Riding to Babylon — The Ancient City of Iraq (S2/Ep60)

Added: 2026-05-12

[00:00:00]Oh, madam.

[00:00:02]Hello.

[00:00:20]Good morning from Baghdad.

[00:00:22]I will show you real quick where we are.

[00:00:24]We are right now in Iraq and last time we drove from Erbil over to Baghdad and today we will continue south and go to An Nasiriyah. So on my route I have basically two goals. One is an old gate of the ancient city Babylon and the other goal is at the very end where I might stop most definitely stop for the day and yeah, we'll see if we can go in. I think we will have around 350 km something like that. Let's go.

[00:01:57]So.

[00:02:00]time to leave Baghdad.

[00:02:05]The generators are so loud.

[00:02:20]It's not that easy to navigate here because many times they just block roads.

[00:02:25]And you actually cannot go where the navigation tells you to go. I have sun.

[00:02:30]Isn't that amazing?

[00:02:33]I didn't really understand the communication yet because most of the motorcycle riders are just honking constantly like all the time.

[00:02:43]I think it's a way of saying, "I'm here."

[00:02:49]And many of the other riders, either way they just honk and go or they honk be like, "Hey, I want to go in." Or I don't know. I really have no idea. This is so confusing, eh?

[00:03:02]Oh, no. This is not the right one.

[00:03:05]But there's no other road.

[00:03:15]Yeah, well, doesn't matter.

[00:03:19]As long as I can take the third exit on the roundabout, which I highly doubt.

[00:03:24]I'm not sure, but it was already two times in a roundabout that they just blocked the exits and you had to take another one.

[00:03:45]All right. Uh Okay. Okay.

[00:03:54]Okay.

[00:03:57]>> Not even a checkpoint and he's waving me out, eh?

[00:04:06]What kind of brand is this? Stinger GT?

[00:04:09]Never seen that.

[00:04:18]I think there's a fuel station.

[00:04:21]Yes, I'm already on reserve.

[00:04:28]I'm always so insecure going to fuel stations here.

[00:04:37]I cannot get fuel directly as it seems.

[00:04:44]He already said I have to go here.

[00:04:49]This.

[00:04:53]I don't get it.

[00:04:55]Oopsie.

[00:05:00]Uh Benzene. Benzene.

[00:05:06]Benzene.

[00:05:08]Ah, okay, okay.

[00:05:11]Uh saddle mode.

[00:05:13]I cannot go directly or Uh yeah.

[00:05:28]Yes, yes, yes, but I don't have uh I don't So, I leave it here?

[00:05:47]Fair.

[00:05:50]>> Okay. Okay, tell them.

[00:05:53]After the owner invited me for a cup of tea, I was allowed to pull up to the fuel pump.

[00:06:35]Bye.

[00:06:53]So now, we will test if the bike works.

[00:07:15]My fuel ran out to the floor because I took this tube off.

[00:07:21]Obviously.

[00:07:22]But it's working, huh?

[00:07:26]Yes.

[00:07:30]So I can just let them film my bike and nothing happens.

[00:07:35]What a crazy fuel station, eh?

[00:07:38]Oh, that was cool. I didn't pay for my fuel.

[00:07:41]Can you imagine, eh?

[00:07:44]I didn't pay for my fuel. I didn't pay for anything.

[00:07:47]Of course, it was not only okay, we ask how we fill your bike. It was just uh yeah, just sit down, have a tea, have water. Do you need anything? And then they filled the bike.

[00:07:58]And they were a bit nervous because the fuel was running out of the bike.

[00:08:03]And I was like, "No, no, it's okay.

[00:08:05]Um it's just because the air vent is there."

[00:08:10]And yeah, otherwise this fuel that now was on the floor would have all been in this carbonated filter.

[00:08:17]And that's why the bike turned off all the time.

[00:08:20]So, as you can see now, it's running.

[00:08:23]Yes, I can get fuel without a problem, eh?

[00:08:27]Unbelievable.

[00:08:30]It took me far too long to find that out.

[00:08:33]But that is why learning a job will never beat experience. That is just such a difference. If you have never seen something or an issue or a problem, whatever, it doesn't matter that you learned the job. You cannot just find out by by reading some books.

[00:08:51]Especially because I'm a car mechanic, and that is a not very specific problem on a car.

[00:08:57]You don't have that on cars.

[00:08:59]Oh, that is making me happy now. Yes, I lose a bit of fuel on the top, and I need to find a solution for that.

[00:09:08]But at least look at this, eh? I got fuel. I can just ride, eh? No problem at all.

