Around 10 o’clock we start our 750-mile trip back to Tehran. On the first leg of the trip we drive past a lot of pistachio plantations. The small gray trees will develop leaves later in April. Roshanak, whose family owns a pistachio plantation, tells me I should come here in September if I want to see the harvesting of the pistachio nuts.

We stop at a truck stop before Yazd and sit down at a low table covered with a plastic tablecloth. The place is a real hole in the wall, but the kabob, served on large flat bread with torshi (pickled vegetables) is really good. We head on down the two-lane highway. We constantly have to pass trucks, which billow huge clouds of black exhaust fumes. We watch out for opposing traffic. We have tea in an inn in Nain and hit the road again. It has gotten dark and passing cars on the highway has gotten even scarier, especially because the use of headlights appears to be a voluntary thing. Some trucks have only one dim little green light on. I am told that there are rules among truckdrivers concerning headlight use, but they do not become clear to me.

It is Thursday night in Kashan and the streets are buzzing with activity. Unfortunately we have arrived too late to visit the Fin bathhouse. But the many restaurants and teahouses lining the street that leads to the famous bathhouse are all open. We choose one where we can sit outside, next to artificial waterfalls. The kabob is, if such a thing is possible, even more delicious than what we had this afternoon in the truck stop cafe. The last 130 miles we breeze over a new freeway. I only wake up when we stop in front of Mamy’s house in Tehran.