This post was kindly contributed by Robert Ryan.

我住在迪拜从2012年到2018年底，担任航空公司飞行员的阿联酋航空公司。迪拜，大多全是沙漠，但有山两三个小时的车程到北，东到阿曼，是越野爱好者的天堂与一个大型社区的4×4，MOTO-X，耐力赛和冒险自行车骑手。新利18苹果

I rode with a group of 40-50 somethings, mostly on BMW R 1200 GSAs. Riding abilities varied, but after three or four years of trips into the mountains of Oman, with ever increasing difficulty levels, almost everyone had achieved a respectable level on fully-loaded GSs off road, with some of the guys qualifying for the Middle Eastern GS Trophy Trials.

阿曼拥有一些最好的越野小径你所希望的与允许随处可见免费露营，但它是非常遥远，而且很多时候没有手机信号。故障或伤害可以得到迅速严重。

Most trips were two or three days starting early morning from Dubai, with a 400km drive east, crossing the border into Oman and leading up into the network of rugged, remote trails around Jebel Shams Mountain range.

温度是白天高，但能得到晚上在山上严重感冒，所以合适的服装和装备是非常重要的。一个几趟不断微调我们的装备后，我们在知道需要什么硬核骑马和露营三天取得了良好的，哪些只是多余的，不必要的自重。带着几分乘车前协调，设备和工具被瓜分的人之间，又保持所有重要的体重下降。

Bike Preparation

这是由一套好的80/20tyres的,most importantly for puncture prevention. There were surprisingly few of these, considering the hammering the tyres received on a loaded GS in the mountains. Shinko 804/805 tyres were popular and available locally at a very reasonable $140 per pair, proving very good on and off road.

Then the usual Touratech accessories, most importantly a heavy duty sump guard from which we would hear frequent loud clanging as the front wheel fired rocks at it. Add a TouraTech tool roll, with everything needed to take apart an R 1200 GS, a puncture repair kit and mini compressor, and that was it.

回家了

After six years in Dubai, it was time to head home to the real world.

Flying from Dubai, the standard routing for an Emirates flight to a European destination used to be north, across the Gulf, crossing the southern Iranian coastline, and then north-west along the middle of Iran, crossing into Turkey at Van, onwards into Bulgaria, and then the rest of Europe.

That’s almost identical to the overland route, and after six years of looking down on this route from the air with its beautiful mountain ranges, hidden villages and salt lakes, I swore that when it came time to go home, I’d ride home on my bike.

Planning

Planning for the trip consisted mainly of securing a visa for Iran. While I needed to allow plenty of time in advance, this was pretty straightforward. I usedOverlandtoiran.com由侯赛因，谁发出“邀请”，它进入伊朗的移民系统中运行。这就允许你提交你的护照旅游签证。侯赛因还负责绿卡保险的伊朗和土耳其。

Next was the Carnet de Passage, also very straight forward, from the local FIA office in Dubai. A “Tourism Certificate” from the vehicle licence authority was required to allow the bike out of the U.A.E, and also to allow purchase of a ferry ticket from Sharjah, U.A.E, to Bandar Abbas, Iran.

对于旅行本身，一个快速的互联网搜索之后，很明显，住宿可以在线为几乎无处不在沿线订满了，我决定不带任何野营装备。这节省了空间和重量的整个负载。

Navigation

导航是通过我的iPhone提供的，安装在一个快速释放把手“四锁”附件（强烈推荐）。即使在雨中呆手机相当干燥的屏幕后面。我用了一个离线地图应用程序，“Maps.me”，并会下载当前区域为第二天的行程，每当无线网络是可用的。

Bike Preparation

Bike preparation consisted of an oil change, a packet of “octane booster” tablets to help with Iran’s low octane (85’) petrol, and fitting a set of road tyres since the trip would be 99% road. I bought an “Airhawk” seat cushion for my saddle, which I can safely say adds another 300km a day to what your backside could normally endure.

I already had a set of aluminium panniers, and used my BMW topbox for ease of access and security for passport, cameras and so on during the day when stopped. At night, I’d just put my valuables and fresh clothes in a small backpack, and everything else stayed on the bike for the night. Minimizing the hassle of packing/unpacking each day is really important when you are doing it for two weeks.

时间表

I had two weeks before I had to be back in Europe to start a new job, so I was working on 12 days of riding, with a day either side to get ready for work and so on. So a daily distance of 670km was required to cover the 8,000km back home to Dublin.

B计划,in case something went wrong and I got stuck somewhere and lost a few days, as long as the bike was still going, was to get to “Motocamp”, in Sevlievo, Bulgaria (150km east of Sofia), where they will store your bike, repair your bike, offer hostel and camping accommodation and so on, and then fly home and pick up the bike and continue at a later stage.

Setting Off

Finally the day arrived, and I headed off to the ferry terminal in Sharjah, with wads of paperwork, permits to enter the port, customs forms, export documents, and a ferry ticket.

I was waiting at every stage to be told I was missing some vital piece of paperwork and couldn’t go, and I would only be able to relax once I was through customs on the Iranian side the next day.