[00:09:16]I had the first checkpoint for today, and of course again passport control.

[00:09:22]Many times when I have my helmet on, they don't realize that I'm a woman. So, they open the passport, they see a picture of a woman, and they're like, "What the hell? Is this you?"

[00:09:33]And then they say, "Go to the side."

[00:09:37]And everyone wants to know anything.

[00:09:40]Like they all look at the passport.

[00:09:44]And they are in disbelief and then after a while they just say okay, keep going.

[00:10:13]I already saw the first sign to the ancient city of Babylon.

[00:10:20]I think it said 5 km.

[00:10:23]Too many lanes here.

[00:10:28]So slow.

[00:10:35]Italy? Uh no, Alemania. Alemania?

[00:10:38]Yes.

[00:10:39]Babylon to Najaf? Yeah.

[00:10:41]Babylon? Babylon.

[00:10:46]Oh, madam?

[00:10:49]Hello. Hello.

[00:10:51]Hello.

[00:10:52]>> Hello.

[00:10:54]You are British?

[00:10:57]Alemania. Alemania?

[00:10:59]>> Alemania.

[00:11:05]Alemania. Alemania. Where are you going?

[00:11:07]Uh to the ancient city.

[00:11:10]Yeah, yeah. Yes, yes. Nice to meet you.

[00:11:11]Nice to meet you. Nice to meet you, too.

[00:11:23]Okay.

[00:11:32]They always ask if I'm from Italy. I wonder why.

[00:11:41]Can I go in there?

[00:11:53]Hello. Hello.

[00:11:55]Where are you from? Alemania. Alemania, everyday Germany. Yes. Germany.

[00:12:00]Huh? Man or woman? Woman. All right, come on. Thank you. Thank you. Uh passport? Yes. And ticket 25. Okay.

[00:12:21]Thank you. Thank you.

[00:12:23]Thank you.

[00:12:27]Shukran.

[00:12:34]I mean this blue gate is actually a replica.

[00:12:38]The original one it's a bit funny, but like of course it doesn't exist, but most of the pieces of the original gate are in Germany, in Berlin, in a museum.

[00:12:50]Because uh a German archaeologist uh yeah, dig them up and uh the took them to Berlin.

[00:13:00]I I don't know, it feels kind of wrong, but it's cute, hey.

[00:13:09]All right, who was here?

[00:13:11]Hello. Good morning.

[00:13:14]Good morning. Morning. Where are you from? Germany. Oh, welcome. Sorry.

[00:13:19]Welcome to Babylon. Thank you. We need to take a picture for with the the gate.

[00:13:23]Can I park the bike and Okay.

[00:13:26]I am sorry. No problem.

[00:13:29]Okay.

[00:13:35]That is so cool, eh?

[00:13:43]Incredible.

[00:14:18]So, this gate is a replica of the Ishtar Gate, which was originally built in 575 BCE. Actually, there were two gates back then, an inner and an outer gate, and the inner gate was much bigger, and they believe it was 14 m high. The Ishtar Gate was one of the entrances to the ancient city of Babylon, and it was dedicated to Ishtar, the goddess of war, love, fertility, and protection.

[00:14:49]Back then, it was meant to overwhelm the visitors. It was mainly built from fired bricks, but the top layer were blue, deep blue glazed bricks. And these bricks are actually, they found a lot of them, and they're now in the museum in Germany, in Berlin.

[00:15:05]The gate is covered in symbols of animals, and the lion is the symbol of Ishtar.

[00:15:13]The bulls are the symbols of the storm god Adad, and then they had some uh animals that looked a bit like a dragon and these are the animals of the god of Babylon, Marduk.

[00:15:45]Well, Babylon is also known for the for one of the seven world wonders, the Hanging Gardens of Babylon, but they actually never found any remainings of these Hanging Gardens. So, it is more likely that these gardens were in the north of Iraq, but not here in Babylon.

[00:16:05]Well, some say this, some say something else, so they could never prove it. But, they found remainings of these walls, of these ancient walls of the city itself.

[00:16:44]It's kind of unreal that they rebuilt all these really huge walls.

[00:16:50]They're really, really big. If you look at this, this is so wide.

[00:16:59]And it's just like empty in between. It's like a ghost city.

[00:17:06]It's just crazy.

[00:17:09]I feel like I'm in a labyrinth.

[00:17:13]Behind every corner, you find another corridor.

[00:17:17]And I have no idea where it leads.

[00:17:20]Look at this way. It's just never ending.

[00:17:25]You can go there, here, there.

[00:17:44]So, what you can see here today consists of, let's say, three layers.

