Despite my enforced early start yesterday it was still mid/late afternoon by the time I hit the outskirts of Tehran due to all my stuffing around looking for a money-changer and the too-numerous photo stops.
And this landed me smack bang in the middle of Friday afternoon peak hour traffic. Tehran is a BIG city – on a par with London and New York, except the driving is much worse. Much, much worse! Not as bad as Delhi, mind you. Nothing is as bad as the driving in Delhi. Driving/riding in Delhi is beyond description. It has to be seen/heard/smelt/felt to be believed. But at least you don’t have feral goats and cattle in Tehran, just feral M-series BMWs and CLK Mercs.
But I digress.
With a little bit of help from a friendly surveyor I found Ferdowsi St without too much trouble (it would have been a bit hard to miss – it runs due south from Ferdowsi Square. Duh!) But, despite my many attempts, I could not find the hotel in the chaos of the crazed traffic. Eventually I pulled up beside a policeman who seemed to be completely mortified that a western tourist had stopped to talk to him. After a bit of mime and mapping he pointed to a small side street about 100m away. The hotel was not on Ferdowsi Street at all. It fronted a small side street coming off Ferowsi.
The so-called mid-range Ferdowsi Hotel was actually called the “Ferdowsi International Grand Hotel”. And it certainly lived up to its grandiose title. One look at the ornate, almost life-size prancing horse statues guarding the entrance and the doorman wearing a cap and jacket said it all.
At first, I was reluctant to even approach the main entrance but the “help” were very helpful and took me to a desk clerk who spoke quite good English. She told me single rooms were 1700 toman/night (which is 17000 rial). This was equivalent to about US$80/night. For what it was the price was a steal. A similar room in Sydney would have been $150-200/night at least. I hadn’t stayed in such a fancy hotel since the Awari Hotel in Lahore nearly 3 months ago. And after the flea-pit in Gorgan I was looking for an upgrade! They also changed money at an unbelievably generous rate. I took it.
And so the “Ferdowsi International Grand Hotel” became my home for the next few days while I tried get a feel for Tehran.