DAY 145 - SHARJAH TO BANDAR ABBAS

CRAZYJOURNEY IS BACK IN IRAN!

Hummer on the ship back to Iran

With the Hummer on a separate boat which left from Sharjah Port the night before, we had arranged to get ourselves on a different ferry from Port Rashid in Dubai back to Bandar early this morning. As we’ve become used to, we were the only westerners on the boat and we slept for almost the entire 6 hour trip.

Arriving in Bandar Abbas again that afternoon, we checked back into the same hotel as last time, chilled out and got to watch the Champion’s League semi-final between Liverpool and Chelsea. We did our best to ignore the dead-pan Farsi voiceover commentary.

After the match, we continued our endless struggle with the blogs and got to bed early with Dave expecting another painful day at the port tomorrow to try and release the Hummer.

DAY 145 ROUTEMAP - FERRY BACK TO BANDAR ABBAS

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SHOTGUN LEGISLATIVE FRAMEWORK

As the front passenger seat in the Hummer is the most comfortable, there is always heated competition for it’s use, especially on days with long stretches of driving. Through many heated arguments, stringent shotgun rules have gradually been established. The following are the CRAZYJOURNEY shotgun rules:

1. Visibility: In order to call shotgun, the car must be visible by the caller.
   
2. Outside: You must be outside and the driver must be in the process of leaving on a particular journey. A call cannot be made if there is a roof over the callers head, unless in a multi-storey carpark.
   
3. Expiry: The reign of shotgun automatically expires if there are any substantial stops. This does not include petrol stops unless a meal was included in the petrol stop.
   
4. Offside: In order for the shotgun call to be legitimate the caller must not be offside, ie in front of the driver as he walks to the car.
   
5. Clarity: The shotgun call must be loud, clear and heard by the majority of passengers.
   
6. Tie: A tie in a shotgun call between two or more people leads to a rock off showdown for shotgun position. Only one single rock off competition is acceptable.
   
7. Tyre Lick: There is only one feasible method for a challenger to override a legitimate shotgun call. This is known as a ‘tyre lick’. The challenger can call ‘Tyre Lick’ and the driver who is a neutral party will be called upon to select with reasonable judgment and integrity a ten centimeter length on the front right tyre. A reasonable amount of pressure and tongue surface area must be applied during the lick. A majority of the tribunal must agree on the lick’s quality. Any evidence found of previous tampering of the tire by a tire licker results in a shotgun tribunal where a maximum fine of two weeks in the bitch position (back middle) can be given to the guilty party. If tyre lick is not performed, the shotgun tribunal can automatically serve a two trip bitch positioning. The tire lick can only be called up to the time the driver puts the keys in the ignition. (Footnote: The licker may not consume any liquid for 5 minutes after the tyre lick.)
8. Not Bitch: A subsidiary battle after the shotgun call is the ‘Not Bitch’ call. This is only used when 5 passengers are in the Hummer. 2 successful callers get either window seat leaving one loser to ride bitch.
   
9. Back-Left Call: Due to recent developments, a ‘Shotgun Back-Left’ call has become another heated battle. This successful call entitles the passenger to ride in the back-left passenger seat. The rules for this call are the same as the main shotgun call. (see aforementioned legislative articles 1-7). Two factors have led to the desirability of this call; 1-After the close call with the overloaded truck in India, shotgun riders now have to deal with a broken window, held up temporarily with paper splints and constantly sliding down which leads to noise and constant irritation. 2 –The TV screen in the back-right passenger position displays some DVDs only in black and white.
   

Ends.

For footage of CRAZYJOURNEY’s first ‘Tyre Lick’, please view the video below with caution…

(if you can't see this video, click here)

DAY 142 - 144: LAST DAYS IN DUBAI

Dave and Fintan in the Dubai Desert

We made the most of our last few days in Dubai by getting ourselves back into some sort of health by eating 3 meals a day again, having decent sleeps and going to the gym again.

Rhys and his Dune Buggy

After constantly putting it off, on our last day we took a day trip out on a desert adventure tour which kicked off with a dune buggy drive. Bouncing through gigantic sand dunes at over 60km/h in nothing more than a cage attached to a motor is definitely one of the most thrilling ways to experience the desert. Getting a bit cocky, we began to lose the run of it, tearing through the sand until Dave wrote his buggy off in a spectacular hurdle attempt.

