22 Oct 2003 - Quetta (1690m), Islamic Republic of Pakistan, Day 206, 9555km

We finally arrived in our first city in Pakistan, the dusty frontier town of Quetta, 3 days ago through the historic hallways of Bam, the wild and barren Dasht-e-Lut desert of Eastern Iran, the culture shock of the Middle East giving way to the Subcontinent in Pakistan, and a 7-day non-stop mad dash through the bandit covered Baluchistan desert to Quetta, stopping for a night in an Afghan refugee camp along the way.

But by far the most momentous event did not happen anywhere along the way, but in Tehran a long way back where we met 2 German cyclists, Andreas and Marcel, who have joined us for this leg of our journey. They had started in south Turkey, but lost 10 days just before entering Iran because Marcel had a really bad case of (surprise surprise) diarrhea. So they took the train to Tehran and had missed most of Iran, which we told them was not that bad a thing - the magnificent NOTHING of the Iranian countryside can drive you mad. And because our bicycles were in Yazd, a good 800km away, they decided to forego as much cycling as possible and catch up with us so we could cycle the desert together. But due partly to finances and partly to their inability to take buses (we don't know why. We shy reserved Singaporeans do not prod :) they had to cycle and hitchike on trucks to catch up with us in Bam, where there was a posse of people waiting for us... tell you about it later.

Anyway in Kerman the tea obviously inhibited our thinking as we decided to do the 198km to Bam in one day. We loaded up on tasteless pasta, competed with an extended Afghan family for toilet time, and started off at 655am into the cold dusty air accosted by guys on motorcycles riding alongside us wanting our Rudy Projects. The crosswinds and slight uphill kept our speeds down to about 20kmh, and after 115km we had gained substantial elevation to 2600m, the highest point in our trip so far, but nothing compared to the 4000+ roads we had to look forward to in the Karakorum. After the pass we had a beautiful long downhil for at least 15km, where we met 2 Japanese cyclists going the other way. The feeling of camaraderie was overwhelming as we exchanged stories and notes about the roads ahead, but the wind picked up and the cold forced us to part ways earlier than we would have liked. But they left us with tough stories of the coming desert stretch, of unabating winds and long stretches with no water. It was with a heavy heart that we rolled into Bam a few hours later.

But that heavy heart quickly lifted as we got to our hostel. There we ran into Andrew, a South African who proclaimed that he had heard a lot about us, and was looking forward to our meeting. Apparently our reputation preceded us, and no wonder, too - in the hostel was a veritable gang of people we had met all over Iran: on top of the 2 germans who had arrived slightly earlier, after passing us on a truck, there was Geoff, the ever-smiling Englishman who we met in Tehran and suffers from the delusion that Dorset is the most beautiful place on Earth, Jane (who we met in Esfahan) the fiercely independent Australian with her infinitely cute daughter Noa (she's three, we think), a French guy we met in Yazd and a couple from Hong Kong who had lunch next to us in Kerman. We had a whale of a time, and Jo spent the next day listening to the echoes of eternity in the 2000-yr old mud brick city of ancient Bam, which had been meticulously uncovered and restored.

The next day began our ardous journey through the unforgiving Dasht-e-Lut desert of East Iran after Jo called his mother for her birthday (no, not the ONLY time he's called home). The first 2 hours were awesome as we covered 56km with an avg speed of 29kmh. But as the saying goes, "If the going's good, you're going downhill". We would pay dearly later for our moment of happiness. There we had a break at a small town and then began the desert proper - the first thing that greeted us were a flock of carrion birds sitting atop a hill. Jo had distinct visions of the vultures in National Geographic documentaries, waiting patiently as their intended prey tried to crawl out of the desert. Not a good sign. But one good thing about being so late in our iternary was the desert was getting cooler. The crosswinds (which whipped us around after the 100km mark and reduced our avg to 15kmh) helped cool things down and the highest we had so far was 35 deg C. We cycled the last 10km of this 161km day in failing light, and as we struggled to overcome the hills and the crosswinds, the magnificent panorama that unfolded itself as the sun went down and a full moon slowly rose behind a curtain of mountains to glow above the vast sandy plains was just amazing. We arrived at the police station where we camped just as darkness set in.

The following day was another desert run, but this was where we paid for losing more than 500m of elevation: we had to trudge up 1200m of vertical elevation, but the welcoming vistas of the brown rocky mountains were a welcome sight to the long ardous desert plains. It was no picnic though. I finished half my water supply and the germans HAD to stop and eat. Andy had a carrot and Marcel a raw potato. But at the end of the 115km day we were treated to an even more wonderful repeat telecast of the moon gliding majestically over a glowing orange horizon and were greeted at the police station with naan (Iranian bread) and soup.

