Here’s our TOP 10 favourite places in Iran:

10. Historical Houses in Kashan

Enormous mansions that make it easy to imagine the true meaning of luxury in Iran during the Qajar era. This particular mansion Khan-e Tabatabei was built by a wealthy carpet merchant and consisted of over 40 rooms and 4 courtyards!

A courtyard of one of the historical houses in Kashan

9. Shaking Minaret and the abandoned village at Khanrnaq

The minaret in the abandoned village of Khanrnaq (near Yazd) gained its name not without a reason. The mud bricks and wooden elements used in the construction process make it possible to actually shake it even nowadays! Do you know what is the best part? That you can actually climb to the top of it and shake it!
Warning: to climb the minaret you’ll need to go through a VERY narrow staircase so those of you with claustrophobic inclinations should probably be in charge of taking pictures from below :)

Waving from the top of the Shaking Minaret, Khanrnaq

Abandoned village of Khanrnaq

8. Chak-Chak – the holy place of Zoroastrians

Chak-Chak is the place where the Zoroastrian religion was born. It was the main religion of Persia until the Arab invasion. Nowadays it has only a few thousand followers in Iran and the largest community of Zoroastrians currently live in India (known as Parsis).

In the Zaroastrian Fire Temble, Chak-Chak

Some people come to Chak-Chak looking for spiritual experience, others just to pose for a photo.

7. Colorful Nasr ol Molk Mosque in Shiraz

You can see our ‘Photo of the Week’ and read more about it here.

Morning sun lighting up the interiors of Nasr ol Molk Mosque, Shiraz

6. Alamut Valley and the Castles of the Assassins

Great place for those who enjoy spending time in the mountains. Read more about this place in our post here.

Rapidly changing weather created an amazing spectacle of light in the Alamut Valley

Rain-carved lines on the slope of one of the mountains in Alamut Valley

5. The Bazaar of Tabriz

The largest covered bazaar in the world, divided into parts where you can buy famous Persian carpets, jewelry, spices and much more.

Bazaar in Tabriz - probably the best place to buy a persian carpets of all kinds

Light beaming through the holes in the ceiling of the Bazaar in Tabriz

4. Ancient Persepolis

The well-preserved ruins of the ceremonial capital of the Persian Empire that remained buried in sand till 1930s when they were discovered and excavated by French archaeologists.

The grand entrance to the Persepolis city complex

3. The Tomb of Hafez in Shiraz

The best place to experience Iranian’s emotional attitude to poetry. Read more about it in our post here.

Witnessing strong emotional reactions at the Tomb of Hafez, Shiraz

2. The Old City in Yazd

An incredible maze of narrow streets twining among mudbrick houses often topped with characteristic, impressive windcatchers (natural air conditioning towers).

Famous windcatchers in the old part of Yazd

Narrow winding streets in the Old City of Yazd

1. Naqsh-e Jahan Square in Esfahan

Favourite of ours and many Iranian families who come there to spend their weekends gossiping, sipping tea and playing with their children in front of the impressive Shah Mosque, Ali Qapu Palace and smaller but splendid Sheikh Lotf Allah Mosque.

Woman in chador strolling through the Naqsh-e Jahan Square in Esfahan

Inside the Lotfollah Mosque at the Naqsh-e Jahan Square in Esfahan

While visiting all these places was really worthwhile, both Lavanya and I agreed that it’s a real shame that due to the current political situation in Iran so few travellers decide to come here. If only the Iranian government was more keen on inviting foreign tourists and creating a better infrastructure for them, Iran could easily become a favourite tourist destination in the Middle East.

If you want to admire the place in all of its splendor, you need to pay a visit as early as 7-8 a.m., when the sunlight falls through the windows at the right angle and lights up the interiors of the main prayer hall.

Nasr ol Molk Mosque, Shiraz, Iran

On our first stop in Iran we landed in Tabriz at night, clueless about where we were or how to get to some hotels when we approached some students standing nearby for help and they turned out to be our first friends in Iran. They not only helped us get to the right place but came along with us looking for hotels and we spent the next 3 days seeing Tabriz with them!

