Out of Iran and into Turkey

James and I left early at 05.45am to try and get ahead of the pack for the border crossing from Iran. We had a lovely 300km run on excellent roads to the border. Only one mishap when, just as I said "this Lagonda was made for these conditions" the engine started misfiring! Luckily it was very quickly fixed and the rest of the journey was fault free.

Which cannot be said for the border crossing. We were car 7 at the border and first we joined one queue then were told that we were meant to be in another, then we were back to the first one! In the meantime, even with only 7 cars being in the customs area people cannot hall trying to push in, one car reversing into another - unbelievable. James and I were reasonably calm at this stage. Then the organiser, Philip Young, directed one of the cars to reverse into another one - even more unbelievable.

The cars at this stage were in a queue and noons, irrespective of whether they had the completed paperwork, could move until the car in front moved. It took James and I to organise everyone in order of the cars in the queue and finally things began to move.

Then onto the Turkey side which was even worse. We got our visa stamp, we then went and got the stamp, stamped. Then I needed a stamp for the car which be quad of the traffic when I went to get my visa, was still the other side of the boxer gate. I was able to get the vehicle stamp until the car as the right side of the gate. Well this simply wasn't going to be allowed to happen and the customs man recognised as my volume increased by the second, that this was not a battle he wanted to have and g e me a stamp. In the event it was less than 2 hours which in relative terms was a result.

We had an excellent run to the hotel. Off on 700km run tomorrow. We might try and cut some of it out. We are working on a cunning plan.

RHC
Sent from my iPhone