8th March – The 5 D’s

I know I said I wouldn’t lapse in updates but internet was harder to find last night than rocking horse poop. Today will be an amalgamation of 2 days.

You would call me a liar if I told you more stuff fell from a truck we were following. I am many things, but I am not a liar. Yes, we were following a scrap metal truck and the basket from inside a washing machine fell from it and seemed to take a bee line for our only remaining headlight….. No, we didn’t collect it and I managed to do the 5 D’s – Dodge, dip, duck, dive and dodge – the washing machine innards.

How many people does it take to fix a broken Bentley? About 7 apparently! Hahaha just kidding, it wasn’t broken, but just running badly with fuel pump issues. Word on the street is the problem is somewhat fixed. Good stuff.

We left San Pedro de Atacama A.K.A San Ped-nowhere de desert, for the border at zero dark hundred and watched the sun rise over the Andes while we waited. Fairly speccy. New highest height recorded yesterday for Dad, Penny and I – 4834meters. There were 2 stops on the way up to that altitude yesterday to simply dig out more clothes to put on. Small lakes and puddles of water on the high plateau had ice at the edges. Coming down the other side of the range was pretty much the greatest drive of my life. It could have been better in a car with slightly more efficient brakes but it was still utterly spectacular. It was literally just switchback upon switchback for 1.5 vertical kilometers. Stats, 28 switchbacks in 23k’s of road to drop just under 2km’s of altitude. Second gear and heavy brake usage the ENTIRE way day. Kinda glad we didn’t have to slog our way up.

This morning was the opposite side of the scale in terms of driving. We got a special police escort from the Sheraton, Salta, to an unknown surprise location. And it was an unused racetrack!!!!! Yaaaaaayyyyy. Never driven a racetrack before so I was more than a little excited. 3 timed laps with 2 stop-go passage control things before high speed corners to prevent serious crashes. Each progressive lap I did I reduced lap time by about 5 seconds. Very happy with how it turned out and I’m not sure I could have asked more from Penny for the 2minutes 56 seconds she was shining.

Tonight our dinner is traditional Argentinean meat for dinner. And lots of it. Maybe I won’t need as much breakfast as per usual.

2 fairly big days to come, then a rest day in Mendoza. A wine region of something. Talk soon. Mucho gracias.

James