Shiraz, Pasargadae, Zeinoddin and Yazd – Days 5 and 6

Art Student at Yazd Mosque

We departed Shiraz at 8AM for our long bus ride to Zeinoddin Caravanserai, the place we were going to stay for the evening before continuing on to Yazd the next day. The Caravanserai served as a rest stop for the merchants on the Silk Road trading route hundreds of years ago. That’s my first history lesson for the day. In our way, we stopped at Pasargadae, the burial place of Cyrus the Great, father of the Achaemenid empire over 2500 years ago.

We arrived at the Zeinoddin around 7:30 in the evening and we shown our room which was basically a rectangular stone area with a curtain pulled in front for privacy with two sleeping pads setup. There were many of these rooms setup right next to each other along a circular hallway. There was not much privacy other than the curtain and because of the open concept, you could hear everyone’s conversations (and heavy breathing while sleeping) bouncing off of the stone ceiling. Still, it was a very unique place to stay and i am glad it was included in the itinerary. Dinner was served later in the evening buffet style and male dancers with sticks entertained afterwards. The best part of the evening occurred after everyone was asleep and Derek and I decided to stay up and BS in the center courtyard. We talked about smoking a hookah and as soon as the words were out of our mouths, one of the workers appeared from the room next to us inviting us to sit down for a smoke. We don’t think he heard our conversation and I am guessing it was a very good case of someone reading our minds. We smoked for close to two hours trying to communicate with him and his friend ,with us having no grasp of Farsi and they with their limited English. Afterwards, I tried to sleep on the stone floor with the thin mats but my shoulder was killing me. I didn’t want to take an Ambien for fear of keeping everyone up with my snoring all night.

The next day, we had breakfast, collected our visas and hit the road for a 90 minute drive to Yazd where we saw a few sites, the highlight being a beautiful Persian art student drawing at one of the mosques (see photo above). I think every guy in our group was mesmerized and was trying to sneak a photo but Michael had the courage to approach her directly and asked her to pose for a photo.

The evening began with Michael, Stella, Derek and me meeting in central Yazd to explore the town. We met up with Jan, the son of a German couple who is traveling with our group and he tagged along with us.

As part of an effort to buy one thing in each town that the town in famous for. In this case Yazd is known for a textile called termeh, a kind of multicolored shiny cloth with metallic gold and silver threads running throughout that can appear extremely gaudy and ostentatious or stylish and cool, depending on the pattern and quality of work. Of course, I didn’t stop at buying one, instead it bought three as I kept finding one I liked better in each successive store I visited. Finally, to stop myself, I forced myself not to visit any more stores. So, after chastising Stella last night for her complete lack of buying restraint, I exhibited that same behavior tonight. The scary part is that we haven’t even reached Isfahan yet, the shopping capital of Iran. Thankfully there are very few places in Iran that accept credit cards.

We ended the night at an Indian buffet located inside of one of the hotels and then a long walk back to our hotel where we crashed immediately. A really good last couple of days. Hoping they continue.