The boys on some camels

After this high paced madness, we took a quick camel ride to a desert camp and gathered with other travelers for a barbeque, belly dancing and some sheesha, a favourite of ours since entering the Middle East. This flavoured tobacco smoked through a tall pipe and filtered through gurgling water, is an indispensible part of Arabian social life and a relaxing way to end the day.

DAY 140 - 141: ANZAC DAY - GUEST BLOG APPEARENCE BY CHUCK

Chuck and Rhys celebrate Anzac Day with the Aussie Expat Contingent

April 25^th is a national day in Australia held in remembrance of the “diggers,” Australian and New Zealand soldiers who lost their lives in the Dardanelles in Turkey  during the Second World War.

After what could only be described as a hefty pre-anzac day session the night before, during which we made several promises (with the best of intentions) to rise and shine only hours after arriving home to attend the ex-pat  dawn service, Rhys and Chuck overslept by 45 minutes and went back to sleep until  midday. We then dusted ourselves off, held a private moment’s silence and headed down to Jumeriah beach to meet up with fellow Aussies Russ, Tess, Mark, Jess, “Gillian” and Knighty to carry on the day. The beach was packed with people reveling in not only the weekend but the 38 degree heat, and no time was lost getting together with our fellow patriots and having a drink in the sun and on the sand. The beach had great atmosphere due to several decorated camels wandering around and the about 50 cars backed up onto it, pumping out all kinds of music from Arabic hits to top forty. 

Chuck on the Beach

We took up spots in the water and as the sun began to slowly go down, we took the advice of our Aussie friends and moved on to the beach Bar “Coco Cabana’s.” We sat down for a very long lunch to the sounds of Phil Collins and the Eagles in this brilliant little spot that was straight out of Miami in the 80s, and wound the afternoon with some cocktails.

Rhys with the camels

As we were moving back to the beach to collect our belongings with a somewhat depleted crew after suffering a few casualties, Rhys, Gill and Knighty got involved in a brief spot of beach volleyball before we headed back to Knighty and Gill’s house for a few more glasses of Champagne. Upon arrival, Gill realized that one of them had dropped their house keys, and had no other option but to go back and comb the volleyball court for the keys  for a few hours in the dark while Rhys and Chuck moved on to Barasti Bar to keep the party going and rendezvous later. Although Knighty and Gill were understandably spent by the time the key surfaced at 10pm, we kicked on well into the night and made a few new friends in Barasti, including a nice lady who told us her name was Mrs. Robinson. After she had bought us several rounds on her husband’s credit card to tune of our ironic vote of thanks, “here’s to you, Mrs. Robinson,” we said our goodbyes and collapsed into bed, but not before a quick trip to the local petrol station for a well earned visit to the Golden Arches. All in all it was an incredible ANZAC day that I’m sure we’ll both remember for a long time.

Aussie Beach Volleyball Session

The following day we were invited around to Tim and Gill’s place again to make up for being locked out of afternoon drinks the day before and watch the Waratahs brilliant in the super 14. After a few very slow beers and a world class, hangover-busting surf n’ turf lunch cooked by Gill on the Barbie, things really gathered pace when Tim opened a few extra cases of beer and a bottle of Tequila, then Mark and Jess arrived, we put on Phil Collins and once again we had a party on our hands. Although it didn’t go on as late as the ANZAC day, we had a great time and thanks again to Tim and Gill for having us around to their place for a memorable afternoon. 

DAY 139 - RETURN TO DUBAI DAY 1

Burj Dubai, World's Tallest Building!

Back in Dubai today, we contacted the joke of a shipping agency who informed us that the next ship might be in two days but they weren’t sure. This was typical of the shoddy outfit and it left us not knowing our exact plan of action. We got ourselves back into the cheapest accommodation we could find again and needed to call the next day to find out further information.

If the boat was going to be delayed, we much rather be waiting here in Dubai then in Bandar Abbas in Iran and was at least some consolation, especially for the Aussies who wanted to celebrate Anzac Day.

That evening, as our luck would have it, one debacle led to another when the shipping company informed us that our car ferry was now stuck in Kuwait. This left us in the uncertain position of not knowing what date we could return to Iran. We finally came to an arrangement whereby the Hummer would travel on a separate ship, thus giving us another few days in Dubai. Hopefully the ferry does leave this time or we may as well start looking for jobs in Dubai because we can’t seem to leave this place!

