The first leg of the Asian Adventure started on the 21st of March, where I set out from my Geneva lairs with my girlfriend, bound for Istanbul, the gateway to Asia, traveling through Zurich, Budapest, and Bucharest. In Istanbul, my girlfriend returned to Copenhagen, but I was joined by my father, who arrived to Istanbul on the same day. After seeing the city, we set out over Anatolia for Iran on the Trans-Asian Express.
With tales of adventure from Ankara, Tabriz, Tehran, Esfahan, Yazd, Shiraz, and Persepolis, our three weeks of overland travel mostly by train, but occationally by bus and once by ferry (across Lake Van) became a surprisingly delightful meeting with modern day Iran as well as ancient Persia. And though the architecture, the monuments, and the nature was awe inspiring, the inhabitants was in the end the most abundant source of experiences.

The route: (see also map and route page.)
The Trans-Asian Express departs once a week from Istanbul, and traverses across Anatolia over Lake Van and into central Iran, from where we continued south, with the choices of visiting the following places:
Turkey: Istanbul, Ankara, and Lake Van
Northern Iran: Tabriz and Tehran
Southern Iran: Esfahan, Yazd, and Shiraz
Using Shiraz as base, we went on an expedition to Persepolis and Persegard. For a more detailed description of the route, please consult the map and route page.

The team:

Lars Erik Petersen

Long time explorer (though mostly at sea), an accomplished map reader, keen bridge player, and mostly in for new experiences, as long as they don't includes heights.

Troels Christian Petersen

Insatiable adventurer, particle physicist, photographer, and (wannabe) poet, taught map reading and playing bridge by father (above). For further (sailing) details, see the Skardu crew listing.

The short movie:
Using my tiny Canon IXUS camera, I managed to record a few scenes from the trip. Upon return, a friend of mine and I sat down and managed to select the best parts and put them together into a short movie (11:12 minutes), which can be found here (.wmv format):
Smaller version (43.1 MB)
Large version (263 MB)


The photos:
A few pictures of what we were to expect are shown below (click for large photo). Needless to say, they only give a vague representation of the immaculate beauty of the regiions we have traversed.

Photos taken on the trip can be found on the photo page. Below are a few examples of panoramic shots:


The daily logs:
Eventually, when a world of infinate time emerges, I hope to put the daily logs (written en route) below. For now the links are not working - my apologies.
Zurich, 21st of March 2009
Istanbul, 31st of March 2009
Tehran, 15th of April 2009

An exceptionally good source on the Trans-Asia Express are:
The man in seat 61.