Iran - Andrew Burke [206]
From Mashhad, buses (IR25,000, four hours) pass between about 6pm and 10pm en route to Esfahan and Yazd. Ask to be dropped at the police check point in Baghestan; taxis opposite here will take you the last 5km. From points west, buses en route to Mashhad pass late at night. A savari from Tabas to Ferdows (IR40,000, two hours) is easier, then take a taxi. Alternatively, Iran Air flies daily between Tehran and Birjand, from where a taxi service costs about IR170,000 – Noushin can arrange it.
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YAZD
0351 / pop 533,000 / elev 1213m
With its winding lanes, forest of badgirs, mud-brick old town and charismatic accommodation, Yazd is one of the highlights of any trip to Iran. Wedged between the northern Dasht-e Kavir and southern Dasht-e Lut, it doesn’t have the big-ticket sights of Esfahan or Persepolis, but as a whole, and in the context of its relationship with the desert, it is at least as enchanting. It is a place to wander and get lost in the maze of historic streets and lanes (and your imagination), before returning to a hotel that is itself a piece of Yazd’s history. It’s also an ideal base for day trips to several evocative villages and towns.
Yazd has been known for its silks and other fabrics since before Marco Polo passed through. And while weaving remains an important industry, it is tourism on a far grander scale than Polo would have imagined that has been booming since the traditional hotels began opening. While nothing like Qom, Yazd is a fairly conservative town, especially in the older parts. It is also home to Iran’s largest population of Zoroastrians (see the boxed text). Yazd can be quite cold in winter and is boiling hot in summer, but not humid.
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VOICES OF IRAN: ZOHREH ZAMBE
Age: 15
Lives in: Koreshk, South Khorasan Province, at the edge of the Dasht-e Kavir
‘Koreshk is a very small village and there are only about 50 people living here, in 20 families. I am the youngest in my family and I have three sisters and two brothers – for some reason there are always more girls than boys in this village. We’re in the mountains and most people farm for fruit, walnuts and almonds. Everyone works here and we daughters help all the time. Last night we were up at 2am to change the water channels.
We also grow roses and sell the petals to be used in rose water and in medicines, though I don’t know which ones. Oh, and carpet weaving! It’s hard work! And we don’t like it, but it’s important. All the girls who make carpet have to get eye glasses when they’re young because they are always looking so hard! Everyone in the village is related somehow and we all work together. When we don’t have enough bread we ask the neighbours, and when they don’t have enough, they ask us. That’s how it works here.
I like the village, but it gets very cold and icy here in winter. Definitely, in winter the city is better. My brother lives in Tehran and I like to visit him. When I’m there I am with my brother all the time so I don’t see so much traffic, but we do visit Qom.
There are no jobs here so most of the young people leave for the city, either to Gonabad or Tehran. I’d like to go but the parents won’t allow me to leave until I get married. My mother was married when she was 13! And she had her first baby when she was 14! My father is seven years older. But I don’t want that. I want to be 20 or 25 when I get married, and my husband should be not more than four years older. But then, it is hard to find a husband here…’
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History
Yazd is said to be the ‘oldest living city