DAY 136-138 - MUSCAT AGAIN and BACK TO DUBAI

The next few days involved towing and froing between embassies in Muscat in a last ditch effort to try obtain a Saudi Visa, as well contact with the shipping agents to organise our Plan B option, which was a return ferry to Iran.

Full of hope, we headed early to the Saudi embassy for the appeal. However, our spirits were quickly dampened when the first Saudi official we met wouldn’t let us enter the building, never mind meet anyone else. The grumpy sod bluntly explained that unless we were Omani citizens, there was no way we were getting a Visa.

Over the next two days, in a last ditch effort, we managed to secure an amazing letter in both Arabic and English from the Irish Embassy in Riyadh, which kindly asked for support on behalf of the Irish Government in helping us pass through the country. However nothing materialized and realizing our attempts were futile, we now need to head back to Dubai with our tails between our legs in order to catch the next car ferry back to Iran.

OUR 2 OPTIONS....NOW WE HAVE TO TAKE THE IRANIAN ROUTE

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DAY 135 - RAS AL HAAD TO MUSCAT

Waving Goodbye to The Turtle Resort in Ras Al Haad

We found out this morning that our Saudi Visas had been rejected and that we had to return to Muscat to appear at the embassy and appeal the decision. We were hugely disappointed as we had intended on visiting the Omani Desert and the vast empty quarter to do some dune driving. So after a quick snorkle and lunch at the Turtle Resort, we hit the road.

Lovely views on the road from Sur back to Muscat

This drive back has some beautiful ocean scenery which was some consolation after the bad news. Arriving back late in Muscat, we met the visa agent again to get our passports and documents back and arrange our plan of attack at the Saudis.

DAY 135 ROUTEMAP

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DAY 134 - SUR TO RAS AL HAAD

Rhys looks over the Dhow Boat-Building Yards of Sur

After a decent lie in, quick feed and braving the searing heat, we had a look around Sur and it’s Dhow boat building yard which since it was the weekend, wasn’t very active. With every boat carved by hand, the town has been regional centre of this traditional activity for over 300 years.

Dave and Fintan near Sur

Heading further south towards Ras Al Haad, we had a lovely coastal and desert drive. Oman is a big off-roading destination so we decided to get involved and went joy-riding around the desert to take the Hummer through it’s paces. At one point, looking over a vast expansive desert, we had an ingenious idea to get some good footage of the Hummer disappearing out into the desert. 

The Hummer nearly gets stuck!

Funnily enough this is nearly what happened, after Dave sped into the desert with a cloud of sand behind him, only to almost get stuck in muddy and sinking sand! He managed to just about keep momentum and returned to the lads in a shattered mess, fully believing he was going to die in quick-sand!

Rhys outside our Barasti Huts in Ras Al Haad

Sticking firmly to the tarmac for a while, we reached the Turtle Resort in Ras Al Haad. This lovely beach hut accommodation, run by Indians, has its own lovely beach and a relaxed atmosphere. Rhys and Fintan, sweaty after a long drive, legged it in for a quick snorkel and were lucky enough to just avoid a poisonous Morey Eel who passed close-by!

The Spotted Morey Eel that nearly caught us snorkling!

Back on dry land, the lads found a fishing rod and had a crack at catching the dinner for that evening. Rhys being the bloke that he is, formulated a bread and honey concoction that he was adamant was irresistible to fish. Out on the pier, there wasn’t much action. He will argue strongly against this, but Rhys was the only person to get a solid bite on the line, and completely bottled it, letting our dinner escape!

Dave tries to knock Fintan off the floating pier while he's fishing!

We had a lovely fish dinner at the resort and met a nice English couple who were off-roading around Oman, as well as a travelling Australian couple. After dinner, Dave, Rhys and Fintan along with the other two couples headed to the main attraction in the area, Raz Al-Jinz beach, the Easternmost Point in the Arabian Gulf and a major nesting site for the endangered green turtle.  20,000 turtles return annually to this exact location to lay their eggs during night. The whole area is under government protection and we took a guided tour of the beach to witness these gentle giants nesting. As everyone knows, these guys don’t move too fast and the extraordinary process takes about two hours before they crawl back into the ocean. 

