Our friends John and Sally Watson cycled from London to Delhi in 2006: spend some time with their excellent website: www.cyclingtoindia.com. They therefore know both the pleasures and problems of the route very well indeed. John, more than almost anyone, is in an excellent position to have written the following.

Dear

I hope you are enjoying Turkey: it's a great place.

From what I understand, you are feeling a little apprehensive about heading East. I remember having similar feelings. I also remember at the end of the trip (Delhi) thinking they were pretty much without substance.

It's always hard to know what is safe and what is dangerous. We cycled from London to Delhi and the only act of aggression we encountered was in Kent on the A2, where somebody leant out of their car window and walloped me.

Maybe we were just lucky; perhaps we were foolhardy. One thing I do feel reasonably confident about saying is that the single biggest danger for any cycle tourer is, by a considerable distance, getting knocked over. All that said, we do remember feeling apprehensive at times. Principally this was when we were about to head into Iran and about to cross Baluchistan. Fear, mine at least, tends to fixate on the gruesome: being robbed/kidnapped or worse and ending up blindfolded on some grainy video footage sent into Al Jazeera. When I think about my own fear it usually tends to gravitate on the unfamiliar. I guess that's probably because "the unknown" creates a vacuum in the imagination that can be filled with lots of fearful thoughts.

Like you, I also remember these fears being given credence by locals. As soon as we left the European Union each country we went into was very keen to tell us how the next one was very dangerous. "Don't go to Bulgaria" the Romanians pleaded "you'll get robbed, they're thieves ...". "Don't go Turkey" the Bulgarian's pleaded, it's "very dangerous". The reaction of Turks when we told them we were going to Iran was broadly similar. The Iranians told us "don't go to Pakistan, it is very dangerous" - however, in this case I do think they had a point. In Turkey I remember a man in a petrol station coming up to us and offering to help in any way. At the end of our conversation he told us with no hint of irony that we should never accept help from strangers.

We crossed into Iran in Autumn 2006 and at the time George W and President Afterdinnerjacket were squaring up over Iran's nuclear programme. I remember receiving a lot of emails from people thinking we were nuts for going. When we got there we soon realised what a lot of rubbish it all was. Iran was overwhelmingly friendly. The drivers are kamikaze - worse even than the Turks and the Romanians, with road kill statistics to prove it.

Without knowing much about your proposed route, I would say that the "dangerous bit" is the leg across Baluchistan stretching from Kerman in south-east Iran to Sukkur on the Indus. It's over two years since we did it and the situation is in flux. We cycled all of it and were glad we did. We stuck to the unwritten rules (written by the drug smugglers), which is that civilian traffic is safe by day but the traffickers own the roads at night. On that basis we only cycled during daylight (setting off at least an hour after first light and being off the road an hour before sunset). We never camped on that leg - rather we stayed in a mixture of police stations, customs houses and army bases.

The scenery was stunning in a desolate sort of way and the locals that we met were all very friendly - even the Taliban and various militia who were hanging out at the side of the road. We did quite a bit of research before making our decision to cycle that stretch and what we found was that anything bad that ever happened only occurred to cycle tourers who had disobeyed "the rules", either by cycling after nightfall and/or camping.

One person I would recommend contacting is Mark Beaumont - if you search on Google you will find him - who recently broke the round-the-world cycling record. He passed through Iran and Pakistan more recently (late 2007). His only near-death encounter was a car hitting him in Louisiana. We had his mother on the phone many times during the Pakistan and Iran leg, seeking reassurance. Mark cycled solo and so it might be good to get his take on it - as did Alastair Humphreys.

As Barry says, it's really a personal decision on whether to cycle through any area. Re-reading the above, perhaps I sound a bit flippant about the risks. That said, I'm not sure how risk-averse Sally and I are. On the one hand we cycled through all of these supposedly dangerous countries; on the other we wouldn't get on our bicycles without donning helmets and fluorescent safety vests.

What I would say is that we loved Iran and its people. We had our apprehensions about going there but they soon evaporated when we got there.

Pakistan is a different kettle of fish, but again I think the dangers are probably more in the big cities. After a month of sleeping in police stations and dingy hotels, we treated ourselves to a stay in the Marriot in Islamabad and ate out at an Italian restaurant (our first wine since leaving Europe). Both establishments were subsequently blown up by suicide bombers.

If you do cycle across Baluchistan you'll get a police/army escort for a lot of it. It's incredibly tedious and - given that the locals have issues with the government and not tourists - has the opposite effect of reducing your "personal safety". Ironically there is no police escort between Taftan on the Iranian border and Quetta: if there is a dangerous bit then this is it. However, the government don't really control this area and the police lock themselves in at night.

Lastly, I remember the kids being a bit aggressive in Kurdistan - throwing stones - and the sheepdogs, which we nicknamed Anatolian werewolves, chasing us. Both of these were a bit unnerving but nothing a bit of counter-aggression couldn't deal with.

One top tip is that if you need a visa extension in Iran, then choose your city carefully. We got our first extension in Isfahan and our second in Shiraz. We heard Yazd can also be okay.

I hope this is helpful. Don't hesitate to drop Sally and me a line if you need any advice at any time. My work email gets checked most days.

If you do decide to cycle across Baluchistan, then I'd canvas opinions from locals who are familiar with the route. The hotel owner in Kerman where we stayed gave us accurate up to date information, reiterating the good by day/don't go out at night rule.

Good luck. We're very envious that you are going to Iran.

John