Lets try walking the desert (Robb Maciag)

The thought of riding through a desert two years ago would have sounded ludicrous to me. The idea that I could get some kind of thrill and enjoyment from such a crazy past time would have baffled me and probably still does to many people. But I had been looking forward to getting back on the bike and going out into another, different wilderness. In comparison to Iran, the Syrian desert was tame, water was the biggest problem. Whilst there were plenty of trucks flying past blasting their horns and carrying water it was simply trying to drink enough. I don’t know exactly how hot it was but I can guess it was over 45 – “hotter than hell”.
We were cycling from 6am until midday (ish) and then resting out of the heat for a couple of hours before pushing on until about 7pm. These rest hours were a welcome break but by using a bridge was a shade it worked quite well as a wind tunnel as well. Quite a few of our lunches were enjoyed with an extra seasoning of sand. The wind rather than the heat was a bigger challenge. In the afternoons, when something to do with convection currents, the wind picked up to a fair old speed and usually not in our direction of travel.

The scenery was as amazing as I could have imagined. The dry plants somehow poking out of a ground so dry it was like a tiled floor in places. I wasn’t expecting mountains but the few that poked out from the barren skyline caught the sun and the sky in ways I have never seen before. Because of the constant heat we slept outside but with our tents up just incase of a sandstorm and the nightsky was the best so far. Not surprising considering we were over 200km from any city.

After reaching Tabas I headed on an odessey of a trip to Tehran to collect some much needed money which involved 2 lorries, 2 buses and a lot of begging. But arriving back in Mashhad I realised how much I was looking forward to heading into Central Asia, a bit of a mystery and a whole new adventure awaiting.

But not before an awesome chocolate icecream sundae!!

Birthday Celebrations with another crazy family (Robb Maciag)

Yadz Alley

The Storm is a' coming (Robb Maciag)

Desert Ground (Robb Maciag)

Yadz Mosiac