We were supposed to wake up at 3.00 am but Alan made me get out of bed at 2.30 am, insisting that it would take me more than an hour to get packed. Which was probably true. Mohammad, as usual was punctual, arriving on the dot of 4.00 am and as it happened we were pleased we had plenty of time. Initially we thought it sounded like a very early start for a 7.30 am flight but we had not realised that it would take us an hour to travel to the airport from our hotel in Tehran and also that in Iran you are required to be at the airport three hours prior to an international flight.

Imam Khomeini Airport (IKA) was not a relaxing place to be. It was a procedural nightmare. Mohammad in his usual thorough fashion, made sure that we were in the correct queue to go through the initial security checking procedures and we bade him a hasty farewell. Whether you are at airports, bus depots or railway stations, the parting of ways between people is always brutally swift. There was no time for fond farewells or lengthy thanks - we had done all that on our way to the airport. And suddenly we were on our own. I turned to wave to Mohammad as we got caught up in the frenetic queuing process, saw his characteristic faint smile and his red polo shirt - and that was it. We were gone and he was gone. And now we faced another set of adventures.

It is well to know beforehand that men and women are segregated at the various security checks at Iranian, and indeed other Muslim country's airports. Security at IKA is tight. You don't mess around. I was suddenly stopped from entering security by several stern faced female staff who barked at me and pointed to my purse. Despite containing all my security documents, money and credit cards it was obvious I had to leave my purse in my handbag before it entered the x-ray machine conveyor belt well out of sight on the male-only side, while I entered the female security room. It was with some relief that I rescued my bags coming off the conveyor, and that I also ran into Alan during the process.

Checking in for our flight was not quite as easy as Ms Pari had told us. Our lack of language skills didn't help either. The check in attendant looked long and hard at our newly printed what-we-thought-were-our-new-air-tickets, shook his head sadly several times and after some minutes directed Alan to another desk while I waited at the check in - tense. After a very long ten minutes or so Alan arrived back with some further documentation which was stamped and we checked in our baggage, sighed with relief and rapidly headed to the Business Lounge.

Well, no - we were required to pass through at least three more security checks and then through the fearsome sounding and equally unfriendly Passport Control Security Desk. The queue here for foreigners was very, very long and we were held up for a considerable time as a woman in front of us argued loudly with the security officials. We were beginning to worry about time when she was finally allowed through but then pushed roughly aside by the officials and obviously not allowed to proceed further. We found her sobbing pitifully and went to her aid. But we had no idea what her problem was and of course could not help her. We thought about her a lot after we left. Goodness knows what sort of trouble she was in.

We finally arrived at the Business Lounge where we flopped into comfortable chairs, heaved a sigh of relief and grinned at each other. We had finally made it and we were more or less on our way to Dubai - and on our correct Mahan Airlines flight. The lounge coffee tasted wonderful.

Dubai airport was highly efficient and the staff was friendly. At last I was able to shed my head scarf and feel air around my face and head. It was strange however, that for the first few days I felt quite naked without the scarf, even though I had disliked wearing it so much.

Booking our Al Marooj Rotana Hotel had been a bit like purchasing our air tickets to Dubai. We had booked through the on-line agency Agoda and had paid for what we thought was a very comprehensive but expensive package (around $AUS400.00 per night) for a Club Room, with inclusions such as breakfast, airport transfers, use of the Club Lounge facilities, evening drinks, free Internet connection etc. The receipt from Agoda however was somewhat different from what was advertised. After payment was verified a line stating that breakfast was NOT included and any other inclusions were "subject to availability on the day" had been inserted. And like Cheap-O-Air, Agoda went brain dead after payment and was extremely difficult to contact. Obtaining what we understood were paid for inclusions became like pulling teeth. In desperation we sent a fax to the hotel and to our surprise we received a personal telephone call one evening just before our departure from home from the hotel manager assuring us that they would honour the package as advertised. It certainly put us off booking through agencies, even if their prices looked competitive in their advertisements.

We entered the greetings area of the Dubai airport, looking hopefully for our hotel transfer person. Hundreds of hotel placards with every name other than ours were held up for their guests. Our transfer person did not materialise and once again all the passengers departed and we were on our own. This situation had happened so often on our previous travels that we sometimes wondered why we ever thought we would be picked up. A rather despondent man at the Tourist Information Desk looked glumly at our hotel voucher. "Was this all the documentation we had?" he asked. Well, yes. A phone call to the hotel confirmed our worst fears. They had no record of our booking, let alone an airport transfer. But thankfully the good news was that the staff assured us that our booking (or lack of) was not a problem and the hotel would refund us if we caught a taxi. Which we did. And they did.