Our first friends made in Iran in Tabriz.

While spending one such day at Khaqani Park in Tabriz with our new found friends, an older disabled man came up to us, though he was using crutches it didn’t stop him from walking across the park only to talk to the foreginers he spotted there. He introduced himself and asked where we were from. Soon we were chatting away with him, spoke to his wife on the phone and he even taught us (not without tricking us with them first) some mathematical puzzles and tricks, all over cups of tea. At his age he had taken up learning English by himself and even showed us his notes. Quite inspirational!

Teaching us math puzzles

When we arrived in Esfahan, we were lucky to have planned our trip in such a way that we arrived on a Thursday, beginning of Iran’s weekend. The large Imam’s square in Esfahan was filled with 3 generational families picnicking together. We only had to walk a few metres before someone would offer us tea, or wave hello to us or shout out ‘Welcome to Esfahan!’. It all felt really welcoming and made us think of the way we usually react to tourists in our own countries.

One of the families inviting me for tea and a quick chat in Esfahan

Another family waving hello and 'welcome to Esfahan!'

Not long after a bunch of students approached us and asked if we would meet with their group and answer some of their questions as they were keen on practicing their English. This ended up in a 10 minute long ‘interview’ between Pawel and the young boys, with questions ranging from ‘What’s your favourite Iranian dish to your favourite soccer team’.

Pawel being interviewed by the students

In Esfahan itself, in an urge to smoke some shisha/hookah we stumbled upon this (normally all male) chay khaneh / tea house, where they welcomes us both. Between words of English and Farsi they asked us where we were from and on hearing I’m from India were only more than happy to play out old Hindi film songs from their mobile phone (Iranians LOVE Bollywood). We later found out that women are generally not allowed in such places and I probably got special treatment being a foreigner!

The all male tea house, where I got a special invite :)

We met Maryam at a restaurant in Kashan where we dropped in for a quick bite before heading off to see the city. Seated by herself in the next table she shyly asked if she could join us and soon we spent the next hour chatting over lunch. She even joined us for the day going around the town of Kashan and told us which sights were better to visit and which were not.

Our friend Maryam showing us around the town of Kashan

During our trip around the city of Yazd we came across these students on a school trip at one of the old forts in the city. They were quite friendly, not shy at all around us and even requested for a photo together.

Students on a school trip near a fort in Yazd

At the ancient temple of Zoroastrian religion, in Chak-Chak we met yet another school group. These were quite a chatty and boisterous bunch. They were very keen on us taking their photos and on seeing the pictures later on the camera all of them clapped and shouted out in glee – Merci! Merci!

School girls we met at Chak-Chak, the Zoroastrian temple

Taking photos of the school girls we met at Chak-Chak

We also had a chance to meet with other travellers who were in Iran at the same time and funnily kept bumping into the same people in different cities and sometimes even at the same hosts in each city. For some of the hosts it was very normal to have more than 1/2 guests staying with them at the same time so their homes usually felt like small guesthouses but with twice the fun.

Enjoying our trip to Persepolis in Iran with Thomas

Having dinner with Max (from Netherlands) and Thomas (from France) at our host's house.

There were countless other such experiences but in order to protect the identity of our hosts (from CouchSurfing) and at other times for lack of photos we can’t put them up here. I can tell you one thing though – to really experience Iran and learn that the real people of the country are nothing like what is shown and talked about on the news, you only have visit it. And I know I’m going to return there one day!