The ferry was a 10 hour trip through the night, with just a seat for comfort, and about 50 other passengers. To say I was the odd one out is an understatement. The evening meal consisted of some bread and … “Carrot Jam”… with an unlimited supply of tea, served with what tasted like at least 10 spoons of sugar per small cup.

第二天早上在阿巴斯抵达，我遇到了一个代理报关，和大约三个小时的等待和各办事处之间会后，我被海关和移民清除，终于可以自由地开始我的旅程！利民港口和进入城镇，这是与繁文缛节的大量完成一个巨大的安慰，而且能够走自己的路。我改变了一些钱，得到了镇出来，因为没有什么可看那里，和一般的存在只是空的沙漠地区。

Route Planning

Route planning was simple since I was taking the most direct route possible. I rode for one or two hour stints, or for as long as I felt good, and when there was something to see, I stopped. I always had a rough idea of where I would look to spend the night by lunchtime of each day, and would try to get there an hour before sunset. As long as I was on the road by 8.30am, 670km each day was not a problem.

Hotels are very cheap, with 15-20 euros getting you a basic room with breakfast in most small towns.

Food

Food also costs next to nothing, and readily available. Most of the hotels had a decent breakfast. A friendly truck driver in a petrol station gave me a huge bag of dates. At first he produced an enormous bucketful, but when I politely demonstrated that I physically couldn’t carry them all, he reduced it to a shopping bagful. They were enough to keep me going until I reached whatever town I was going to spend the night in, where I’d find a kebab or something similar.

Fuel

Fuel at about 7 cents/litre was readily available all along the route, with only one or two of the longer sections requiring some forward planning. As my GS is the non-Adventure spec. with the relatively small tank, I brought along a spare 5 litre container of fuel but never had to use it. I added an “octane booster” tablet to each tankful of fuel, and never had any “pinking” issues.

Shiraz, Isfahan, and Qom

设拉子，伊斯法罕，库姆和精彩的城市访问，虽然你可以花费数周时间四处寻找他们每个人，随着时间的我有我可以只参观的主要景点，虽然我确实花了一整天在伊斯法罕。

我骑着然后到乌尔米耶满足侯赛因谁了我的绿卡保险土耳其准备收集，并提供了夜间的B＆B。

Into Turkey

The next morning, I was up early and headed to the Iran-Turkey border crossing at Serow. This is the southern border crossing as opposed to the more frequently used, and probably easier, border crossing at Bazargan to the North.

The mood here was a little darker. Yuksekova, on the other side of the border crossing, was officially a conflict zone until 2016, between the Turkish military and the PKK.

I had a hard time finding anyone to talk to about where to start the exit process and get the important exit stamp on my Carnet. As far as I could see I was the only foreigner crossing over that morning. I eventually found a guy who seemed to know the procedure and pointed me in the right direction.

基本上一切负责围绕着一个人，显然也是非常重要的，你只是...等着谁的面前。他主要喝茶，在电话上交谈，而当出现了一个缺口，有人有胆量直接称呼他，将可疑过目，然后再签署各种形式被介绍给他。45分钟我是看不见的，他招手叫我过去，检查了我的文书工作，提出的问题，并最终签署了我的论文并盖章的特许证。

The big gates were opened, and I was let out into Turkey. The Turkish entry procedure was a lot more straightforward, and I was on the road again by lunchtime.

Yuksekova

Yuksekova and onwards for the remainder of the day was not a happy zone with the Turkish army all over the place, checkpoints every 10km or so, and very tense looking soldiers. By the end of the day the army was less visible, and I could start to enjoy the surroundings a bit more.

土耳其有一个惊人的各种景物，道路，大部分是空的，真的很不错。再次，这是什么地方，你可以花几个月探索，具有良好的食物，廉价燃料和友好的人民。

伊斯坦布尔

隧道伊斯坦布尔，东到西，在黑暗高峰高峰时段太可怕了。爬行一起，用很少的空间，过滤器和侵略性司机谁没有太在意自行车的时间。

Bulgaria

Crossing into Bulgaria was much faster, and I was glad to be riding a bike and not driving a truck, as there was a line of trucks 6km long, waiting to cross the border.

At this point I was very much aware that I was back in Europe. Prices creeping up, expensive fuel, and thanks to my tight schedule, mainly boring motorway from this point on.

我开始增加我每天行驶，并在一些天，良好的道路和体面的天气，在做900公里天。它开始变得更冷，这是11月中旬，以及采取了哪些冒险高达感觉就像是即将结束了这一点。新利18苹果

I pushed on through Serbia, Croatia, Slovenia, Austria, Germany, France etc, and at that point just wanted to get home.

家

After 11 days on the road and 8,000km, I arrived home. Happy to have made it without any issues, and feeling much love for my trusty 2007 R 1200 GS, which despite the previous four years of off road abuse in Oman, had performed perfectly.

Summary

Overall the trip was a lot easier than I envisaged during the planning stages.

Once you have the correct paperwork organised, all you need is time, a smartphone, a half decent bike but nothing special, and not a whole lot of money.

Enough time is always the hardest part, and I have no doubt I rode past many incredible places which, with more time, I would have loved to explore.

Finishing a big trip just makes you want to start the next one, and there is no better way to explore the world than on a motorcycle.

（组图罗布Ryan和朋友）