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Published: November 28th 2005
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It was 35km from Ancud and I was just coming up to two hours on the bike. I had just reached the top of a little hill and ´pling´... I heard a sound I dread. It´s a hard sound to describe but unmistakable ... the sound of a breaking spoke.
Suffice to say the rest of the day did not go as planned. It had started out so well!
This morning when I first looked out the window it was perfectly calm with some blue skies and even a rainbow. Sure it hailed 10 minutes later, but Chiloe is pretty much directly east of Tasmania, so no surprises there. Had another fantastic breakfast (Mundo Huevo is pretty $$$, but it is worth it - aybe they should change their name to mucho gusto desayuno) then I´d set off cycling south to the point where that bloody spoke broke.
Of course it had to be on the cassette side of the rear wheel which is the hardest to replace ... especially when you don´t have a cassette remover on you. I did have a cassette remover ... it was just on Christie´s bike. I had spokes, spoke key and
Long road ahead
... except it wasn't so long as my spoke broke another 15kms down the road. cassette holder with me ... everything but the cassette remover itself. So close and yet so very, very far.
This brought me to the question of what do you do 35km from the nearest town when you can´t rid eyour bike. Panic was one option, sit on the side of the road and cry was another, blame the world for not being fair was the third that came to mind, but I went for option four ... procrastinate and trust in my luck ... I took all the panniers off my bike, turned it upside down so people could see I was in trouble, stuck up my thumb and began rehersing my Spanish for the kind motorist I was sure would help me ... always the optimist.
Sure enough, five minutes later a big ute pulled over with a man and his wife inside and I began stuttering my way to explain what had happened when the guy just says to me ¨Do you speak English?¨. Never underestimate the power of procrastination and good luck.
The driver as it turned out was called Andy, he had lived in Seattle half his life and Chiloe the other half. He owned a nearby mussle farm which produces 2000 tons of mussels a year and two dairy farms and he was on his way to inspect his mussle farm before heading on to Castro where I needed to get to. So I got to go to Castro via the scenic route. He was a great guy. Him and his wife even went out of there way to help me get directions to the nearest bike shop when we arrived in Castro, and they would take no money for their help. I owe society a debt of gratitude ... again.
The bike shop they sent me to was closed, so I wandered around the corner and a couple of blocks later saw this guy standing inside a phone shop with shimano shoes on. I went to ask him if he knew where a bike shop was and thus met Marco (German) and his Brazilian mate who were cycling from Puerto Montt to half way down the Carretera Austral. He gave me directions to another bike shop and offered to lend me some tools if it wasn´t open.
I walked down one more block and ran into yet another cyclist who had left Puerto Montt three days ago and was spending the next two months cycling south. I told him that there were some other cyclists just around the corner and he said, Yea I was just talking to that French guy too. French Guy?? ... Yep, turned the corner, walked up another block and there was a fourth cyclist ... This guy had been on his bike for nearly two and a half years, having cycled here from France via Asia. We were all a little in awe (by this time the five of us had all found each other as you do).
Turns out none of them had a cassette remover (making me feel a little less stupid) and all the bike shops were closed. I filled them all in on the ferry information from Quellon to Chaiten as they couldn´t find anything out, and then we parted ways ... most of them were off South to try and catch the Wednesday ferry. I went to email Christie to say I might be a while ...
What followed after that was a comedy of errors, but I finally managed to buy a cassette tool, and an adjustable wrench to fit it. It took about 2 hours, but once I had everything I needed in one place it only took 20 minutes to get the new spoke installed and the bike back on the road. Thank god the wheel hadn´t gone out of true.
Backtracked about 14km to Delachue, where I was supposed to meet Christie, but the hostel we´d agreed to meet at didn´t exist (my fault). After cycling around town aimlessly for 20 minutes, I finally went into an internet cafe to find that she had left a message saying she was at a hospedja, 100m from the T-junction coming into town, but she couldn´t remember it´s name except that the sign had yellow writing.
Ignoring the fact that I didn´t remember any T junction coming into town, I figured how hard could that be to follow ... in fact I stepped out of the internet cafe and immediatley spied a yellow sign with red writing (close enough) for a Hospedja just down the road and after a bit of back and forth with the owners finally convinced them to let me in and be reunited with Chrisite (or more specifically ... la chica con bicicleta azul).
What a fun day, and don´t worry ... I promise I have everything under control, at least until tomorrow.
😊
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Ralph
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ping
handled yr frustrations well there John, good work