Pass Day 136 Kajaran - Meghri

Puuuuuuh! That was a hard hard day. But I made it over the highest pass so far - and possibly the highest pass of the whole trip (or at least for a long long time). Going up to over 2500m in November proved possible - but I still would not exactly call it a good idea. Strangely most of the drivers were very supportive, shouting and sign-languaging encouragement all along a way. Only very few made unmistakingly clear that they considered me a raving lunatic. The road condition was mostly more or less ok - only on some north-facing stretches and at the top I had to push the bike, because the snow-ice-mud-mixture really did not allow me to drive on. Of course everything around was white. On the way up my mood  constantly swung between «Oh that's so beautiful» and «Damn, that's so freaking exhausting». Once I was over the pass my mood somehow got stuck in only one condition: «Aaaaaah! Cold! Cold! Cold! Cold!». On the way up I had been working enough to not feel the cold, but on the descent all my clothes could not safe me from freezing. Worst were the hands - they felt like they were close to falling of. I could not even try to take them somehow out of the wind as I had to brake constantly. After all it went nearly 2000m down. Furthermore once the top was reached I started to feel all the exhaustion of the last days - I had to stop several times for a few minutes on the way down, just because I really could not ride on, even though I just had to let Arthur roll.
But now everything will be good. I successfully defrosted myself in Meghri. I am in the Arax plain again and according to the weather report there will be spring-like temperatures the next few days.
Tomorrow (or if I am really lazy in 2 days) I will finally enter Iran. Despite some hardships it was a good decision to take the detour through Armenia (if you want to call tossing a coin a decision).
I am not sure how soon I will be able to update the blog once I have crossed the border. Both blogspot and facebook are blocked in Iran - the best communication method will be email or - as soon as I have it - telephone.