[00:17:49]There's still some of the base, some of the ruins of the ancient city of Babylon.

[00:17:54]Then it was archaeological rebuilt in the early to mid-20th century.

[00:18:01]And finally, it was rebuilt to the point where it's now under Saddam Hussein in 1980. Yeah, basically most of it is rebuilt, which is quite obvious.

[00:18:20]But then you can see different stones in the base.

[00:18:25]I mean, I'm not a specialist for stones, but it looks like maybe I don't think this is the ancient Babylon, but maybe the reconstruction, the archaeological reconstruction back then.

[00:18:39]And this top layer seems to be really new.

[00:18:45]If you look at the difference here, from this to this.

[00:18:56]So, this is where the real Ishtar Gate was.

[00:19:00]The real remainings of the gate.

[00:19:04]Here you can see Ishtar Gate was built during the reign of Nebuchadnezzar the second, 604 to 562 BC in the northernmost section of the inner city wall to connect the northern procession way with the main sanctuary.

[00:19:29]Look at this, hey.

[00:19:32]Wow.

[00:19:51]The main palace that over there.

[00:20:24]This lion sculpture actually survived because it's made out of basalt, which is a very hard stone, and that is why it's still here even if it's an ancient sculpture.

[00:20:38]And the lion is standing above a human figure, and because the lion is the sign of Babylon, it shows the defeat of the enemy.

[00:21:04]Seeing it now from above, it really looks like a labyrinth.

[00:21:18]Let's go. We have 260 km to the next goal.

[00:21:41]Still have quite a big distance to cover.

[00:21:45]I tried to find a little bit of a better route, but then I have to go straight through the towns and that is just too much traffic.

[00:21:58]So we'll just stay on the fast road now.

[00:22:10]Like a highway rest point.

[00:22:14]But they said there's food here.

[00:22:18]I never saw that before.

[00:22:22]Petrol station, petrol station.

[00:22:30]Look at this, hey. There's like a restaurant.

[00:22:34]I can absolutely eat something here.

[00:23:15]>> They want me to follow them.

[00:23:17]No, dude. That is I will not drive a convoy for 200 km, my friend.

[00:23:28]Impossible.

[00:23:31]Okay, let's go.

[00:23:34]Doesn't matter where I stop. If it's just like a like a rest point here on the highway.

[00:23:41]If it's like a restaurant, it doesn't matter. People ask me for pictures.

[00:23:45]If I'm sightseeing somewhere, people ask me for pictures.

[00:23:49]I think I'm on so many phones now.

[00:23:55]Impossible.

[00:24:12]The amount of trash on the side of the road is insane. That is Oh.

[00:24:20]It really breaks my heart to see that.

[00:24:24]That is so unnecessary.

[00:24:27]So, there you see so many oil transports.

[00:24:33]36,000 L per truck.

[00:24:38]And the highway is full of these trucks.

[00:24:41]5% of the oil we use on this earth come from Iraq.

[00:24:47]So, that is quite a lot.

[00:24:51]Saudi Arabia is a bit more than 10%.

[00:24:55]And there are two more, three more, five Look at the fuel station, eh.

[00:25:03]So many oil trucks.

[00:25:08]They sell toys on the side of the road.

[00:25:14]Okay.

[00:25:36]So now I hope that there are some fuel stations because they are marked they are on my map.

[00:25:45]And I need a fuel station again.

[00:25:51]Oh, please tell me it's not closed, huh?

[00:25:54]What the hell is here?

[00:25:56]It's closed, huh?

[00:26:03]Hey.

[00:26:07]Yeah.

[00:26:09]Closed?

[00:26:10]Okay.

[00:26:13]Hope.

[00:26:20]Wait.

[00:26:21]One moment. No, no, here.

[00:26:30]Okay. Shukran.

[00:26:32]Bye.

[00:26:44]Bye.

[00:26:49]Hey, hey, hey, hey, hey.

[00:26:58]I have I have Woo.

[00:27:05]But it's like super deep water.

[00:27:14]Okay. Yeah, they make a business out of that.

[00:27:18]But the fuel station is not working at the moment because that was far too expensive.

[00:27:27]He wanted 20,000 for the fuel and I paid for one full tank.

[00:27:34]When I had my first fuel, I paid 5,000.

[00:27:38]So, I was like, "No, you don't get 20,000."

[00:27:42]So, in the end, I paid 13,000.

[00:27:46]Oh, they blocked the road there.

[00:27:50]Oh, damn it.

[00:27:53]Are you for real?

[00:27:55]I have to ride all the way back.

[00:27:58]Unbelievable, eh?

