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Sunday 20 June 2010

Trip to Hamadan

Taking advantage of the few days between the end of the children’s exams and the beginning of summer school for my daughter, we went on a mini-break westwards to Hamadan and Kermanshah.
We left on Monday 14 June at 7 am.

According to the inscription, the Ali Sadr Cave is the world’s largest underwater cave and dates back to the Second Geological Period (Jurassic, 136 – 190 million years ago). Parts of it remain unexplored and may stretch for hundreds of kilometres; the locals think that a cave near Zanjan, hundreds of kilometres to the north of Hamadan, is actually the same cave.
We arrived at the cave complex at 2.30 pm and had lunch at a traditional restaurant, sitting on a wooden platform covered in carpets. A brief walk during the hottest part of the day led to the entrance lobby to the cave. As soon as we stepped inside the specially formed corridor, the temperature dropped markedly, and during our visit it dropped as low as 16C, while outside the temperature was in the high thirties.
Visitors can proceed on foot until a certain depth, after which they need to board a boat tugged by a pedalo boat operated by two employees of the cave organisation. The passage is so tight in places that the sides of the boat scrape against the rocks. The water is Ph neutral, colourless and odourless, and has a natural taste. Because the water is crystal-clear, the underwater rocks and stalagmites are visible even to a depth of 14 meters.
Stalactite formations are stunning: white bunches hanging down from the roof as giant cauliflower; reddish and glistening patches spread along the sides in the shape of octopus tentacles and body parts of aliens (“They make me sick!”, daughter exclaimed); near the end of the tour, in a wide space named Talar-e Niayesh (Prayer Hall), an overhead stalactite forms the name of Allah in Arabic.
As we stepped out into the daylight again, the weather was slightly cooler. We drove for another hour and a half to Hamadan to look for a place to stay, but when we went to check-in, we realised that since Hossein hadn’t brought his ID booklet (shenas-nameh) to prove that we are related, we needed ID documents for all of us, which we didn’t have. The hotel receptionist directed us to a branch of the local police responsible for public places. The young officer on duty asked us a few questions and eventually issued a document allowing the hotel to give us a room.
More to follow in the next post.

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