A kid stopping to say hi to us during our walk around the city of Yazd

A park in Shiraz

To let you better understand what made me think this way, I would like to give you a few reasons from our experience, which are the most important for me:

1. It allowed us to meet up with some really unique and very interesting people who were nowhere close to the stereotype of a fanatic/orthodox Iranian Muslim that some people might have about Iran. In fact a few of them turned out to be much more open-minded than some of people I know back in Europe. If we didn’t have a chance to get to know these people while staying at their homes where they felt completely safe to talk openly about anything be it religion or politics, we probably wouldn’t discover this side of the Iranian society at all.
2. Being invited to people’s homes is not only a chance to talk to them but also to see how they live. From our experience, most of Iranian Couch Surfers come from middle class families and it was very interesting for us to see, how the western culture (represented by numerous modern appliances, officially banned satellite TV etc.) mixes with their traditional, Persian housing style. Of course, all of it happens despite the official governmental condemnation for the ‘western world’.
   

   Lavanya with our new friends met on the bus to Tabriz

3. In many cases, after spending some time with your host, you get to know him/her well enough so as not to be afraid to ask all the question that you wanted to ask since the time you arrived to Iran (but were not brave enough to ask them to the strangers) – that’s how it was with us. We found out for example about the underground parties that take place among the youth, the many ways they find to meet each other, that the obligation of wearing a hijab is merely a sad and unpleasant necessity for quite a few women in Iran, that people do drink alcohol despite the religious ban imposed on it throughout the country, as well as that there is a large group of people completely disagreeing with the current state of affairs in the Iranian politics, etc… Of course if you don’t have the kind of boundaries we had, you can ask these questions to anyone you meet even in the street but you also need to remember that in a country invigilated by the secret police, like Iran is, it’s necessary to gain your interlocutor’s trust first, in order to hear a real opinion about the subject.
4. Iranian hospitality is really unique. We experienced it in many different moments, in various ways– some people invited us home without us even requesting them for a place to stay, others offered us some great Iranian home-made food, some drove us around their city for many hours but the most striking (and strange) experience was when the father of our host, who was impressed by what we’re doing and our way of traveling, gifted us money so that we can travel longer!!
   

   Quran Gate in Shiraz

5. Even though Iran is definitely not a top tourist destination, there will be other travelers that you’re going to meet on your way. And you’re not going to be the only CouchSurfer in the country either, so that’s also going to be a chance for you to meet interesting people from other countries. Apart from Iranians, we managed to meet people from France, Hong Kong, Netherlands, New Zealand and Poland and we had some really good time together.
6. Sometimes you’ll have a chance to see or do something unique – for us one of such things was for sure listening on 2 separate occasions to hear our hosts’ play traditional Iranian instruments – setar and santoor. As the mini concerts happened at our hosts’ homes, we even had a chance to try playing these instruments ourselves.

I hope we convinced you that there are at least a few good reasons to take CouchSurfing in Iran into consideration. There is however one important fact that you should also be aware of – for local citizens in Iran hosting foreigners in their house for more than 2 nights and without registering them with the police is technically illegal… but don’t worry, from the great number of people who tried it and didn’t encounter any problems (like us), we can tell you that there is nothing to be concerned about. And also as it’s illegal, we’re not posting the pictures of any of our hosts anywhere on our blog.

Football game at the Imam Square, Esfahan

There is however one precaution that you should take – if someone asks you in the street where you’re staying, always name a hotel and never the place of your host. You never know who is a regular citizen and who a member of the secret police in Iran… and sometimes by saying something innocent like this to the wrong person, you might just make your host’s life more complicated.

Nevertheless, don’t let me discourage you. As I mentioned a few times before, CouchSurfing is surely worth trying at least once. And even if it turns out you don’t like it… no big deal… you don’t have to use it for 90% of your stay in Iran as we did, you can always switch back to the hotel accommodation whenever it suits you (that’s another great thing about CouchSurfing, isn’t it?).

All the best for your surfing experience!!

In front of the Blue Mosque in Tabriz

*Internet based networks for travelers from all over the world that enable them to find hosts who can offer them a place to stay during their travels. For the ones that don’t have their own place or enough free space to host but still want to be a part of it, it can also involve meeting up for a coffee or a drink as well as simply providing useful information over the phone.

It was incredible to watch the reactions of the people who came here, almost like they were visiting a shrine of a saint. Some of them came here and read their favourite poems of Hafez while others kissed or touched the tomb with respect and a lot of emotion.

