Carreterra Austral Day 4 Our Bridge to Puyuhuapi

What we had to wake up too

IMG_6149 by twomotokiwis, on Flickr

The sun sneaking through and starting to grace the landscape

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Due to road works further down they were closing the road from 1 - 5 pm daily so they could blast rock etc, we only had 150 km to do but most of it on gravel, the last part very boney rock base with 40 - 80 mm roundish rocks.

This meant a not so lazy start and on the road by about 9.30 am.

Just as we went to move out so did the dickhead in a large motorhome who was an arrogant wanker the day before and no better today.

He jumped in front of us with his motorhome then proceeded to bottom it out through the entry then stop in the middle of the single lane exit and entry to check if he had damaged anything ….WTF…. we waited for a bit only to find he had got our and was looking at his motorhome and happy to hold up everyone else in the process, I spotted enough of some room to scoot along side, brush the bushes then out, the guy was a prize dick all round.

F i n a l l y getting out and up onto the bridge we got all of our photos etc while he was still busy blocking the whole camp entry in and out with his epic driving skills.

IMG_6164 by twomotokiwis, on Flickr

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We are off

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On the road and hitting it south was slow for Alice and Juan, the wee Vespa wheels bouncing off the not so small rocks but in cred to Juan he held a steady pace which allowed us to take in our surroundings again of hanging basins, rock tops and spectacular faces while still making good progress, we could only get as far as Puyuhuapi anyway before the road was closed so no rush.

Our road took us on new pavement, old road, new gravel, awful rock and all sorts with the Chileans paving it flat out.

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Such a beautiful place to be

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Arriving at one intersection was a mob from Peru Moto Tours who were slightly surprised at the combo of a 950 SE and 250 Vespa pulling up and riding together, amusement, amazement and good good chats all round before waving goodbye and heading on down.

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The last bit of our road was starting to impinge on our timetable, the road works some 10 km short of Puyuhuapi meaning if we didn’t make it we would have to sit and wait for 4 hours in no mans land, being stuck at roadworks prior did not help.

As luck would have it the last stretch to the big road works where they close it was tar and Juan making the most of this winding up the Vespa to a healthy clip to make it, the dead soldier for the day being Alices glasses which flew off in front of us hitting the road and disintegrating so we didn’t even bother flagging them down to tell them or to stop for the debris.

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Making it through “the zone” we got into town tanked up and Juan found a neat camping spot on the lake edge, 200 meters from the gas station, a quick ride down a single track and we found nice grassy area with some shelter from the crisp breeze that was teasing us.

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A very pleasant afternoon followed with some maintenance on Juans Vespa needing an oil change and air filter cleaning job, the air filter was leaking some dust through as well which is less than ideal so we dealt to that hopefully fixing the problem.

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A small fire at night and some drinks we had planned to head away the following morning however the RTV we used had not dried overnight with very low temperatures and very very damp, they result was we decided to stay for that day so we could fix the problem properly knowing we had a lot of dusty road ahead.

Trying to dry he RTV

IMG_6221 by twomotokiwis, on Flickr

There was no rush, the weather was plus or minus ok (note not wet) and the long term forecast no worse for further south.

Some more supplies and recharging of batteries for cameras and lappy, actually I am writing this report from the Copec gas station beside the lake with the lappy plugged into an external power socket and working on a wheelibin … dedication.

It was that or an over expensive shitty hostal with poor services…not while the weather is ok!!!!.