Iran - Farewell to the greatest adventure of our lives so far

We are sitting in a café in Van, Turkey, reading last night's news. God bless all people, no matter which side of this senseless event they are on!

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I'll keep it short: we're a good two to three weeks behind with our posts. And I'll be writing up all our experiences here, I'm really looking forward to it.

Nevertheless, early yesterday morning, Saturday 13 April 2024, we decided to end our trip to Iran. We had over 600 kilometres of motorway ahead of us, which unfortunately cannot be compared with the motorways in European countries. The most comfortable travelling speed here is 70 to 80 km/h. The many potholes gave our Felix a hard time for the last time. We could hardly talk to each other, so we let our newly compiled Iran playlist play on the radio - my goodness, we are romantic.

Why did we leave after just under three months, even though we had applied for a visa extension? Two reasons: The current political situation and: we are tired. Very tired. The country is so beautiful, so loving, so surprising and full of great people. And at the same time so intense, it has demanded so much of us, we are exhausted from experiences, from noises, from a lack of privacy, from conversations, from stories.

We are also tired, but never uninterested in the situation in the country. Yes, we can also say it: about the hopelessness of the people and their future.

It makes us tired, the many conversations about the dissatisfaction in a country that is so loved by its people. From now on, I will also write more openly about the conversations we have had.

I suspect that each and every one of you has thought at some point: "Is everything really so great in Iran?" Of course not, as everywhere in the world there are always two sides. But as a precaution, we haven't documented everything here on our blog. We have rarely shown pictures of people dancing, of women without hijabs. I haven't written a word about the many really beautiful and intense conversations about the big difference between the Iranian people and their government.

I myself grew up in the GDR, in a dictatorship, and learnt what it means not to say many things for fear of reprisals. I recognised a lot of things here in Iran. And I admit it right away: Iran catapulted me back to my childhood and youth at full throttle. Things that I thought I had already dealt with came back with a vengeance. And wanted to be seen. I flinched anxiously at every police and passport check. Maybe in a later post, because there's more to come.

Yes, Iran was intense, and Iran was the most beautiful thing we have ever experienced.

And so we roll through a beautiful country once again, the weather and the landscape are at their best. We buy dates for our friends and family, eat Iranian food one last time and meet our friend Erfan, who gave us great support when we entered the country.

We sit with him in a café in Khoy and tell him that we want to leave the country today. He wonders why the rush?

Yes, we have been following the world situation for days. And yes, we only have the sources that everyone has: Media from all over the world, embassy information and so on. And we both realise: it feels better to leave Iran. This decision is subjective, it doesn't get much more personal than that. Our Iran Traveller WhatsApp group receives so many thoughts about possible dangers and travel advice that we can hardly keep up with reading them all.

As we sit there in Erfan's café, we both know that we've made the right decision. No matter how the political situation develops, no matter whether the borders remain open or not, no matter what nonsense the world around us is up to: we're crossing the border today.

Erfan realises that we are serious. "Which border do you want to cross?" he asks. The northern one, where there's less risk of us having to pay the licence plate fine (actually, if you stay in Iran for more than 10 days, you have to have Iranian licence plates. Of course, we don't have them and it's up to the border officials whether we have to pay a fine of 2 or even 9 dollars per day). But travellers have told Erfan that just today there were kilometres of traffic jams in both directions at the northern border because there was a computer failure at the border.

So we quickly change our minds: We take Razi, the middle border, even at the risk of having to pay a fine. Then that's the way it is. Erfan looks at us, "Really now? Razi?" We nod, he nods and says, "All right, I'll come with you, I'll help you!" Razi is not far from his town, he can take a taxi back.

So the three of us sit in our Felix, buy fresh bread on the street one last time (actually just like when we entered the country, we travelled with Erfan here too, we bought fresh bread here too!) and stand in front of an almost deserted and car-free Razi-Kapiköy border. Erfan grabs all the papers and dashes here and there. We pay the necessary petrol tax, which you have to pay when you leave the country, and he comes back beaming: no number plate fine today. Wow! How did he do that again? We don't know, but I've been ordering the universe the whole time: "Maybe we are the lucky ones today!"

On we go, passport control, car check. We say goodbye to Erfan, he has to go back, Gerd has to continue on foot, I drive our Felix across the border. One, two, three more passport checks. Meanwhile on the Turkish side. I put my hijab aside and face the first official without my headscarf. It feels unusual. Then half an hour's break, the whole border team has to pray.

Next, I drive into a hangar, they want to look under our Felix. Let them. In the car itself, they are surprised at our vitamin supply, saying that we don't need that much, we just need to eat enough vegetables. "Let me worry about that," I think, but say that we're travelling a long way. Cigarettes? No, not a single one. How much petrol? Not a drop? Why not? Because we're happy to be filling up with clean diesel again and our Felix can breathe a sigh of relief. (I'm just thinking that last part).

We laugh a lot, the people are friendly. The strategy of travelling across the border as a woman has proved successful. People take their time, but they also leave me alone.

One last check, one last Merhaba and a first Hos Geldinez in Türkiye and after about 3 hours (record for this border, as Erfan tells me later via WhatsApp) I'm in Turkey, where Gerd is already waiting for me.

We are now tired, stand at the side of the road and want to get a good night's sleep. We don't quite manage to fall asleep, we talk, let our thoughts and feelings run free. And confirm once again that our decision is a good one, just as it is.

And now I'm sitting in our Felix, still near the border crossing, the next morning's sun is shining, I'm sitting in my own house without a hijab for the first time in months and writing down our memories. I feel the need to write down and publish this report on a daily basis.

We say thank you for a wonderful time in Iran. We say thank you to everyone who made this experience so incredibly wonderful. We say thank you Iran. And we keep our fingers crossed for a country whose people are simply so incredibly wonderful. We are all keeping our fingers crossed for the future. We wish you peace and we wish you freedom for all your decisions! And we wish you a future. Because, as you have told us again and again, that's what you miss most.

We switch AdBlue back on ✅

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Merci for "travelling with us

We are thinking about taking another break from travelling in the summer and visiting our families in Germany and Switzerland. One of the ideas is to organise a Lecture about our long journey to the Persian Gulf to prepare. If you would like to, what would interest you the most? We will also tell stories here that don't find a place here on the blog. We're thinking of the Bern and Berlin area - simply because we have family there. But other places are also conceivable. Feel free to write to us.

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