Yazd was listed by UNESCO as a whole city, and the listing divides the historic town into numbered zones, which is where labels like Area 3 come from. The walls are the colour of the desert, the roofs are domed to shed heat, and above the skyline stand rows of badgirs, the wind towers that catch the faintest breeze and push it down into the rooms below, a form of air conditioning that has worked for centuries.
Walking is the way to see it, and a motorbike is best parked at the edge of the old quarter. The lanes are only a couple of metres wide, roofed in places by arches and dark tunnels, with sudden turns and doors set at the side of blank walls. Many of the old houses have been turned into small hotels and teahouses, built around courtyards with a pool in the middle and rooms opening onto a shaded iwan. Look up and you will find fine plaster ceilings and painted glass in coloured windows, which throw patches of red and green light across the floor.
Yazd lies between two great deserts, the Dasht-e Kavir and the Dasht-e Lut, and the climate is blistering in summer and sharp in winter, with very little rain. The city lives from water brought in by qanats, which come from the mountains to the south-west, and a water museum in a historic house tells the story.
The outskirts have fuel stations and a modern city of nearly half a million people, with traffic that behaves rather more calmly than in Tehran or Isfahan. Taft, about twenty-three kilometres away, is a small town in the foothills with orchards, and makes a pleasant excursion. Try the local sweets, especially baklava and ghotab, an almond-filled pastry, and the cardamom cakes sold in shops around the old bazaar. Carry water even for a short walk, and wear light clothes that cover arms and legs, both for the sun and for local customs.