A Final Return to Buenos Aires Pt.2

After a nice day off from van maintenance and daily chores, it was time to finish up the outstanding things. The main job now was the brakes. We had decided that we would drive to a local park that we could stay the night at. It was close enough to the brake shop that we could get a taxi over. It wasn’t glamorous but it seemed to be the best and probably cheapest solution. We parked up on the side of the park and got to work. One of the ladies who presumably maintained the park came over. She asked if we were planning on stopping, saying the police didn’t like people to stop for long. We said we had a problem with our brakes and needed to stop for the night and would hopefully be gone after that, which she was fine with.

We got Ruby’s rear wheels off and could now actually see what the problem was. On one side, the brake had managed to completely pop itself out of the wheel cylinder. The metal edge of the shoe was now scraping on the drum and obviously, in this position, it wasn’t doing anything at all. The other side was fine though. Still, in the interests of “doing it properly,” we stripped down both sides, putting the drums and shoes in a bag to take to the shop. We put the wheels back on temporarily so that we could still safely get in the van to sleep that night. Then we jumped in an Uber and headed off to the brake shop. Our ride was almost comical. A small, dilapidated hatchback arrived. Bits of it were missing, bits held on with cable ties. Lee went to get in behind the driver and couldn’t—the guy was so large that his driver’s seat was back to the point where there was no legroom for a passenger behind. We squashed ourselves into the other seats and, with the suspension riding uncomfortably low, set off.

We arrived at Aufren. They accepted our bag of parts and told us they’d be ready the next morning at 10:30am. As we had dropped them off only an hour or so before they shut, this was a pleasant surprise. Now we just faced the issue of getting back to Ruby. No Uber wanted to pick us up here, it seemed. We tried to catch the bus but you had to have a prepaid card, and they didn’t sell them around here. Eventually, we managed to get a taxi back.

The next morning, we booked another taxi. This time a far more luxurious estate car turned up. We booked him to take us there, wait, and then take us back to save the problems of yesterday. It was a smooth operation and in less than an hour we were back in the car park with our new brakes. The lady was back, asking if we were OK. We reassured her that we had collected our parts and that it wouldn’t take us long now to install them and be on our way.

The first side went back together with the usual amount of wrestling that brake shoes require. I got on with this while Lee went back to the drone shop to collect Steve. I’d finished the one side by the time he got back. Now I just had to refit the other. As I put the shoes back on, I noticed that the adjuster had clearly been snapped off and re-welded. It seemed that when they had relined them, they had managed to break it. When they had refitted it, it wasn’t at the correct angle. I tried to bend it back into place, and it snapped off again. Quickly, a small job developed into a nightmare.

I set off in search of a welding shop. The first one I went to didn’t exist. Then my phone died, leaving me with only my memory to get back to the van. I’m not the best at finding my way around cities, especially when I’ve relied on sat nav to get there in the first place. I did manage to find my way back, and I arrived hot and annoyed at Ruby. Time to try another place.

I took Lee’s phone, leaving mine on charge. This time it did exist. You might think this was good news, and for a second I was happy. A quick blob of solder and we’d be back in business. I think I knew in my heart of hearts that it wasn’t going to work. Any decent solder joint doesn’t break with just a bit of bending. My suspicions were confirmed when the welder told me he couldn’t solder it. He said it was some kind of alloy and wasn’t bonding properly.

It didn’t take me long to get back to Ruby. My rage-fuelled pedalling was unaware of hills or any other obstruction. I was angry. The reason we had gone through all this effort to go to a garage was that they were supposed to have a special talent for fixing the small, easy things. We could not have relined the brakes ourselves, of course, so we had no option but to use this shop. Even then, they had made a mistake that meant once again we wouldn’t have proper brakes. Without the adjuster, I could manually adjust them, but nothing would hold it in place and it was likely they would simply back off the drum under use. What was even more infuriating was that the side that was broken was the one that didn’t really need doing. If I had just not bothered at all, we’d have been better off. We could try going back and complaining, but I didn’t really see what it would achieve. They’d probably just fob us off.

The adjuster is only a small sprung piece of metal, but it is not easily replaced. It’s held onto the drum with a riveted metal peg. It’s also very important that it’s the right shape and has the right springiness, otherwise it won’t work. I was left with little choice but to put it all back together as it was and accept that we wouldn’t have decent brakes again for a while.

