Chos Malal and disaster!

Little did we know when we set off today what the day would bring. Today we are crossing back into Argentina via the.Pichachen Pass. This is a fairly remote board crossing that crosses around 100 km from Los Angeles. And goes around one of the volcanoes here and into Argentina over the top of the mountains.

We had a good breakfast today, even got some fruit. And we set off out of the city through the rush-hour traffic having filled bikes to the brim. The road out of town was long and straight and passed through huge areas of managed Woodland.. Always in the distance loomed the huge snow cap volcano. It looked almost on top of us even though it was still 50+ kilometres away. As we approached the road ran out and the Ripeo . We stopped next to the most amazing waterfall and check the bikes and rearranged our clothing because the weather is now warming up and we needed less.

We arrived at a set of gates which was the entrance to the National Park on the Chile side. And we were waved through and continued our way up the mountain. We passed through a ski resort which was based on the volcano slopes.

continued up into the most amazing lava based landscape. I don’t think the photos will do justice to the vastness of this area. Apparently the volcano has not erupted for 100 years, but the devastation was everywhere.

We stopped, flew the drone and took in the surrounding Vistas. It really felt as if we were on the moon. The smooth lava and the dust, made the road at least for me very difficult. It is much like driving on sand, and for a motorbike that’s quite hard, at least for one as heavy as mine. I did my best to keep up with Tim Who has a lot more experience with this but it was getting harder and harder and so we For a rest and a well earned cookie.

We set off again and came to what we thought was the board post, only to find it was a refuge. And so we continued on our way.

We finally arrived at the Chilean border and it was a real pleasure doing our paperwork with such friendly and

and interested people. They wanted to know where we were from and to look at our bikes.We cleared on the chilli inside, and proceeded up a mountain pass to the very top and the views stretched out in every direction. This is not a well used pass, and we were

completely alone in the middle of nowhere.

The distance between the Chilean border Post and the Argentinian border post is approximately 60 km. On the stretch there is very little communication with the outside world and certainly no cell phone coverage.

This would not be a great place to breakdown.However, that is exactly what happened. I was riding along over the corrugated road surface and suddenly the rear suspension completely collapsed. It was incredibly lucky that I was able to stay on the bike. The bolt that holds on the lower part of the suspension. to the frame had shared in the spring had just collapsed to the floor dropping the rear of the bike onto the rear wheel.

We managed to get the bike onto the centre stand and then went off down the road to see if we could find the offending bolt. Hoping that it has just loosened its way out rather than shared. . The questionnaire is what to do. It was a full sunny day in the desert I was we had water and food it is not somewhere you want to stop and wait for help. We had two plans. The first was for Tim to write forward to the Argentinian border post and let them know the situation. Which was going to be fun with Tims Spanish. But we knew he would cope fine. The other was to use our Garmin in reach SOS signal. This little machine which we pay for by a subscription service. Us to send our location to a central office and they will coordinate a rescue.. We took both options Tim wrote ahead and I contacted Garmin. We got an immediate response to say that they were alerting local emergency services and they would keep us informed but could give us no timings at this time. In the meantime, I had a text via the same device from Tim to say he had reached the border and the customs officials were on their way. . They would not let him back across the border. The border officials Julia arrived and collected me and the luggage from the bike to get me to a safe location. The bike was going to be another matter because they had no vehicle in which to collect it.. as we were sitting at the border post thinking of what to do a police pick up truck arrived which had been alerted by Garmin and so we went back to the bike and loaded it into the back of the pick up. The big BMW only just fitted and tying it down was an experience in itself.

Having got everything back to the border, we will then able to make our clearance into Argentina, and make a plan with what to do with the bike. The police were able to take myself and the bike to the nearest local town called Cholar. This was really just a collection of houses about 30 km inside the border. Our hotel for the night was another 75 km away in Chos Malal. Are there any chance of getting the bike fixed was going to be in the next big town, so we had to get it? Chos Malal if we ciuld. That part of the plan was to offer one of the policeman some cash to take us in his private pickup truck. It was already 7 pm and so it took no small amount to get him to take me. We made it into town at around 10 pm. And unloaded the bike right outside the front door of the hotel, where it remained for the next 48 hours unable to move. Tomorrow morning we will try to find a replacement bolt and fix it, but if this is not possible then the bike will have to be moved again up to BMW in Mendoza, this will be a challenge for tomorrow.

We went out and had a steak and got back in at around midnight.

morning we will try to find a replacement bolt and fix it, but if this is not possible then the bike will have to be moved again up to BMW in Mendoza, this will be a challenge for tomorrow.We went out and had a steak and got back in at around midnight. Today has been quite stressful and I wonder what tomorrow I will bring.