It seemed to me that this little girl who came there with her family didn’t quite understand what Hafez means to Iranians and was thus simply distracted by the foreigner with a camera.

Here is one of the poems written by Hafez translated into English (‘My Brilliant Image’):

One day the sun admitted,

I am just a shadow.

I wish I could show you

The Infinite Incandescence

That has cast my brilliant image!

I wish I could show you,

When you are lonely or in darkness,

The astonishing Light

Of your own Being!

Graffiti outside the old embassy building showing Khomeini

We were however reminded of the volatile past between these 2 countries, one day while walking around Tehran near the area where the previous U.S embassy was located (today both countries don’t have an embassy in either’s territory). The building today is (perhaps aptly) called ‘The US den of espionage’, as this is where the CIA led an infamous coupe in 1953 against the then democratically elected prime minister Mohammad Mossadegh who was trying to nationalize the oil of Iran in order to keep the money within the country than in the pockets of the western super powers. You can read about this rather revealing story about politics and western interest in Iran here.

Does the KTC restaurant in Tabriz remind you of something?

Graffiti from the time of the '79 revolution showing the Statue of Liberty with a skull

The building unfortunately is no longer open to outsiders; though we did manage to have a look at some of the graffiti that adorns the outside walls, some of them more than 30 years old. Our visit also coincided with 13 ABAN (otherwise known as 4^th November in the global calendar), a day that the Iranian government proudly recalls as the day the embassy was taken hostage by Islamist students just after the 1979 revolution, and the whole hostage crisis lasted over an entire year – 444 days to be exact! It was this anniversary that the government was preparing to celebrate and for the occasion was putting up some new anti-America posters which we managed to catch a quick glimpse of. Oddly though none of the local citizens even gave it a second glance, some wearily remarked that every year the government tries to create a whole hullabaloo about nothing and gets students from various universities to compulsorily attend this event and chant out slogans against the United States, though in reality most of them couldn’t care less.

Posters being put up outside the former embassy on 4th November

I must stress here that though these images seem quite spiteful towards the States, the large majority of people’s opinion (from our experience) is far from same. We even heard some young Iranian students joking with other tourists that if America ever attacked Iran they would probably side with the opposition.

Poster of a burning US flag with Obama depicted below it

During our one month in Iran we were also watching the news closely as rumors about supposed US or Israel led attacks were making the rounds on the news websites accessed through proxy servers in Iran. When we asked our friend in Iran what he thought about this he nonchalantly remarked ‘The more you shout your threats out loud repeatedly, the less intimidating they become’.

More graffiti on the walls of the former embassy

New poster talking about the anniversary of the hostage crisis

Anti US posters talking about the Occupy movement

Posters seen at the Imam Square at Esfehan

Some of the posters were up to date with the latest Occupy movement

New posters seen at the Iman Square in Esfehan

Old lady sewing souvenires dressed in traditional Abyaneh clothes

Abyaneh village near Esfehan is one such place. It has stayed different from the rest of Iran not only for this reason but also for their unique dialect, way of life, reddish hue of the soil and costumes. The women in Abyaneh dress themselves in white shawls adorned with colourful floral motifs and leaf designs typical only to that region, quite contrary to the look and mood set by the black chador seen across the rest of the country. We also learned that the village is occupied by only older people and children, as the young move out for reasons education and work.

One of the characteristic red colored houses in Abyaneh

The village houses a Zoroastrian fire temple as well as a handful of mosques, evidence of its religious history. Though the village isn’t too big, it’s easy enough to lose yourself walking around in the narrow alley ways which twist and turn in no particular direction or order. There were a few local women selling dried apples, plums and apricots to any tourist who’d decided to drop by. Don’t let their frail demeanor fool you, these women were quite hard bargainers, didn’t budge an inch with the price and only once we relented were they willing to smile for the pictures, fair deal I’d say.

Local woman selling dried apricots, Abyaneh, Iran

A strange mix of modern and traditional clothing perhaps?

