Contrary to our fears, the border crossing went very smooth.
Of course we had to -still on the Iranian side - remove the bags from the bicycles and slide them through the x-ray scanner.
At the passport and visa control, the officer tried to convince us that our visa had expired. 'No, that's not the case' we explained and showed him that he should not consider the time period for picking up the visa, but rather calculate 90 days from the date on the entry stamp. He kept the visas (for Iran it is on a separate paper, as some countries would refuse entry when having an iranian entry stamp in the passport) and gave us back our passports.
In the next room, we were greeted in High German and immediately led to the next x-ray scanner. All the locals, with their worn bags, old suitcases, and dozens of plastic bags full of tomatoes, had to wait. We felt totally uncomfortable and so sorry when we saw how the Turkish border guards treated these people.
As quickly as possible, we packed all the bags from the bike into the scanner and were then asked to push the entire bicycle through 🤣 Wow, we had never experienced anything like this before! - too bad we didn't have a photo of that! - then got the entry stamp and off we went...
The first thing Fiona did, on turkish ground, was removing the headscarf 💁♀️
The temperature was quite chill up there and the snow was within reach. From the border we pedaled ~15km uphill until almost sunset and until we found a suitable campspot for this night 🏕️ 😴