A Green Turtle lays her eggs at Ras Al Jinz Beach

DAY 134 ROUTEMAP

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DAY 133 - MUSCAT TO SUR

Oman Dive Centre By Night, where we had our Buffet Dinner

Dave and Fintan had an early start, heading to the Irish consulate’s office in Muscat to collect our letters of recommendation before meeting the lads at the Saudi Visa agent’s office to hand in all our documents. The application process will take a few days, so its now the perfect time to hit the road south to visit other parts of Oman.

Before hitting the road for the 5 hour drive to Sur, our first stop, we decided to spend another lovely day back at the beach of the Oman Diver Centre. This place is very relaxing and we rented kayaks for a few hours to visit some of the surrounding beaches.

After another buffet dinner, we hit the road late on a long coastal drive to Sur. Unfortunately the new coastal highway wasn’t quite complete and we were lucky we had the Hummer for sections of the drive that were still under construction.

Arriving at 3am in Sur, we checked into a cheap hotel and hit the hay straight away.

DAY 133 ROUTEMAP

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DAY 132 - MUSCAT DAY 3

The Oman Dive Centre in the Distance

This morning, we up early to get our Jordanian Visas and letters of recommendation organized. The Jordan Visa process was straight forward as all of us could get a Visa upon entry anyway. However, getting hold of letters of recommendation at such short notice, was a much harder task, especially since there was no Irish or Australian Embassy in Muscat. Rhys and Chuck managed to get a faxed letter from the Australian Embassy in Riyadh but Dave and Fintan needed to wait until the following day to collect their letters from the Irish Consulate in Muscat.

After dropping Chuck home, Dave, Rhys and Fintan took a trip down the coast to visit Bandar Al Jissah, the picturesque location of the Shangri-La Hotel Resort. We couldn’t find our mate Talal in this massive and extravagant complex so instead we headed down the road to the Oman Dive Center, located in a picturesque cove with an amazing beach to swim in. We would’ve loved to have stayed in the resort’s Barasti Hut accommodation but this place is so popular that it’s actually booked out for the next 3 months! We soaked up the sun and had a relaxing time on the beach smoking some Shisha and having a few drinks before meeting Talal after his shift for a great buffet dinner there.

The Boys Getting Stuck into Omani Shisha! Note the Hilarious Poses....

DAY 131 - MUSCAT DAY 2

Dave working the phones outside the Saudi Embassy in Muscat!

Because of the Chinese debacle and a few other delays along the way during CrazyJourney, we’ve been a bit pushed for time, especially since we’ve set deadlines in Europe to meet the Paul Sokhi, Marty Spargo and a mob of Irish Hooligans. So needing to stick to a schedule, we thought it would be ideal to obtain a Transit Visa for Saudi Arabia and drive directly from UAE to Jordan, rather than taking a boat back to Iran and chinning a much bigger loop around Iraq to reach reach the same destination. We had heard stories that Saudi Transit Visas were notoriously difficult to obtain and as a westerner, dealing with the Saudis is almost impossible.

With the worst possible outcome being rejection, we decided to suss out the Saudi Embassy in Muscat. When we arrived, we found out that all applications needed to be done through an agent and luckily enough he was still around outside the Embassy. We organized to bring him all the necessary documents the following day which included letters of recommendation from our respective embassies as well as Visas to Jordan as proof of passage.

The Hummer outside The Sultan's Palace, Muscat

Once this was done, we took a drive to Muttrah, a lovely harbour port and also to Muscat’s old town. Muscat is a spotlessly clean low rise city. The highly respected Sultan Bin Qaboos, has opened up the country to tourism over the past 20 years and ensured that this sector’s development has not come at the detriment of the country’s natural beauty, peaceful atmosphere or national identity. While in the Old Town, we stopped to visit the Sultan’s magnificent Palace. Returning home, we stopped at one of the old coastal forts, overlooking the picturesque Muttrah.

Dave and Rhys look over a Foggy Muttrah

That evening, Rhys, Dave and Fintan went for dinner with Detta, Yayha a friend of Detta who worked in the Omani Government and his son  Talal at a lovely restaurant by the sea. Interestingly enough, Talal had worked in Dublin for 5 years and we had a great laugh at his accent which had a  slight Dublin twang when he spoke English. 