By the end of this debacle, it was late morning and the traffic was chaotic through downtown Dubai. Our friendly taxi driver was from Ethiopia, working in Dubai with his father to save money to send home to his family. It seemed that most of the services staff in Dubai were ex-patriots from a diversity of poor countries and all trying to do the same thing. These hard working people certainly did not enjoy the same pleasures or standards of luxury that were offered to the tourist trade. At least we supposed, they were able to make some money in Dubai and try to improve their family situation in their home country. It certainly added to the international atmosphere of this outrageously beautiful, if rather bizarre desert city. 

This was our first real visit to Dubai city. It had been described to us by friends as "over the top" and a rather boring place to visit. But for us it was a welcome opportunity for a break in our travels and time, if only one day, to chill out before our travels to Pakistan. As we drove through the city we could not help but marvel at the sheer majesty and enormity of the city high rise buildings. The architecture was magnificent and we were mind blown by the sight of the telescopic, pencil-like spire of the famous Burj Kalifa sky scraper, the tallest building in the world, shimmering against a scorching 45 degree sky.

The Al Marooj Rotana was all that we had hoped for in a truly five star hotel. The architecture was stunning, the grounds and pool area were beautifully maintained, the interior tastefully furnished and the staff was friendly, courteous - and as we were to soon discover - unbelievably helpful. All our concerns with our flight from Iran and accommodation in Dubai evaporated as we checked in at the luxurious Club Lounge Floor of the hotel. Well, that was for at least five minutes.

Alan was attending to our check in procedures when I casually looked over at the Club Lounge enormous flat screen which was televising what sounded like some ground breaking news. At first I mistook the headline as reading "Obama Dead" but for us it was just about as shocking. It actually read "Osama Dead" and then went on to explain that a discrete US military forces unit had only hours earlier murdered Al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden at Abbottabad, some 50 kilometers north of Islamabad. Even worse, there was endless footage of unhealthy scenes of Americans cheering and celebrating in the streets of the USA. Our timing was impeccable. We were due to fly to Islamabad the very next day and then fly first thing the following morning to the Chitral District of the North West Frontier Province right on the warsome Afghanistan border. We had always known that our decision to travel to this region was not without some element of danger but at that time it certainly looked like the worst place in the world two western foreigners who look like us could possibly travel to. Our plans were in chaos. And we were faced with one of the worst dilemmas we had ever experienced. 

The assassination of Osama bin Laden reminded us of the the often quoted saying that everyone remembers where they were and what they were doing when they heard of the death of President Kennedy - or Princess Diana. I'm sure that we will never forget the dilemma we were in that day. I don't even think we took in much of our lovely Club Suite room as we sat on the bed in shock wondering what on earth we should do about our impending travels to Pakistan. Our very first reaction was to cancel our plans to travel there but we needed further information. 

We were so very fortunate that we were in our Dubai hotel with unlimited access to the Internet and helpful staff. We looked up the on-line "Smart Traveller" website of our Australian Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade (DFAT) to find that there was no change in their advice about travel to Pakistan. It had always stated "Reconsider Your Need to Travel" which was never very reassuring I must say. There was a warning about overseas travel in general following the assassination but that was all. We had registered with Smart Traveller** and had also contacted the Australian High Commission in Islamabad to notify them of our impending travels well before we left Australia. And so we immediately sent an email to the High Commission requesting urgent information about the local political situation. We were not asking for advice about whether or not we should travel to Pakistan, just information that could perhaps place us in a better situation to make some sort of informed decision about our impending travels. We did not ever receive a response to our email*.

Alan then rang the hotline for ACE Insurance, the nominated company for our travel insurance that was covered by our American Express (AMEX) Platinum Card we had used for our travel payments. Unlike our Australian Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade, ACE proved to be surprisingly helpful and efficient. The hotline contact person confirmed with us that if we thought the situation in Pakistan was too dangerous for travel, then it most probably was so. She could not of course guarantee us that we would be compensated without all the paper work and following insurance assessment, but she assured us that our request for assistance had been noted and that we should make any arrangements for our claims when we returned to Australia. She advised that the company would send a follow-up email to us within the next day or so - which they did. This information was at least of some assurance and we were more than impressed with the ACE Insurance personnel***.

While waiting for a response, we decided that given the circumstances, it really was far too dangerous to risk travelling to Pakistan. But we were unable to make a final decision. The exceptionally helpful Club Room personnel were horrified that we would even contemplate our planned travels and offered to secure us our room for at least another day if we wanted more time to make a decision. In the meantime, the concierge at the front desk informed us that he would devote his time to assisting us re-arrange our schedule to see if we could avoid travelling through Pakistan by flying direct to our next planned destination of far west China (we were intending to travel through Pakistan along the Karakoram Highway, finally crossing the Khunjerab Pass into far western China). He pleaded with Alan not to go ahead with our intended travels. "Please, please do not go to Pakistan sir. You will certainly be killed!" We thought we might too.

