El Alto

We awoke in the warm morning drizzle. after spending several weeks as altitude, it was odd to have such warm and humid temperatures. We had been used to the cold bright days that awoke us every morning up in the Andes. We debated whether to wait a day to drive back up or just to go and get on with it. We didn't really fancy the drive back after just doing it the day before, on the other hand sitting here in the drizzle for the sake of it seemed pointless too. We finished our morning coffee and bit the bullet.

While we had been preoccupied with our brake problem on the way down, engine temperature would be the thing on the way up. The ascent was over 3000m in under 80km. While we had descended the evening before in queues of lorries, thankfully we had better timing on our return and the roads were clear. this was much better for our engine as we didn't have to crawl up the incline behind slow trucks. Ruby did surprisingly well and drove us the first few thousands metres without even stopping. As we once again neared the statue we pulled over for some lunch and to give the engine a chance. She was now struggling a bit as we passed 4000m but we conceded that the air filter definitely needed cleaning.

After stocking up at a nearby supermarket, we parked up outside Leo's house for the night. Once again we felt the chill of altitude and even bought Aimee a new jumper. She was way to angry for us to put it on though.

The next morning we decided to head into the city centre and get a quote to fix the laptop. Leo had returned from his trip at about 4am that morning, so we didn't imagine they'd be much going on at the garage today. Rather than tackle some of the insanely steep descents into the city with the car, we left Ruby there and walked to the nearest teleferico station. La Paz is somewhat famous for its cable cars. They connect the city in huge network of public transport that is far superior to anything on the floor. As the city is mainly in the valley below, the cable cars are the perfect way to get down and up. You can enjoy the beautiful views as you glide serenely down into the centre. They're quick, quiet and also cheap.

We tried to find a repair shop for Mac without much luck. Next we went to fix Lee's phone which wasn't charging properly, that at least was easy with an abundance of phone repair shops around. While we waited for that repair, we to another shop about the laptop. Despite the big apple logo and 'laptop repairs' advertised, they said that they couldn't do it and sent us back to the one we couldn't find. This time though, we did find it. turns out we were just being stupid. They gave us a quote that was just as unpleasant as we expected it to be.

This is in dollars folks. $690 dollars...

As we waited for Lee's phone we grabbed some food nearby in the square and watched a rather awkward comedy performance by some local people trying to raise money for charity. In the midst of the awkward comedy, we were happy to slip out the side and go for the phone, before jumping on the cable car back up.

The next morning, we headed around to the workshop, listening out for the suspect clunking noise we had heard on the final stretch yesterday. While it sounded bad, and it was, it was an easy fix. Turns out the rear gearbox mount had nearly worked itself complete free and the clunking we could here was the box sliding back and forward as we braked. After tightening up these bolts we moved onto some of the other niggles.

We had still not reconnected the oil cooler since we had got it repaired. It was there mounted underneath since we fixed it back in Piura but we had decided that we should wait until we changed out the oil before reconnecting it. As an oil change was now due, it was the perfect time to re-attach it. It was a novel feeling to be actually needing to do a proper oil change, not just a slow continuous one from the leaks we'd got accustomed to.

Once we removed the front wheels, we finally found out the cause of the brake noise. On the right hand side, we had completely lost the pins that hold the pads into the calliper. it's not possible for the pads to entirely leave the calliper, but they had ridden up and out until the hit the wheel, leaving us with this.

New pads was an easy fix, but the pins that held them in, not so much. I had tried to replace them before only to discover that the ones available here for the Brazilian bay are too short. This meant we would have to get some custom made at a torno. In the meantime, we rebuilt the calliper, cleaning out the internals and changing the seals for some new ones that Tacu happened to have in his shop.

With Ruby up on two old cylinder heads outside the workshop and the brakes disassembled, we slept outside the shop that night. unlike sleeping outside the house a few blocks away, this road appeared to be a cut through and traffic bombed past us to the main road at the end. We decided much to the anger of the cats that they'd be staying in that night.

The garage dogs needed a clean even more than we did

The next day, Lee went to buy some new oil both for the engine and the gearbox. I cleaned the air filter and a few other bits and bobs while we ultimately waited for the pins from the torno. He had told they would be ready today and that would be good as the next day was Saturday and we didn't fancy staying here at the weekend. Taco helped us find a new correctly sized bolt for our calliper which had lost one just before the border crossing. Now we had all the oils changed, the air filter cleaned and the gearbox attached to the vehicle. All we needed was brakes.

That evening, we were both utterly filthy and so we headed to the only place locally where we could grab a shower. It was a kind of sauna/jacuzzi place and we weren't entirely sure how it worked. We paid for a jacuzzi and then were told to wait upstairs. After a while they called us down. It turns out that you book your own private room. It's filled with a jacuzzi bath, you can pay for optional 'mountain herbs' that they run a steam jet into and filled the room with a nice herby smell. We turned the nice clean bath water into a rather questionable brown sludge and enjoyed our free complimentary soft drinks that were also included with this. Then we set about actually washing rather than just stewing in the bath.

At this point things got a bit messy. We thought we'd turned off the jets and went to drain out the very nasty water. Lee had finished and got out. Then the jets turned on again. it appeared we had no control over what they did at all. It wouldn't have really mattered, if we hadn't drained a lot of the water out. There was enough left to shoot out of the high pressure jet but now that the main water level was below it, it shot straight out at the wall. It was kind of a wet room in here after all. All four main jets from the jacuzzi shot out of the bath at the walls and door. I turned on the tap to try and get the water level back up, but it was filling up too slowly with the hot. I turned on the cold as well to speed it up, but then I couldn't escape the now rapidly cooling jet of water blasting at me from the bath. I tried to shout at Lee to make them turn it off but it took a while for him to hear me over the jet that blasting directly onto the glass door. While he went to get them to turn it off I hid on the side trying to stay out of the chilly water. Clearly, we were not practised at this and we got changed in the flooded puddle we had created outside the bath. Still, we were very clean!

Now, we were just waiting on the torno. Lee headed back to collect the pins and came back telling me that the machinist now wanted until Monday. Taco came out of the garage, asking us what was going on. I was on the warpath now after two nights on the noisy street. I told him the torno was delayed again and wanted till Monday, he was in the midst of an apologetic shrug when I told him that it wasn't what we agreed, but not to worry, I'd go and speak to the torno in person. Never have I seen someone reach for the phone so fast. Within a few minutes, they'd be ready today. Still a day later than agreed, but at least we didn't need to spend the weekend on the noisy street, sleeping at a wonky angle.

Eventually, about three hours after the arranged time, we got the pins.

The work in progress... Our old pin pictured on the right

To his credit, he had done a great job. We quickly reassembled the brakes, bled them and got round back outside the house as night fell. Ruby was back on the road. We planned to leave the following morning and so we decided we'd cook a nice curry for the guys to say thank you. We ate that evening, all five of us crammed inside Ruby against the cold. It was a nice way to end things though. Not only were we heading off, but Sandra had already got back on a flight back to Colombia. We grabbed one last photo outside their workshop, and hit the road.