As the tongues loosened up, plenty of stories started flowing. Yayha told us a cracker about his wealthy Arab friend who is 100 years old and had had 100 children, and constantly renews his supply of wives. Its reputed that the legend at his age, still has no need for Viagra to do the business! We finished up the night with a few drinks with the legend Talal, who is now a manager at the 6-star Shangri-La hotel in Muscat, so we promised to pay him a visit tomorrow.

DAY 130 - MUSCAT DAY 1

CRAZYJOURNEY MEETS THE OLYMPIC TORCH RELAY!

The Olympic Torch Relay Guards don't like photos being taken!

Dave and Fintan were up early to meet Detta in her hotel where we had an interview with the Times Of Oman about CRAZYJOURNEY.  The Indian journalist didn’t seem to give a toss about the interview and spent most of time answering phonecalls as we in the middle of answering his questions. We were sure the article was going to be a shocker, but it actually turned out quite well! See copy below and click on it to read...

After the interview, we met up with Rhys and Chuck and headed to the Crowne Plaza where we had heard there was a lovely beach. We chilled out here for a few hours and kicked a rugby ball around. It turned out that the Chinese Olympic Torch Relay entourage were staying in the hotel. These are the supposed torch guardians whose job it is to protect the torch from the Pro-Tibetan activists and constant attempts to put out it’s flame. We’ve been watching the whole relay with interest and find the thing a complete farce, yet hugely entertaining. Muscat will probably be the most quiet and tame leg of the relay and the thought came into our minds of stirring things up a bit, possibly involving water-ballons from a safe distance. But sense took the better of us when Fintan and Chuck saw the 20 guard procession bundle the flame into a minivan outside the hotel!

The Crowne Plaza's Beach in Muscat

Later that evening, we caught up the torch relay itself at its final leg in Muscat’s main park. To be honest, we were a bit disappointed by the overhyped procession and the ridiculous amount of security surrounding one old guy who was struggling to hold the torch and make it to the finish! Davo even threw in a few ‘Free Tibet’ shouts to stir things up a bit, but disappointingly enough, there wasn’t one incident to have a laugh at in Muscat. We’ll have to just make do with the BBC World reports from other citys for a laugh.

The Olympic Flame passes us by

DAY 129 - DUBAI TO MUSCAT, OMAN

CRAZYJOURNEY ARRIVES IN OMAN

Night Falls Over beautiful Muscat 

We left Dubai late enough for the 5 hour drive down to Oman. Fintan had already been here but the rest of the boys didn’t know much about this country. The border formalities were relatively easy since they’re used to UAE cars coming down for weekend trips.

About two hours after crossing the border we arrived in Muscat where we Detta O’Reilly, a friend of Fintan’s family and the Omani Consulate in Ireland, who happened to be in Muscat at the same time. Like Dubai, Oman caters for a more upmarket traveler so we were lucky enough that Detta had picked out a relatively cheap and central place for us to stay.

After checking in, Detta showed us to a an outdoor kebab restaurant down the road which was filled Omani locals who had their eyes glued to the Italian Football on a projected outdoor screen. They all seemed to be huge supporters!

As it turns out, a stage of the Olympic Torch Relay is being held in Muscat so we definitely wanted to get to Oman in time for it, especially after all the Pro-Tibeten disruptions and controversy surrounding it lately.

DAY 129 ROUTEMAP

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DAYS 118 - 128: DUBAI DAYS 1-10

CRAZYJOURNEY HITS DUBAI !

Dave and Fintan at Dubai's famous Burj Al Arab Hotel

Arriving in Sharjah around lunchtime, it was Friday which was actually the weekend here so all customs offices were closed, meaning that the Hummer would have to remain on the boat until the following day. Sharjah is one of the most conservative of the seven Emirates so we didn’t hang around for long, instead heading straight to Dubai, it’s glitzy neighbour, only 50kms away. The next day, Dave had to return to Sharjah port and go through an 8 hour ordeal with customs, police and immigration to get the Hummer out of the port and back on the road again.

Arriving into the city, we were instantly struck by the hyper-development being undertaken. The sheer scale and imagination behind some of the construction projects is incredible. Dubai’s vision, driven by it’s ruler Sheikh Mohammad, is to establish itself as a city like no other on Earth. Marveling at structures such as the ostentatious Burj Al-Arab, the World’s only 7-star hotel as well as the Burj Dubai, recently announced as the tallest building on Earth despite only being 75% complete, highlights Dubai’s over-the-top nature and craving for attention.