While the concierge was looking up various flight options for us, we decided that it was high time for a drink and made our way to the delightful Double Decker Bar of the hotel where we had our first alcoholic drinks for some two weeks. From memory we had more than a few.... The ice cold gin and tonics were wonderful in the searing Dubai heat but they did not help us resolve our travel dilemma. The real problem - although we did not admit it to each other at the time - was that we both desperately wanted to go back to Pakistan, a country we had fallen in love with some two years before. The bar was a great place to hang out. It was rather bizarrely decorated like an English bus but it was peaceful and we could sit outside on our own and enjoy our first drinks for weeks. A young Romanian fellow served us. If the hotel staff were horrified by our intended travel plans, then the waiter was mortified. "You are going to Pakistan? You are mad!" he exclaimed. We were starting to agree but we still could not make a decision.

In the meantime, we were receiving urgent text messages from family and friends who also were alarmed about our travels. "This is SERIOUS. Please do not go!!" my sister Jill's text message read. Other text messages from Australia told us of the volatility of the situation and that our Prime Minister Julia Gillard was warning Australian citizens against any international travel.

The good news, if there was any, was that we managed to contact our China travel agent Silk Road Adventures. The ever reliable Mr Abdullah replied to our email immediately saying that it was possible for us to re-schedule our trip two weeks earlier than planned and he would assist us in any way.

Our problem then was that we could not fly to western China from Dubai. We looked up every flight option we could find, but try as we might, we could not get to either Urumqi or Kashgar without travelling via the east coast of China.The connections were hopeless and the trip would have taken us two days - and an estimated additional $10,000 in airfares. Reluctantly we decided our only options were to pack up and fly home - or to travel to Pakistan. By that time it was late afternoon and the first option was looking like the only realistic one. And we had no reply from the Australian High Commission in Pakistan. From the constant ground breaking television news stream, we assumed the situation in Islamabad must have been chaotic.

We rang Ishaq Ali, our friend and travel agent in Pakistan and left a message to say that we could not risk our travel there and would sadly have to cancel our tour with his company. To our dismay, Ishaq rang us in the early evening saying "Everything is fine. Things are the same. It is peaceful. But you must make up your own mind..... I will call you every few hours to let you know of the situation." And true to his word, Ishaq did call us every hour or so to tell us all was calm in Pakistan.

I must say we were expecting him to tell us the situation was volatile so his call really blew us away. We trusted Ishaq Ali implicitly and we certainly did not want to go back home so early in our travels. It was impossible to make a logical decision and after a few more gin and tonics - we decided to proceed with our plans to fly to Islamabad the next day. I was secretly delighted although at 2.30 am when I was lying awake the next morning, I was not quite so "gung ho". Alan was as usual, amazingly philosophical. "No point in worrying now. We have made our decision - for better or for worse" he added unhelpfully. Thanks....

We had enjoyed our evening in the Club Lounge though. The atmosphere was lovely, the food was great and the staff was professional and friendly - most of whom were from the Philippines - and like our Ethiopian taxi driver, were working hard to make some money to take back to their home country.

The hotel guests on the Club Floor were a mixed and somewhat interesting group. A group of young Australian business people were actually living in some of the condominiums of the Al Marooj. They were friendly but it was obvious they were deadly serious about their work and spent most of the evening rapping on their computers and talking urgently on their mobile phones. A brittle loud American woman sat glued to her notebook computer, barking orders at the staff and offering no thanks or pleasantries when her demands were met. A handsome young Arab man dressed in an immaculate white flowing dishdasha and his wife and child glided into the lounge later in the evening. His wife was totally covered in a black abaya and hijab, her darting black eyes only just visible. Senior hotel management materialised from nowhere. From the deference displayed by the staff and the quiet calm air of confidence exuded by the couple, it was obvious they were people of some considerable importance. Interestingly, it was the woman who was in control of what appeared to be serious conversations with the managers. The child gambled around the lounge, playing like any other child and quite oblivious to the intense adult conversation. It was all quite fascinating. And much more entertaining than watching the non-stop all encompassing news about the recent assassination.

A chance meeting in the hotel lift with an overseas travel agent made our day, even if it was quite surreal. A bright red headed, very fair skinned man chatted to us. He was wearing an Uzbekistan name card and so we thought he must have been from that country. We had loved Uzbekistan during our 2009 travels and asked him what part of the country he was from. He laughed, saying that he was attending an Uzbek conference but he was actually a Pakistani travel agent living in Lahore. We didn't like to point out the bleeding obvious that he looked as much like a Pakistani as we did, but we did talk to him about our travel plans. "You think that YOU would be in in danger? Just look at me!" he laughed, pointing at his skin and flaming red hair. He then reassured us that we would be fine and that Chitral, even though it was so close to Afghanistan, was a wonderful and safe destination. He bade us farewell and wished us luck with our travels, and disappeared.

We looked at each other and shook our heads. Were we dreaming? Oh well, we were going to Pakistan and that was that.....