Iran - Andrew Burke [279]
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CROSSING THE TURKMENISTAN BORDER AT INCHEH BORUN
The border known as ‘Incheh Borun’ is actually at Pol. That’s 4km off the Gorgan road: turn north, 12km before Incheh Borun village. On the Iran side peddlers sell felt rugs and the nearby lakes are popular with picnickers on Fridays, but there’s no public transport. On the Turkmenistan side, 1.5km across no-man’s land, there’s just a lonely gateway where the queues of Turkish LPG gas trucks wait. You’re really in the middle of nowhere, with even the small town of Etrek around 20km distant. There is reputedly a bus to Balkanabat (formerly Nebit-Dag) in the late afternoon but don’t count on it. Lonely Planet has only received one report of travellers crossing here in recent years, although they described officials as ‘utterly charming’. It’s much more common to cross the Turkmenistan border at Sarakhs or Bajgiran.
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The Aq Qal’eh–Incheh Borun road passes within 2km of Alagöl, a large if relatively unspectacular lake that’s immensely popular with local picnickers at weekends. In season you might see flamingos or Turkmen herders’ öy tents. Semi-wild camels roam the fast, desolate Incheh Borun–Maraveh Tappeh road, which passes within 3km of the Makhtumkuli mausoleum (30km west of Maraveh Tappeh). The modernist mausoleum looks like a gigantic four-stemmed concrete umbrella rising discordantly from the hilly steppe. It commemorates the (disputed) birthplace of Turkmenistan’s ‘national’ poet Fargo Makhtumkuli (aka Pyragu Magtymguly; 1733–83), whose statue appears in virtually every Turkmen town. During No Ruz the monument is over-run by truly vast hoards of patriotic Turkmens. However, it’s very peaceful on normal weekdays when humans are heavily outnumbered by scorpions.
Charming, ethnic-Turkmen savari-driver Abul Halim Qarei ( home 0171-225 4049, call evenings) usually does the Gorgan–Aq Qal’eh run but offers very fair prices on day trips into the Turkmen hinterlands. He speaks a little English.
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GONBAD-E KAVUS
0172 / pop 134,000
Until utterly obliterated by the Mongol and Tamerlane rampages, Jorjan was the region’s foremost ancient city. All that remains today of Jorjan are a few lumpy excavations behind the huge, ornate Imamzadeh Yahya (West Mihan St), 3km west of central Gonbad-e Kavus. This predominantly Turkmen town grew up around Jorjan’s one surviving building, the utterly magnificent Mil-e Gonbad (admission IR3000; 8am-8pm). Soaring, 55m tall on 12m-deep foundations, this astonishing tower has the cross-section of a 10-pointed star, and looks like a buttressed brick spaceship. It was built in 1006 for poet-artist-prince Qabus ibn Vashmgir but is so remarkably well preserved that one can scarcely believe it’s 100, let alone 1000 years old. Qabus (Kavus), the Zeyarid ruler of surrounding Tabarestan, had just six years to marvel at his creation before an assassin put him in it permanently. Well, not so permanently, actually. His glass coffin, which originally hung from the tower’s dome, vanished long ago. Now there’s nothing to see inside, although it’s well worth the entry fee for the remarkable echoes both within and even more spookily from the marked circular spot some 40m in front of the tower. Mil-e Gonbad is hard to miss in a park 2½ blocks north of the central Enqelab Sq.
On Friday the hippodrome at the eastern end of town holds savar kareh horse races ( 1pm spring & autumn).
On hot summer days you might want to retire behind the heavy bronze doors of the swish, full-sized indoor swimming pool ( 555 6909; Peyam St; per hr with/without sauna IR30,000/20,000; 11am-11pm, Tue, Thu & Sun for women, other days men). It’s one block east of Daneshju Blvd near its southern end.
The bearable, central Mosaferkhaneh Khayyam ( 222 7663; off Imam St; tw/tr/q IR46,000/67,000/79,000, showers IR5000) is just south of Enqelab Sq before East Mihan St. It’s signed in