed, or so it seems, we make a call, which basically goes along the lines of, “This is not a drug rehabilitation campsite” which is what a campsite is called in Iran. After some clarification it all clicks and the gate opens to a lovely little parking area with a caravan sitting. We meet our host, Mehdi, who is very kind and offers dried fruits and a place to sleep for the night. It freezing in the morning yet again, -5. But we are treated to breakfast and almost 100L of free diesel. I luck out and am able to fill the jerry cans which takes a ton of stress off of us. After saying our goodbyes, we push the last few hours to Isfahan, I have the cruise set at 120 as per the GPS and we are rolling along at a good pace. Then as per usual, I see a police car and try to slow down to no avail, he steps out and waves us down. I am on the brake hard; they leave a very short distance to stop in.
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- Quick break for the cat
We get out of the car and go talk to the officer, he informs me we have been caught going 124 in a 120, impossible. Asareh is translating and I am saying that we were not going that fast, which is translating as not speeding at all, Asareh looks at me with the “you were speeding look” and I replied “Oh I know, but not 124, 120” LOL keep it honest.
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- Mountain honey on the way
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- And arrived!
Luckily in the end he doesn’t want to ticket me, even with Asareh begging him to, and we drive away with a warning to slow down. We arrive in Isfahan to a kebab feast for the night and a real bed to sleep in. We are also able to get some fuel from a family friends’ truck to top us back up for when we leave again. Of course, on the way through town we grab the mandatory car wash and even have time to clean our storage boxes to make extra room.
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- Asareh doing her thing
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- Much better
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- Nothing beats a diesel transfer
