Shiraz - Persepolis, Naqsh-e Rostam and Pasargad

No, no drinking a glass of Shiraz here. Although everywhere has this beer looking non alcoholic cider if you want to recreate the feeling of drinking a beer? The Chai here is sufficient for me! Im even adapting to drinking the sweet hot dark liquid in this heat!

Shiraz is much hotter then Tehran! Obviously, cause its further south, but shit you can notice the difference! I arrived here safely, i must say, i was a little nervous boarding my Soviet style plane, considering one dropped out of the sky only a few months back.

Im getting good at confusing everyone, i greet the locals with a Salam, then continue in english, then the usual conversation comes about, AHHH I THINK YOU ARE IRANIAN!!! I watched this group of German blonde tourists get stopped everyone 5minutes at Persepolis by giggling teenagers wanting a photo with them. I dont get that kinda of superstar attention as they think im one of them! Its good and bad i guess, good cause i dont get haselled, but bad cause i look deaf and dumb when im trying to order something!

I arrived to Shiraz in the evening, and spent the next day walking around visiting the sites. Its a very beautiful city, i see why the Iranian really like it! Its full of gardens and parks. They really like to picnic here. They picnic in style too, with a big persian carpet as their picnic blankets and fine glass pots and crockery for drinking tea!! They picnic almost anywhere where there's a shady spot and grass. I was wondering why there where so many camping shops in the city, on the drive out of Shiraz i realised why, they also love to camp and picnic! They had these tepee style tents set up everywhere along the parks of the highways out of Shiraz! Hilairious !

When coming out of the fortress i was greet by this little kid (i say little cause he was short) who was 15 years old, who wished to be my tour guide, to show his city and in return to practice his english. (I didnt really need tour guide, its not like its Rome, where theres heaps of sites and walking, its all pretty much in a close proximity, with my map being sufficient enough) I liked him, so we hung out for the morning, but i think i tiered him out from all the walking around the Bazaar. So i shouted him to some ice cream, as he assured me that he didnt want money for showing me his city! This kid was a religious one, and i dont think he goes to a normal school, from what i understood he goes to school where he only learns the Quarn. After visiting a few mosques with him, i said goodbye to go to the Tomb of Hafez, and we agreed to meet again in the afternoon for more mosques and gardens!

The tomb of Hafez and its gardens was really nice! Hafez is an Iranian poet, and apparently his still a superstar today, with his poems now converted to songs! (one thing ive notice is not all the taxi drivers play music, its not like Lebanon where music is pumping 24/7, i think their only allowed, or choose to only listen to Koranic music, or traditional Iranian music like that of the poems of Hafez...Maybe they dont like arabic music? ahahah)

The next day i woke early for my breakfast, OH i have to tell you about breakfast. Because of all the difficulties of getting a visa, i went through a tour company who pre arranged all the hotels for my visit in Iran, enabling me for a visa on arrival with my Italian passport. So ive been staying in 3 and 4 star hotels (have only seen one hostel in my travels, and thats here where im blogging from in Yazd) So buffet breakfast is pretty extravagant, they have eggs of every kind, lots of cucumbers and tomatoes, (i got cucumbers coming out of my arse, quite literally!) naan bread, jucies, cereal, and big pots of chai! After breakfast it was organised that on my way to my next destination Yazd, i would visit the sites of Persepolis, Naqsh-e Rostam and Pasargad with a private taxi driver. This was extremely logical, as all the sites are on the way to Yazd, and saves me an extra night in Shiraz to come back and forth from viewing the sites.

The driver was extremly friendly and used the hotel facilities to fill his urn with hot water for the long journey ahead, making sure we had an endless supply of chai! Half an hour into the silent cab ride(no music in this cab either) i discovered that he was under the impression that the transfer was simply from Shiraz to Yazd. After a few picture pointing, and a phone call, we where on our way to visit the surrounding ruins of Shiraz! (imagine that! i had pre organised this transfer, imagine if he just kept driving and skipped it all!) anyway that was my first and final transfer, its buses from here on (AAaauuto Boose) apparently the bus from Shiraz to Yazd would have taken 7 hours! We left the hotel at 9, covered the three sites, stopped for lunch, stopped for a chat with his other tour guide mates and ate watermellon, made multiple chai stops and arrived in Yazd at 4pm!

Persepolis was obviously the most fascinating! Though i kept having that stupid movie with whats his face playing Alexander the Great in my head (im terrible with my movie stars). I much preferred the BBC production with (michael klim is it? ahah i dunno) when they followed the foot steps of Alexander from Greece to India. Persepolis is one of the many ruins im about to visit in the middle east, though something tells me this is probably going to be the most outstanding !

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