[00:28:06]So, this is not possible.

[00:28:12]I actually wanted to ride over the ancient city of Ur to Nasiriyah, but the road was closed and so I had to head back all the way and take the normal road to Nasiriyah.

[00:28:24]All the way back just to to take this road here. I should have turned around right away cuz I think here you can refuel on the fuel station directly, eh?

[00:28:45]Why do they stop?

[00:28:57]All of them want to turn.

[00:28:59]But I just want to go there.

[00:29:10]Could just What a mess again, eh?

[00:29:40]City center.

[00:29:49]Welcome to the ancient city of Ur. This is where we go tomorrow.

[00:30:11]Everything here is just muddy.

[00:30:14]You really have to take care, eh?

[00:30:16]Where you go?

[00:30:21]Super slippery.

[00:30:24]Where can I reach the main road?

[00:30:35]This fast.

[00:30:40]Just look at this road.

[00:30:50]How is this meant to be?

[00:30:53]This is so strange, man.

[00:30:59]Wee.

[00:31:01]I think I have to go here.

[00:31:03]Do I have to go here?

[00:31:05]This is a two-way road, yeah.

[00:31:12]Oh, I'm so lost, eh.

[00:31:15]What the hell? Look at this hole.

[00:31:27]Oh, wow.

[00:31:29]I have normal tarmac.

[00:31:32]Not a freaking mud hole. My boots look Oh, what the hell?

[00:31:44]I'm really not a big fan of driving and reading signs, looking for a hotel.

[00:31:51]Instead of like putting a hotel in my navigation, I just go there.

[00:31:56]Especially when all the signs are in Arabic.

[00:32:00]How should I see that, uh Yes, this is a hotel. I will just ask what it costs.

[00:32:18]I think it's too expensive.

[00:32:22]But I will ask.

[00:32:24]I'll give it a chance.

[00:32:27]Well, that is definitely too expensive.

[00:32:31]He told me it's 90,000.

[00:32:35]My limit is like 40,000.

[00:32:42]But he said there's a hotel auto hotel.

[00:32:48]And that should be cheaper.

[00:32:51]So let's check.

[00:33:00]So it took a little bit longer to find a hotel here because most of the hotels are very expensive.

[00:33:07]But now I found this very tiny room.

[00:33:12]So this is basically my room.

[00:33:14]Just a bed.

[00:33:15]The heater is running since I came in.

[00:33:19]There's even a fridge, but I don't have anything for the fridge. And as you can see, all of my luggage is here.

[00:33:27]Well, my bike is parked on the pedestrian way in front of the hotel and there two cameras of the hotel like looking at the bike. And they put the lock on and they took all my luggage off. That is basically like my main luggage. But I didn't take the black extra bags off like the 2-liter bags on top of the Moscow luggage.

[00:33:50]So the hotel owner came up and knocked at my door and uh all this in his hand and he was like, "The police gave it to me because some children opened your luggage and they took this."

[00:34:07]I'm like, "What the hell?" So yeah, I went down to the bike and I took everything off um like everything that is on the bike, took it off, brought it to the hotel, and the hotel owner gave me a bed sheet and uh my bike is now covered in a bed sheet, which is kind of crazy because the roads are so muddy and so dirty and so is my bike now.

[00:34:34]And there is a white bedsheet on my bike. I kind of feel bad.

[00:34:38]But yeah.

[00:34:39]Even the expensive hotels which I saw before for 60 and 52 euros um they had no garage.

[00:34:49]Like the cars were just in front of the hotel. So it's exactly the same. This place costs 30,000 dinars which is approximately 90 euros something.

[00:35:02]So that is very cheap. But yeah.

[00:35:04]Um I also had some dinner. I just walked somewhere and I found a little place where I could get a shawarma. And the funny thing was I was sitting there I was eating my stuff. I already paid my food. And then the owner kind of like realized that I'm a tourist and was like no she's not paying. So they gave me my money back while I was sitting there and eating.

[00:35:32]Gave me my money back and were like no you're our guest and and you don't have to pay. And so yeah um I didn't pay for my dinner.

[00:35:41]I didn't pay for the first fuel. So the only thing I paid today were my second very random refueling with a canister which cost approximately eight euro 50 something like that. So yeah.

[00:35:58]It's pretty nice. So I rode approximately 400 kilometers today.

[00:36:03]And yeah as you could see it was already dark when I finally reached this town this very muddy town.

[00:36:10]Tomorrow we will go to the ancient city which is right next to this place.

[00:36:14]And then we will continue to Kuwait.

[00:36:17]So that's the plan.

[00:36:27]>> Mhm.