Santiago - Week Two

Amidst all of this mayhem, it turned out that Asking Alexandria were playing here, in just a few days. Again we deliberated. It was pretty cheap, much less than it would have cost us back home but in light of the upcoming rebuild should we really spend any more money. In the end, music won out. With the pandemic it had been so long since we went to a gig and we just couldn’t pass up the opportunity. We both needed a night to let our hair down and so we decided to buy tickets.

Despite the website saying there was a payment option for foreign cards, it declined them. As we didn’t have any other way of getting in, we decided we’d turn up at the door and see if we could buy them outside. We went to catch the metro over there, then realised we didn’t have the right change to top up the metro cards and that they don’t accept cards. So we used the extortionate ATM in the station. Finally, we got on the train. Now we were a bit late and as we arrived the support act, a local Chilean band, was well underway. This worked in our favour though and we got the tickets even cheaper. We were ecstatic and had an absolutely brilliant night. It was a proper blast from the past to be inside a venue where they allowed smoking and not only that, but you could buy a can of beer and take it inside with you, can and all. I had forgotten just how much I miss live music and I hope it won’t be this long again until we see another band play.

After a week in the capital, we finally heard from our friends, now settled in their Air B’n’B. Louis was on the mend now and so we arranged to go around and have dinner at theirs as well as use the washing machine and shower.

Once again, we hopped on the tube and headed over. We spent a very pleasant afternoon sitting in the shade, while three loads of laundry dried in the sun. Kareen had cooked ravioli and we brought a couple of bottles of white to go with it. We freshened up with a nice shower and it was as night fell that we thought we should be going. We had left the cats out when we left, it being way too hot to keep them in. We had parked even further back up the road so that there was less traffic for them and we hoped that after three weeks in this spot they’d be fine. We could also check on their positions remotely via the trackers, which was nice. Then we got a message from an unknown person on Instagram telling us that Lexi had been chased by a dog, possibly been bitten and was now stuck in a tree. So, we dropped everything, grabbed our clothes and jumped in an Uber.

We got back to the van to see a very kitted out Jeep parked in front of us. Lexi was down out of the tree and hiding under their car. It was a weird set of circumstances to get to know someone; this is how we met — Lexi was fine and now that it was dark we put the girls inside and had some drinks outside. Naturally, giving our kitten rescuers some free beers for their trouble.

It was supposed to be the last time we saw Louis and Kareen, but we decided we’d wait a few more days and meet up again on their last night here. That meant we had some more time to kill here, but we weren’t done with parts yet. We had decided we wouldn’t replace the front tyre until we replaced the shock absorbers, not wanting to destroy the new tyre. We also needed some new seals before I could replace the injectors. In terms of parts to rebuild the engine, I wanted to check the pistons before I ordered new rings, but there were still a few other bits we could buy.

It was time to go back to 10 de Julio. This street had the majority of car parts. I went here on my bike the first time and got the seals for the injectors as well as the new valve stem seals. Then I could refit the engine so that it would run again at least. I also bought us a new proper suspension bolt to swap out the piddly substitute we had been using since we entered the country.

Now all that was left was the air shocks. It seemed that this might be a challenge. This time we both went; we decided we’d work our way down the street asking every shop that claimed to specifically sell shock absorbers. We had tried about 5, none of whom sold air shocks and we were about to give up. We had nearly exhausted all options. There was one more ‘Casa del Amortiguador’ on the opposite side of the road and so we said we’d try this last one and if it was no good then we’d have to figure out something else. To our disbelief, he had a pair of Monroes. And even better, they’d fit our car. They were expensive, nearly three times the price we had paid to order them online in Colombia but we decided, for the potential hassle with trying to get them delivered, as well as import costs, it’d be easier to just buy these. The guy swapped out the bushing for us and they were ready to fit. It seemed like we were getting dangerously close to making the final drive north.

The following day, I fitted the new shocks. We checked the engine was running. We were nearly ready to go. The final items on the agenda were to meet Louis and Kareen one last time and buy a new tyre.

They were due to fly out at the weekend and so we met up for Friday night. We met at the Irish pub which we had already visited a couple of times and went down to cocktail happy hour. Then we wandered over to a nearby place for a ‘kebab’. It was nice, but as Lee told me it hadn’t satisfied his kebab craving. Then we tried to find the burlesque dancer bar that our friends had accidentally stumbled on last time they were here. We covered a lot of streets, but never managed to find it and so we just ended back up in the Irish pub again. Still, there are worse fates. It was the early hours of the morning when we finally said goodbye and waved them into their cab; this really was the last time. As ever, it was sad to see them go. We meet a lot of people on the road but it is less frequent that we meet people we get along so well with. Maybe one day we can visit them in South Africa, but for now we wished them a safe flight and headed back to Ruby.

As we had waited to wave our friends off, we were now committed here for the weekend. If we had been sensible we would have popped over to Leon and ordered ourselves the right tyre we needed, so it was ready for Monday, but we didn’t do that at all. That meant that when Monday came around, we headed over to the garage to find out that they didn’t have that tyre in stock at this branch. We could either drive an hour and a half to the branch that did have it, or they’d bring it here in about 5 hours. All things considered, it was definitely not worth a three-hour drive. We arranged to come back at 5pm and collect our tyre. That meant we’d finally be getting out of here on Tuesday.

With not a lot else to do, we decided to head back to our spot and wait. As we crawled back across the city, a lady ran up to us in the traffic jam. She told us we were leaking coolant and a green trail behind us confirmed that she was indeed correct. Lee gave the engine a test rev and coolant gushed out at speed underneath. We pulled over. It appeared that the pipe had simply fallen off the radiator. I don’t know why we have so many of these occurrences. We seem to have a huge amount of things that just ‘fall off’. This pipe has been secured and in place since Ecuador. You would say vibration I suppose, but it’s even on a rubber mounted component. The clip was fine, the pipe was fine. It simply became unattached on a simple city road. As easy as the fix was — put it back on — we had to wait a while for it to cool down enough to do that. Eventually I wrestled it back on and then we spent a while trying to get the air out. We thought we’d got it, and pulled away. Traffic jam long gone.

It turns out that we didn’t have it though and after a few minutes a huge temperature spike made us pull over. And then again. Eventually, we made it back to our street, now without a lot of time left to kill. We decided to leave early as well, just in case it did it again. Sure enough, it overheated again. After a few stops/starts, we made it to the garage again. We shouldn’t have worried, the tyre was arriving at Latin America at 5pm. Still, they let us bring the cats into the air-conditioned waiting room and offered us drinks while we waited. In the meantime, they swapped over the spare as well, as I had asked them to.

About an hour later, our tyre came. It was fitted quickly and professionally. I say this as for possibly the first time on this continent, I saw the mechanic refit our wheel nuts using a torque wrench. For the final time, we headed back to our spot. Tomorrow it was crunch time.