Either way, we’d be leaving soon. At least the drive south was mainly flat and we could get away with badly functioning brakes. We’d have to see what we did about that issue when we got back into Chile. For now, we headed back to our nice spot and I consoled myself by visiting the local panadería and buying an enormous bag of pastries. We also learned that our laptop was not repairable. Of course, all the bad news at the same time.

With nothing left that could be fixed here, we decided to do a few touristy things. We drove around to spend the night in Puerto Madero. This was a spot we had stayed near before after the VW meetup in the city last time. It was a pretty quiet part of the city and a convenient location for us to do things the next day. Funnily enough, we were greeted with similar weather. Just like the last time we’d been here, the heavens opened and it poured with rain. We were undisturbed though.

The following morning we headed into La Boca. We decided we’d do the walking tour here. La Boca is famous both for its historical roots and its modern-day football team. This place used to be the working heart of the city. It’s located at the mouth of the River Plate (which gives it its name, literally “the mouth”). It was home to many immigrants working at the busy port back in the 20th century. They lived and worked in the huge abandoned homes of the aristocracy who had moved to more favourable neighbourhoods in the city, such as San Telmo. Their houses were brightly decorated with whatever leftover paint or materials were available. It is also said to be the birthplace of the tango.

We spent an hour or so walking its streets with our guide, seeing some of the colourful buildings.

We walked along the banks of the River Plate, watching the local boats that are now part of efforts to clean up the river and maintain its wildlife. As you can imagine, this enormous river running along the edge of the capital is heavily populated (much like London’s River Thames), although they have made huge improvements to the water quality. This is not the only similarity it has with the UK: here they also have a transporter bridge. This is a rare type of bridge which “transports” a moveable section of road across to the other side. It was used to move horses and goods in the past and is notable as one of only eight working ones in the world, with three of the others located in the UK.

Our tour ended at the Boca Juniors stadium. This was something Lee was far more excited about. He loves seeing stadiums in other countries and, of course, he loves football. The Argentinians are also football lovers, and this club is a great source of national pride. It’s not currently possible to enter, but we walked around its bright blue and yellow walls from the outside at least.

Despite the fact that this tiny section of La Boca is a bright hive of tourist activity, the surrounding streets are not. The rest was clearly not a nice area of the city, and as we had dumped Ruby down one of its grubby alleys, we didn’t hang around for long once the tour had finished.

We had time for one more thing in the city before we needed to hit the road. We went just down the road to San Telmo. This is a more upmarket section of Buenos Aires: cobbled streets, colourful flower planters, and nice shops everywhere you turn. We managed to bag some free parking and popped into a nearby shop to exchange the remaining pounds that Lee had accidentally brought back with him. With our new wad of cash, we headed to the famous market. This is not the market of the north of the continent where the locals shop—it’s a market you go to if you want to browse artisanal beers on a fancy blackboard. It had some stalls selling produce and we managed to buy some radicchio (this is very rare and we get excited). We grabbed a few spices and some nuts too. Then we decided we’d get some food. We couldn’t really afford to eat the rather amazing-looking food on display here. A slice of quiche would set you back $10. We opted for somewhere printing its menu on paper and sticking it in poly pockets. That felt more our level. It still wasn’t cheap, but we treated ourselves to some melted provolone cheese and a beer.

At least now we had ticked off some boxes, we felt like we could leave the city behind us. After being here for over a week, we were ready to begin the epic drive south. There was only one more thing I wanted: cat litter. It seems stupid, but it’s hard to buy decent cat litter. We were going to pass a shop that sold an expensive but good one. It’s something we like to buy not just because it stops Aimee peeing on the sofa, but because it stops the van in general smelling like a nasty litter tray. It was impossible to park, so I drove around the block and loitered by the park. Lee was not in a very good mood—he just wanted to get out. Things went downhill quickly when, in a momentary lapse of concentration, he slammed his phone screen in the car door as he shut it.

He stormed off across the park. I decided this was not the time to suggest doing anything else, and when he came back we headed straight out of the city. We picked up the start of the Ruta 3, a road famous for being long and boring. It stretches 3,045km from here to the tip of Tierra del Fuego and is largely devoid of, well, anything. We had been warned about the endless, windy driving. We figured it was a good option to quickly cover the distance to Ushuaia for not just Christmas, but the most temperate time of year. Our first stop was just a little way down at Laguna del Monte, and finally, we were out of the city.