Kurdistan... day 2

 Day 2 we headed the opposite direction, and soon after leaving Erbil we stopped for one of my favorite travel experiences, especially in the middle east: the road-side snack stop! Piles of nuts, dried fruit and sweets took center stage, while the processed crap stayed in the back (I was un-amazed at the presence of Pringles. We have decided they can be found anywhere in the world. Perhaps this is because of their cleverly designed container that protects against chip breakage. I digress....).  One unique product they had here was fruit leather: made-with-real-fruit,  sweetener-free, dried-in-the-sun fruit leather. Tart and delicious!  Sweet and sticky turkish delight, colorful piles of marshmallow sweets, wonderful nut-and-nougat concoctions.... mmmm.....

Occasional groves of golden aspens gave me that much longed-for sense of autumn, and I could almost smell the crisp scent of a Minnesota September day.....


Heading towards (but staying far away from!) the border with Iran, we entered into some stark and stunning scenery.  Rocky hills led us into a deep and shady gorge complete with waterfalls and rivers.

We stopped at the Gali Ali Beg waterfall,  which is pictured on the 5000 Dinar note, where we passed under rusty awnings while some guys played pool, clearly bored in the off-season, with no-one paying to take the inflatable rowboats close to the falls. In the spring and summer, however, this place is apparently alive with families visiting and picnicking away from the heat, renting out the gazebos that line the river.

The road along the river has been remade, widened, and repaved, but the original road along this river, the Hamilton Road, was a feat of engineering designed to connect Iraq and Iran through the mountains. We wound our way up to the town of Rawanduz and into the only resort in Kurdistan, Pank.

Pank provided one of those wonderfully and bizarrely random experiences that make one go "I can't believe I'm here"..... at a deserted Kurdistan resort on a mountainside with canyon views, Iran (a difficult country for those with a US passport) right over the mountains,  still and silent amusement park rides gleaming in the sunshine, a restaurant staff serving only us, a personal roller-coaster/alpine slide thrill in the fresh air.... .

.....and our tour guide, Balin, telling us his story. How he decided to escape his war-torn home, over mountains, through rivers and oceans, facing hunger and thirst and obstacles and border patrols, being sent back a stage time and time again in a game of "Chutes and Ladders" with way more than bragging rights at stake.

Descending, we encountered a herd of sheep and more breathtaking views. 

We stopped in the town of Shaqlawa, where we wandered through the bustling bazaar, full of residents preparing for the upcoming Eid celebrations. We also made a stop to buy some of the local wine... which was terrible. 

Locally brewed and sold in a recycled vodka bottle, we should have known.... but now we really do know. Don't buy wine from Kurdistan. 

Kurdistan... the Other Iraq

It’s always exciting to travel, and even more so when it’s to a place that few people venture to.

Iraqi Kurdistan is an autonomous region in the northern part of Iraq with their own culture and government, the KRG, centered in Erbil, the town we stayed in.  Understandably, they don't get many tourists there, but I felt completely safe the entire time, and the people we encountered made us feel welcome.

We flew into Kurdistan’s small but beautiful new terminal and entered the country with no problems – first stamp in my brand new passport! 

A sunny, beautifully cool morning welcomed us to our first day of Kurdistan road-tripping. Our tour guide, Balin, was a Kurd who lived in London for 8 years before returning to his homeland… more on that later! 

A rather barren landscape surrounded us this first day, low hills of winterized wheat fields and rocks in many shades of tan and brown contrasting with the cloudless and brilliant blue sky.  First stop, St. Matthews Monastery, a still-active monastery with a beautiful view and peaceful, blissful silence.  The head monk, wearing his traditional garb, told us about the monastery, a haven for persecuted Christians in the past.  He himself came to St. Matthews after his brother was killed during violence in a nearby town.

 

Stop #2 was just an empty field, but more than 2000 years ago it was the scene of an epic battle between Alexander the Great and Darius the King of Persia, where Alexander overcame great odds and Darius ran away…. as more recently portrayed in the movie Alexander. Soccer-playing boys, amused by the white people staring at a field, followed us around, giggling and posing for pictures.

And in the middle of another random field we find… an aqueduct. Complete with Cuneiform carvings.  The nearby flock of sheep seemed less impressed than we were.  

Our next monastery stop was the much more ancient, but just as blissfully quiet, St. Hormizd monastery. We explored the cave system that was the original home of the monks and Christian refugees.

Our final stop was an amazing village called Lalish, built into a cool shaded valley.  Barefoot beauties and wizened men moved everywhere as we walked into a dust storm, turbaned heads bent over twig brooms, sweeping the temple courtyard. Men, women and children are all taking part in the cleaning of the village. Stepping over the threshold, we entered the Yezidi temple, one of the most important for this small religious sect.

Swaths of brightly colored silk decorate the main room, and as the power flickers and dies we follow the flashlight deeper into the temple, our bare feet walking the same cool stone as countless pilgrims before us, past the tomb of a saint, into a room lined with jars upon jars of the fragrant olive oil used to light the lamps.

The sound of sweeping ushered us from the village as the sun set. It was so utterly amazing to walk in this little enclave of tradition.

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More to come!