One project that nearly defies belief are the Palm Resorts which are being developed off the coast of Dubai. The first of the three Palms Resorts is almost complete and they intend for a million people to live there. As if this isn’t crazy enough, this is by far the smallest of the three Palm Resorts. On top of this, they’re also developing the World Resort, which is basically an island resort in the shape of the world, where prospective buyers can buy plots on their own countries.

Satellite Image of Dubai in 2000

The same Satellite Image, in 2008, complete with Palm and World Resorts!

There was plenty to keep us going during our week in Dubai. With an enormous selection of ultra-modern shopping malls, flamboyant hotels, chic nightclubs and every kind of restaurant under the sun, it all seemed a bit too easy for us here, especially considering the countries we’ve been travelling through for the past few months. The novelty of having a wide selection of decent places to eat was something we had almost forgotten about! We even felt spoilt with the option of going to the cinema!

When it comes to alcohol and nightlife, Dubai is extremely liberal for an Arab city. Since alcohol has been non-existent for us over the last few weeks, we indulged in a pint or ten of ‘The Black Stuff’ at Dubai’s Irish Village and visited some of Dubai’s best nightspots. Our favourite was Boudoir, where we had an amazing Tuesday night which happened to be ladies night so the place was packed out with Emirates and Eithad air hostesses. There’s about 10,000 Air Hostesses living in Dubai, arriving in Dubai, we all felt a bit like convicts being released from prison after travelling through strictly Muslim countries!

Dave and Rhys Going a bit mad at Boudoir Nightclub, Dubai...

The amount of money in this city can be seen everywhere and the best indication is the huge amount of top end cars tearing around the city. It gets to the stage where you don’t even look twice at Ferraris and Lamborghinis. In fact, Dubai was the first place where the Hummer wasn’t ogled at for once. And Liberty Automobiles who are the biggest Hummer dealer outside the US, were good enough to give the car a free service. However, we still couldn’t organize a new wing mirror, which is still hanging off after our incident with the overloaded truck in India!

Chuck with Russ and Tess

There’s a good expat contingent over here and we were lucky enough to know a few people who showed us around. A big thanks here to Russ and Tess for looking after us.

Fintan's second time wakeboarding...

Also a big thanks to Biffo, who brought Rhys and Fintan out for an amazing days wakeboarding near the Palm Resort!

Rhys gets involved on the Waterski

We took a day trip and headed Southwest for Abu Dhabi, the capital of the United Arab Emirates. Much more conservative and laid back than Dubai, this city seems to retain a much stronger connection to the desert and it’s Arab culture. Luckily, the Red Bull Air Race was being held in the harbor during our visit and we spent a great day watching these agile racing planes race around a track at 400 kms per hour only 10metres above the water.

One of the Red Bull Planes zips near Fintan's Head!

Dave and Rhys watch one of the planes on the Big Screen at the Red Bull Air Race

We really spoilt ourselves with a 10 stay in Dubai and felt a million miles away from the countries we had just travelled through.  It was a good chance to get our lives back in shape and look remotely healthy again! But Dubai isn’t a cheap city and although our serviced apartment acommodation was the cheapest we could find in the city, it was still by far the most expensive place to stay on CrazyJourney so far. Dubai is more of a high-end destination and doesn’t really cater to the backpacker on a budget! It was now time to get the show on the road again and head on to Oman, a country we had all been looking forward to for a long time.

DAY 117 - BANDAR ABBAS TO SHARJAH, UAE

CRAZYJOURNEY SETS SAIL FOR THE UNITED ARAB EMIRATES!

Chuck waits for our Ferry to be unloaded at the Port in Bandar Abbas

This morning, Dave was up early again to go to the shipping agent's office where he was given the good news that the ship was leaving today. After buying the tickets, we all got packed up and headed to the port.

At the customs offices, we met two other overlander groups, one Dutch couple and another German couple, who had just disembarked from the same ferry we were about to get on to. With not much time to spare until customs closed, we all rushed to the office to try and get the Carnets and passports stamped and obtain the exit permits for the car. Unfortunately we didn’t make it on time for the exit permits and were potentially in a bit of trouble to get the car on the ship.

