Hotelnet: Tue 23:15

Hmm, Hotelnet actually costs money. I'm not sure how they decided I cost IR25,000 last night as there were three laptops down here and one guy on the PC. Ho hum.

Esfahan, IR

A lazy morning snoozing away after pumping up the bike's tyres -- they seemed to have dropped down to 18psi, possibly when I've been up in the mountains.

A bit too lazy though as my subsequent venture to the banks demonstrated that I'd once again mis-read/remembered the LP and banks close at 1:30. There were various touts around in Sepah Ave and several Exchange shops but none, of course, advertised their rates. I declined their offers.

I then took a trip down to Jolfa, the district of Esfahan named after the town, Jolfa, on the Armenian border from where Shah Abbas the Great transported the artisans en masse to build his palaces here. Naturally, the LP map and I came to a misunderstanding though, to be fair, one road runs straight and wide into the distance. It painfully obviously then runs halfway up yonder mountain but the LP map doesn't rate it an important enough navigational marker.

Trudge trudge trudge and I spotted a coffee shop in a small square and, good grief, it actually sold real coffee. What a delight. In the hotel restaurant they've put out a jar of Nescafe and over four attempts I've finally got a passable drink using the handy heated milk but not a patch on the real thing.

It turns out this little corner of Armenia has several rather cool little coffee houses. Very nice.

I popped into the Vank Cathedral which is something of a surprise. The Cathedral itself is painted almost from top to bottom in oils covering various biblical stories from old and new testaments and is quite remarkably well kept -- very much like a series of paintings on the wall except, in this case, quite literally on the wall (rather than canvas).

On my way out an old boy indicated that I should go to the museum (in front of me) and that there were ten minutes to go. He then performed some throat-slashing wrist-slitting finger snapping movement which I assumed was old Armenian for "ten minutes, sonny!"

There was a display about the Armenian Genocide (curiously absent from my travels in Turkey) and then a whole series of books, mostly bibles and related prayer books, some Qu'rans and a few others in various states of decay but all rather beautiful even if the most common typeface used looks like the awful Mac Classic font -- based on a rhombus rather than a circle, for want of a better description. They were all richly decorated with figures and coloured and gilded embellishments to the text. You just don't get that sort of thing these days.

Then a "Get Out!" -- it's all about timing. The Armenian quarter seemed rather nice so I shuffled about for a bit (the main road was a bit more classic Iranian) before heading back in towards the "oldest cafe in Esfahan" the rather new looking Teria Ani. My question: "So, uh, what's so special about 'Ani's Special Coffee'?" was interpreted as me ordering one. It was more of a coffee surprise when it appeared twenty minutes later, hot chocolate with a layer of whipped cream. Still, I enjoyed it.

I chatted to a bloke for an hour or so about matters best not discussed right now and he kindly paid for my special. Round the corner at the Anobi(?) pizza shop my first two pizza requests (pepperoni and chilli) were rebuffed and I settled, with the help of a local, for something with meat and a bit spicy. It took a good half hour to show up by which time the place had become quite full. Very popular with the locals.