Nothern Tehran Palace Qajar Carpet
After only four hours of sleep we were picked up at our hotel by our tour guide although it took quite a while to sort through all of the tourists and match them up with their assigned guides. We thought for a while that we were the odd men out as we didn’t seem to have a guide but he eventually showed up late and we were on our way. We are a group of 6–three Americans, one Aussie and two from somewhere in the Baltics, I believe. Today seemed to be a make it up as we go day as the first destination we tried to go to–a Palace–closed at 10AM for tourists. This after an almost hour long drive from our hotel to the hillside of northern Tehran where the air is cooler and cleaner. We eventually were taken to another less impressive Palace where we stayed for a couple hours and then taken to lunch at a restaurant in the very nice Jamshidieh Park closely.
Not much of a first day and we probably could have stayed at the hotel and slept for several more hours but we had little choice. One thing I forgot about Tehran is the unbelievably large amount of traffic and drivers like nowhere else in the world. I though Rome was organized traffic chaos but Tehran is 100 times as bad…it is completely disorganized chaos that somehow works out for everyone–cars, motorcycles and pedestrians alike. It is mesmerizing watching drivers work their way out of what is seemingly an almost certain disaster. Another item forgotten is the amount of pollution…you can see it hanging in the air. If the climate change folks have hopes that things can be reversed they only need to visit this city to realize all hope is lost. I don’t think there is any way to contain this.
We are back at the hotel where we will most likely sleep the rest of the day and night awY and hope for a more organized day tomorrow. Too tired to write anymore. Good night.