Entering the port, with every checkpoint an ordeal, we eventually ofund our ship, and had to wait for the tide to rise to an appropriate height for its cars to be unloaded and for us to then board. This ship was packed with brand new cars en route to Iran and Russia from UAE, so it was a 6 hour wait until we could even board the ferry. During this entire time we were still unsure if we could board since we didn’t have the correct exit permits. Dave left with some customs officials to visit numerous offices of port head honchos and after several hours or arguing and a $50 bribe, everything seemed to work itself out.

Finally at 2am, the ship finally set sail for Sharjah with us being the only passengers onboard along with some cargo. Next stop Dubai and Oman!

DAY 117 ROUTEMAP

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DAY 116 - BANDAR ABBAS DAY 2

The beach at Bandar Abbas

Dave was up early to hit the shipping office to try and figure out where we stood with the ferry to UAE. It turned out that this terribly unorganized shipping agency didn’t even have a proper schedule for it’s sailings and they said that the next sailing wouldn’t be for another two days.

So, stuck in this port town with little or nothing to see or do, we got stuck into a few books and even managed to find probably the world’s worst internet connection. Dave, Rhys and Fintan wandered down one evening through the street markets filled with smuggled goods of all descriptions ranging from fake cigarettes to Persian rugs. Usually hassled in these situations, the complete lack of western tourists in this region led to a more confused look from vendors rather than the usual attempt to rip us off. We were also struck by the number of women covered head to toe in black burqas and their astonishing ability to survive dressed like this in temperatures over 30 degrees.

Woman dons a Burqa in Bandar Abbas

We also walked out to the pier and got chatting to an interesting Iraqi man who was fishing off the rocks. This trip to town was probably the highlight of a fairly uneventful 2 days in Bandar Abbas.

DAY 115 - BANDAR ABBAS DAY 1

After a terrible night trying to sleep on Bandar’s streets, we arrived at a lifeless port at 7.30am. We were informed that due to Iranian holidays, nothing was open and no ships were sialing. Gutted , smelly and absolutely knackered, we found a decent hotel where we could finally get to bed and try to get hold of the shipping agency that day.

That evening we came to realize very quickly that there was next to nothing to do in Bandar Abbas, so we all buried ourselves into books, with Dave and Fintan continuing our infinite mission to keep the blog machine going!

DAY 114 - ZAHEDAN TO BANDAR E ABBAS

Hotel View in Zahedan

We left around lunchtime from Zahedan under army escort. We didn’t really get to see much of the town as we weren’t even allowed to leave the hotel. From what we did see, there wasn’t much going for it so we were happy enough to hit the road again. After about 50km, we had left the lawless Sistan Province, ending our two day army escort. It was funny enough at times but we were glad to finally see the back of them.

We decided to make the very long trip the whole way to the port town of Bandar Abbas, situated on the Persian Gulf and where our car ferry to the United Arab Emirates departs from. We had gotten word from the shipping company through some very broken English, that there was a ferry departing the next day at 9 in the morning so it was essential we made it to Bandar in one go.

Luckily enough, Iran has very good roads so we were able to average about 100km/h. We had one quick stop in Bam to go through the petrol ordeal again. Somehow a young soldier with a machine gun always seems to get involved. Bam once quite a popular tourist destination but was almost entirely wiped out by a massive earthquake in 2003. As it was getting dark, we didn’t hang around long and pushed on towards Bandar Abbas, finally arriving at 3am and absolutely ravenous. After a quick kebab we began the ordeal of trying to find a hotel when everything other than the odd burger joint was shut. After an hour of searching and with no luck, we decided to just have a kip in the car until we headed to the port in the morning.

Fast Food Joint, Bandar Abbas

4 lads in a Hummer with about 20 mosquitos became unbearable to the point where Fintan and Chuck decied it would be better to sleep on the street. At this point we didn’t realize but it was a massive holiday period in Iran and there were hundreds of people camping on the beach so Fintan and Chuck just got involved! The only problem was that they had no idea how to assemble the tent, so Fintan just went ahead and used it as a duvet to protect himself from the mosquitoes. Chuck covered himself up in a sleeping bag and was constantly awoken by an old snoring Iranian woman and a pack of wild feral cats! This was up there with some of our worst sleeping arrangements on CrazyJourney so far!

DAY 114 ROUTEMAP:

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