Oct 23 - Cold and rainy on the streets of Tabriz. We collect our washing from the laundromat down the street, for an exorbitant sum. It’s the second time we’ve washed clothes in Iran, and both times the charge for doing so is more than twice what seems to make sense. Some very dark clouds as we leave town, have the look of winter.
The road east from here is mostly gentle rolling hills with abundant cropland, all brown and harvested now. Pass the city of Sarab, with a huge statue of a beekeeper in the main roundabout. This area, including Ardabil, is known for its honey. Further down the road we detour north to Serein. The clouds are low today, but on a clear day one can see the mountain peak of Sabalan. The town of Serein is not impressive, just a jumble of pho-mansion hotels and concrete apartment blocks. Almost all this development has occurred in the last 30 years, to exploit the popularity of its hot springs. We park and take our swimwear into one of these, Pehenlu (Ershad) Hot Spa. Like all bathing opportunities in Iran, it is segregated by sex. Janet and Odette go in one door, and Omid and I into another. It is about $3 for an unlimited time period. Shoes are left at the entrance, replaced by plastic sandals. Clothing is left in lockers, and on to the pools. Cannot show photos because I left the camera in the locker. In the case of Janet (she tells me later), they take any camera device away so that there is no chance to take photos of any women bathing. The facility is done in a very dated style, looks like it is from the 1960’s. In other words, like the décor of every hotel we’ve stayed in. The main pool is fairly hot, really only tolerable for 10-15 minutes. Around it are other facilities, such as a ‘dry sauna’ (same idea as Finland), a ‘wet sauna’ (full of steam and difficult to breathe), a cold pool, and a ‘breezy rain tunnel’, which is just a corridor with mist spraying down from the ceiling. On the second floor are individual tubs with the same hot water as below, and a cold pool with submerged treadmill and bicycle. Spend about 1.5 hours here.
Eat at a traditional restaurant afterwards, down the street from the spa. Then back on the main road for the remainder of the trip to Ardabil. Our hotel in this windy and cold town is just a block from the sanctuary and tomb of Shaikh Safi al-Din. Much of this complex was damaged in an earthquake, but great effort has been made to repair the main tomb and shrine. Safi ad-Din died in 1334, and one of his descendants Shah Isma’il, was the first leader of the Safavid Dynasty.
This complex was famous also for the two huge carpets on the floor of the main shrine. They were made in Ardabil, which is an important center for carpet making in Iran. Both were unfortunately sold off to pay for repair of the shrine after an earthquake, but a copy of one, almost identical, is here. The two sold ended up in the William Morris Museum in Great Britain, and the Los Angeles Museum of Art. Both are now considered priceless.
One large room with some unusual décor is the Chini Khana. Here, Shah Abbas honored the tomb by donating a portion of his collection of Chinese porcelain (of which he had many thousands of pieces). The pieces donated were placed in cubbies all around on the walls.
An important battle was fought near Ardabil between the Safavids and the Seljuk Turks. The Turks were armed with firearms, while the Safavid forces, obeying a code of battle honor, fought only with edged weapons. Contrary to expectations, the two sides were evenly matched, until the Seljuks sent a group behind Safavid lines and opened another front. The Safavid forces were slaughtered, with 8,000 deaths. These fallen soldiers were buried behind the mausoleum. Today, only some tombstones are visible, most long since lost beneath the current town surface.