During our walks around the village

The old houses in Abyaneh

Flowery traditional Abyaneh clothes

Pawel negotating the price for the dried fruits

One of the picturesque paths around Abyaneh

Old lady 'discretely' showing us that the photos are not free of charge

How to get there: Take a bus from Kashan heading to Esfehan and get off at an intersection for Abyaneh. From here the best way to get to the village is to hitchhike so you have to wait until a vehicle drives by. The locals are used to tourists hitching rides and were more than happy to help. Be careful though not to take any photos while waiting for a ride (as I almost did) as the area around is strictly military.

The castle is located above the mountain over-looking a small village Gazor Khan and offers spectacular views.  The best part is that barring 2 guards stationed there, we were the only 2 tourists around.

View from one of the Assassins Castles in Alborz Mountains, Iran

Plenty of carpet stores in the Bazaar in Tabriz, Iran

Yes, Iran- the same country infamously tagged by George Bush as the ‘axis of evil’, it’s also the country rocked by protests and violence recently in 2009 which left many dead and thousands injured and also the same Iran where the hijab (head scarf) is mandatory for all women including foreign tourists.
So why is it exactly we have decided to leave the comforts of Turkey and delay our trip to the backpacker haven -South East Asia, to make a rather risky stop at Iran?

Plenty of travellers who have been here before us, with whom we spoke, have had only the nicest things to say about the country and especially about its people. If you meet anyone who’s been here ask them how they liked it and almost 100% of the time you’d get a reply about it being completely different from what they’d imagined before and the people being one of the most hospitable they’ve ever met. We were keen to experience this first hand as well.

Inside the lanes of the Bazaar in Tabriz, Iran

We didn’t need more reasons than this to list down Iran as a must-do destination on our trip, and soon it was a country we were most looking forward to visit as well. Though we were also prepared for the rather different circumstances of travel this place would offer, (I for one would have to get used to wearing a hijab at all times) we were surely excited!
For some people, Iran in an ambiguous mix between Iraq and Afghanistan, conjures up an image of war, and mullahs screaming ‘death to America’. We hope to clarify and show the real picture of the country through our travels and photos and wish that whether or not you choose to travel here or in any other country you make the choice for yourself and not what the news channels would like you to believe.

In the Khaqani garden next to Kabud Mosque in Tabriz, Iran

To help you get acquainted with the former Persia, here are some tidbits of facts that had piqued my interest earlier on about the country which I think you might find interesting too:

• A country that is now known for the mandatory hijab (headscarf) it imposes on all its female citizens and visitors, had once (during the Shah’s regime) in the 1920s banned the use of the hijab or chador by women in public and even promoted the usage of western dresses, in order to bring Iran into 20th century modernity.

• It was only in 1979 after the revolution that Iran became an Islamic Republic a protest that was mainly conducted by students and religious groups under the guidance of Ayatollah Khomeini, who were not so keen on the reforms and changes in the country.

• Nose job capital of the world: We noticed several young girls with plasters on their nose and were told that they were all nose jobs. In a country where women have to cover up everything except their face when in public, the nose takes precedent in terms of assessing their beauty and it also has the go ahead from the religious heads of the country. We even saw some men with plasters and unlike in other countries where people may just prefer to stay indoors until all signs of plastic surgery have disappeared, in Iran it serves almost as a status symbol! We even heard of some girls wearing the plasters just to show that they have had the job done!
  

  Men stopping for tea at the bazaar in Tabriz , Iran

• Country where no men are allowed to be seen outdoors in shorts, so much that no football grounds are seen outside and are all indoors.

• A country where people initially refuse to take your money as payment for the taxi or net café just out of courtesy, a habit which is a significant part of their national culture and psyche, called ‘Ta’arouf’.

• Previously known as Persia, it has lent its name rightly to its most famous product- the Persian carpets.

These are just a few glimpses into Iran and Iranians that we had before arriving here which got us interested. We will definitely have more to share from our experiences and interactions with the people here, a country shrouded in mystery for some and even feared by others.