After a short uphill we coasted confidently into Zahedan, thinking that we were early enough to get to the Indian embassy to collect our visa. Most offices were open on a Saturday in Iran, but of course not the Indian Consulate. And OF COURSE tommorrow was an Iranian public holiday - the birthday of Imam Mehdi. Our conflicts with Iranian public holidays were getting ridiculous - in Tabriz we couldnt send out mail cos it was Imam Ali's birthday, and in Esfahan we had to wait a day to send it out cos it was Prophet Muhammad's birthday. Jo was beginning to think that Shi'ites were Shi'ites just so they had more holidays, as if their 12-4pm siesta time was not enough. Luckily though the Indian consulate was open, and we spent the rest of the day walking around and hitting the internet (ironically, here in the border town of Iran 2000km from Tehran we had our fastest internet connection yet) one last time before the long and hard Baluchistan desert. And apparently Walking In A Suspicious Manner is a bookable offence here, because in wanting to minimise our presence in the dark hours in Zahedan (and also escaping the cold night) we walked really fast to the hotel and got stopped by the police. After some explaining, a lot of play-ignorant smiling and laughing in front of the waving Kalashnikovs they let us Walk In A Suspicious Manner Quickly back to the hotel.

We woke up at the ungodly hour of 4am to get out of Iran as quickly as possible (the people in Zahedan, esp around the hotel, were a little rough around the egdes. Standing at the corner Alex got manhandled a few times and Marcel just gave up on them and walked away) and raced through the 1st 60km at 27kmh. The germans were astonished at how Jo could coast past them on the downhill when they had to pedal to keep up. Ah, the wonders of the Shimano XTR. At the border village to Pakistan, we saw a motorbike tourer ride into town but he was too far away for us to say hello. We thought of Dalbir's friend, who was riding up the same way and we may run into. Of course, at the Pakistani motel where we stayed it DID turn out to be him, and we missed meeting our second singaporean by a hair's breadth. So, Mr Ng Poh Weng, wherever you may be - we see you in Singapore for some kopi and a lot of talkingcock, yeah?

The immigration and customs checks were uneventful, although the layout of the border post (2 village buildings next to each other with no road to speak of and nothing but dusty plains around) was interesting. We stayed at a motel that night where Alex had his fill of BBC at the reception counter (we had not seen English anything for a LONG time. We resorted to watching a farsi-dubbed version of The Warrior in a movie theatre just because it had Zhang Ziyi) and we had BEEF CURRY AND RICE AND NAAN for dinner. That was capitalised because we hadn't had food with taste for a long time. Iranian food atrophises the tastebuds, and they even somehow manage to make their kebabs and sandwiches tasteless. Up to now we had to resort to the extremely mild tastes in the abgusht and chicken curry (more oil than curry, and the curry like water like that) and it was widely considered that the best food in Iran was the pizza. So with the introduction of REAL BEEF CURRY to our tastebuds-on-vacation, there was a collective sigh of orgasmic delight and we could not express our thanks to the chef lest the basmati drip out of our mouths.

But so began the long, hard road through the Baluchistan desert. The long stretches of nothing, the heat, and the tales of banditry and kidnapping have made most cyclists give up and take the bus through this leg of the journey, as did Dan and the 2 other germans he was cycling with. In fact we talked to people who have crossed the desert on their motorbikes and caravans and the only people they say who would cycle that stretch were 'crazy japanese' (of which, incidentally, we met 3 - the 2 just before Bam and one in Bam itself) at times the nearest settlements were 70/80 km from each other, and they themselves turned out to be just a mud-brick hut or 2 in the middle of nowhere, and if we were lucky they would have tea. And in one of these teahouses in the middle of nowhere (seriously - one building sticking out of the flatness of the wastelands with nothing for tens of kilometres before or after it) we saw not one but TWO posters of Singapore, the 2 best preserved posters of the 5 that plastered the wind-ravaged walls of the mud-brick building. Out here in the middle of nowhere - it was practically a call to go home.

We planned the route so that we would not have to camp out in the dangerous desert, but that made for days of forced long cycling in the dry, dusty heat, accompanied by the flies that would buzz around you if you cycled at under 25kmh, which was most of the time. And the small travellers' resthouses that we stayed in were no comfort, either - we paid serious tourist price (read: overcharged) for a grubby room with straw mats on a pebble and litter-encrusted floor with no lights or ventilation to sleep amongst the cockroaches.

And the villages were... interesting. If we cycled through them boys would throw stones at us, young men on bicycles and motorcycles would ride disturbing close, racing us (although we would not go faster than we were anyway) and asking us for pens (we still wonder about that). If we stopped in