<h5> A Canadian Journey in Iran</h5>

Picture does not show Garmeh, it is Yazd area!

1. This is hilarious . on one hand Iran said we can now enriched our own uraninum and can make Nuclear power station fuels! Now, protesting against Russia why they are delaying to transport Fuel for Boshehr nuclear power stations!! I am not sure what to believe!!

2. Everyone is gone for lunch here at the office, I decided to post this story. Mr. Andy LLoyd a Journalist major from Ryerson University, Canada, had a trip to Iran last year. His perception of Iran was previously conveyed in one of his writing here. This is his special freelence work to Toronto Star To Garmeh a desert village at center of Iran.
read the rest from his work.

GARMEH, IRAN -- The daily bus from Esfahan lurches around its last corner and comes to a stop in Khour's main square. A crowd of men and young children jump to their feet, craning their necks to see who's on board. In this dusty desert town in central Iran, a rare bus arrival is of considerable interest, even at 9: 30 p.m.

As I step off the 1970s-era Mercedes bus, the children pick me out of the crowd in seconds. "Touristi, touristi," they shout, trying unsuccessfully to suppress their giggles. Two men approach me amidst all the commotion; they know exactly where I'm going.

"Garmeh. Maziar," one says, pointing to a nearby car. Every tourist who gets off that bus is going to the same place. Yesterday it was a German, a Brit and a Czech. Today, a Canadian. For a few dollars, the man offers to take me 40 kilometres south into the desert to Garmeh, a place inaccessible by public transportation.

Garmeh is a tiny oasis in Iran's vast central desert, the Dasht-e Kavir, surrounded on all sides by an arid landscape that stretches to the horizon. On the edge of the oasis is a village with just 200 residents. Its houses hug the edge of a veritable forest: a tropical paradise of date palms and pomegranate trees, of fruits and vegetables and gurgling springs.

Garmeh, which means "hot" in Farsi, had all but fallen off the map until recently, when Tehran artist Maziar Ale Davoud and his wife Ariane transformed it into one of Iran's must-see, off-the-beaten-track destinations.

Ale Davoud moved back to Garmeh from Tehran to renovate his family's ancestral home, turning it into one of Iran's most authentic accommodations. It's a true desert guesthouse.

I arrive with my driver well after 10 p.m. He navigates the narrow lanes of the village as far as possible before killing the engine. We step out of the car into silence.

Across a narrow dirt lane, two camels stare at me from behind the wall of their adobe shelter.

Somewhere nearby, a dog barks, breaking the silence. There are guests in the village. We've arrived.

"Garmeh. Maziar," the driver repeats, pointing ahead of us. I hesitate at the entrance to the mud-brick home. Known locally as Maziar, Ale Davoud's unmarked guesthouse is formally named Ateshoni.

The painstakingly restored home is set up around a central courtyard that serves as a dining area and meeting place. It's a traditional house in every sense. The carpeted lounge is lined with pillows; no furniture here. The walls are carefully plastered with mud and bits of grass. In the kitchen, communal drinking water hangs from the ceiling in a leather skin. A tin pot rattles away all day on the stovetop with water for tea at the ready.

Meals are taken on the carpeted lounge floor and sleeping accommodation is in the traditional style, a mattress rolled out on the floor. The bedrooms are comfortably furnished and tastefully decorated with handmade ceramics and desert-inspired art.

Guests quickly realize this is no hotel. It truly feels as if you are staying with the Ale Davoud family, and in fact you are. It's their home. Ale Davoud's parents prepare meals for the family and the guests. Everyone eats together. In the evenings, Ale Davoud and his wife chat with travellers over tea.

The couple is responsible for what is shaping up to be Garmeh's renaissance. Over the past decade, the once-thriving oasis has seen its population shrink as young people left to seek jobs in the cities. The village is dotted with the crumbling ruins of abandoned houses. In the lush oasis, many of the dates are not harvested; there's no one left to pick them.

But Ateshoni is starting to draw a steady stream of international tourists en route between Esfahan and Yazd, two of Iran's tourism hot spots. Ale Davoud's guesthouse is now listed in a popular travel guidebook for Iran, and he's even booking small tour groups.

Since there isn't much to do, Ale Davoud has created attractions. He organizes tours in the surrounding area. He offers camel rides in the desert, day trips to rolling sand dunes and visits to the chillingly sterile salt desert. There are cycling excursions and even paragliding.

But it's hard to beat an afternoon in Garmeh's oasis. Dirt tracks criss-cross the surprisingly vast forest of date palms, interspersed with pomegranates, pistachios, figs and apricots. Other than the occasional bird song, the silence is absolute.

Good book in hand, I spend a silent afternoon in this desert paradise. There are only a few villagers working in the oasis. They saunter back and forth between plots, with fresh clippings on their backs. This is an oasis for the mind; a place where stillness is around every corner.

That is Garmeh's true attraction.

If you go:
At $20 (U.S.) a night, the price at Ateshoni includes three home-cooked traditional Iranian meals a day. It's all you'll spend. There is nowhere to buy anything.
The easiest way to reach Garmeh is from Esfahan. A daily bus runs to Khour (six hours). From Khour, taxis take you to Garmeh. By car, Garmeh is about 700 km southeast of Tehran and 400 km east of Esfahan.
There are no direct flights between Canada and Iran, but most European carriers offer connecting service.