The 53 Places to Go in 2008




18. IRAN

What Axis of Evil? Upscale tour operators are tiptoeing into Iran next year, offering trips that explore the ancient country's Persian treasures and olive-green desert plains. Next spring, the luxury cruise liner Silversea will make stops in the Iranian port city of Bandar Abbas on its Dubai (http://travel.nytimes.com/travel/guides/middle-east/united-arab-emirates/dubai/overview.html?inline=nyt-geo) to Dubai cruise. And California (http://travel.nytimes.com/travel/guides/north-america/united-states/california/overview.html?inline=nyt-geo)-based Distant Horizons (www.distant-horizons.com (http://www.distant-horizons.com/)) is organizing two 18-day trips that start in Tehran and then weave through the once-forbidden countryside, including stops in Shiraz and Isfahan. Prices start at $5,390 per person.

http://travel.nytimes.com/2007/12/09/travel/09where.html

Gotta love it...

http://travel.nytimes.com/2007/12/09/travel/09where.html

Gotta love it...


Hopefully there will be no sympathizers of the terrorist groups operating in Egypt who will disrupt this potentially lucrative enterprise; it would be a shame to have American and/or European tourists being kidnapped and/or killed simply for being non-Muslim, or Western.

Hopefully there will be no sympathizers of the terrorist groups operating in Egypt who will disrupt this potentially lucrative enterprise; it would be a shame to have American and/or European tourists being kidnapped and/or killed simply for being non-Muslim, or Western.

Think what you want of the Iranians, but I can almost guarantee you that security arrangements were made between the travel agency and the Iranian government. I don't see anything happening to them. Iran needs to change its image to the West, and a bad incident with these people would be a big step backwards.

Hopefully the Bush administration doesn't contact it's underground terrorist cell in the region to ambush and frame the Iranian's for a terrible travesty thus justifying another pointless war in which we kill off more of America's gullible young.

!!