Will our van be the death of us!?

Issues with our van seem to be a trend we have to keep overcoming in southern South America.  Unfortunately this blog is more about the same.  After overcoming one of the worst ferry rides of our life our van starts struggling to start.  We do still find adventure on the Chiloe archipelago but not without almost putting ourselves into the ocean (not on purpose) and putting most thing we have stored underwater.  This blog also marks the start of a little break from the daily blog format as we hope to keep our expense low to pay for all the repairs we need.  Our plan is to not do anything of note for a week and hope that nothing of note will happen to us.  This means that hopefully when you are reading this blog we are completely caught up in this blog and our Instagram posts.

March 7^th – The diminishing novelty of being on a ferry for the day

Rupert in puppy prison

Our ferry to Puerto Montt was set to leave at 11am meaning we needed to be at the port at 9am.  Paul decided to see what the plan was for people who were supposed to be going to Chiloe Island and the port directed him to go to the ferry companies’ office.  They assured us we would have time to go there and come back so we decided to head to the office. 

The employees were not very empathetic but did give us an email where we could submit receipts for additional gas and ferries we would have to purchase since they canceled the ferry we needed.  Hopefully we will get some money back from this inconvenience.  Unfortunately, the inconvenience grew when we were told that the ferry we were rebooked on was 4 hours late meaning we wouldn’t arrive into Puerto Montt until after midnight. 

Playing the waiting game

'Carcuterie' for dinner

We decided to spend a bit of time exploring an abandoned prison in Chaiten until we realized that the local homeless population was using it as a shelter and we immediately did not feel welcome.  We headed to the port and just waited watching movies and relaxing.  We continued even after we finally were loaded onto the boat.

At first we were still happy to be travelling north towards Chiloe while given the ability to relax all day.  It felt like we were given all the benefits of both a travel day and a relaxing day.  At least this is how we felt until we had been on the ferry for 5 hours.  By this point in the journey the sun had set and the waves of the ocean had grown and we started to question how good our sea legs were.  It seemed like the longer we were on the ferry and the more we thought about the amount of driving we had to do to get to where we wanted to be the more the novelty of this very long ferry disappeared.

 

 March 8^th – The disappointment continues (End of the road Take 4)

At midnight we were still on the boat.  Our hopes of reaching the shore any time soon had been dashed as the boat battled a massive storm front.  For hours we watched the GPS icon on google maps move a few hundred meters an hour as waves crashed over the walls of the ferry.   The pedestrian doors facing the storm had been rachet strapped closed with ceiling panels in the washroom falling down.  We had started to feel a little concerned about our predicament and safety in our van.  We had no idea when we would arrive but decided that closing our eyes would be our best option to hopefully get through the early morning hours.

The boat is falling a part

At 5:45am vehicles started their engines around the van.  We had made it!  We had survived!  Paul quickly jumped into the front seat and we took off. 

Obviously we didn’t go very far as we were exhausted, but not as exhausted as the average passenger of the ferry who did not have a bed to sleep in.  We had nothing to complain about compared to what most people experienced on the ferry.  A ferry that was supposed to arrive at 9pm yesterday arrived almost 9 hours late.

We drove through the empty city to a little pull out by a beach on the outskirts of town.  We set up the van just as a few young men drove up and started playing music.  For a brief second we were annoyed wondering how we would ever get to sleep with this noise, but suddenly it was in the mid afternoon and we had had our nap.

We had hoped to spend just a few moments in Puerto Montt picking up a few things, namely groceries, but a new priority suddenly took precedent.  Paul wanted to see if we could find a new engine air filter as it was filthy, but he had made the mistake of banging all the dirt out of it which broke the filter.  We searched for hours from store to store and had almost given up hope until we went to a store called Filter World (at least that was what its name translated to).  We were slightly optimistic when the first thing we saw when we entered the store was a sign saying certain products were made in Canada, we became more optimistic when their catalog implied that they had the filter we needed.  The smiles on our faces where massive when the employee walked out from the back room with the correct engine filter.  Mission Accomplished.

WE HAVE A FILTER!!!

The reason Paul had banged out the engine air filter was our engine was misfiring when starting.  It would only due it when the engine was hot, which added to our confusion.  We originally thought it was the battery but quickly ruled that out.  As the air filter was incredibly plugged we had hoped that that was the issue.  By the end of the day the van would rarely start on its first try and we knew we had an issue.  Paul’s theory, it was a bad fuel injector.

The goal of the day was to drive 6 hours south to the southern most point of Chiloe to the community of Quellon, where the ferry was supposed to take us.  We wanted to do this as, for some reason, there was another “ending’ to the Pan-American highway there.  We didn’t make too many stops on our 6 hour journey.  Firstly, because it was difficult to start the van, and secondly because we would have to drive back the same way in the near future.  The only stops we did make was for a free shower which are available to drivers of toll roads but are seldomly every used, and to board another ferry to the island of Chiloe.

Another end of the road completed

The drive was long and uneventful.  We knew there was cool things to see not a few kilometers off the road but it was late and we had a goal to reach the end of the road.  Around sunset we finally pulled into Quellon and went straight to the end of the road and the end of their version of the Pan-American highway.  Interestingly Wikipedia does define this as one of the end of the roads with the only other being Ushuaia but nothing about the route made sense to us as there was so much more highway south and the monument indicated that Anchorage was the start of the Pan-American highway.  Obviously the route was designed in the early 1900’s and was designed with the idea of connecting communities.  At that time there were no highways connecting communities south of Quellon in Chile. The start is also up for debate but historically it was Fairbanks.  At least that is what we understand from our own research.  Either way we did our typical photo and sparkling wine popping tradition before settling in for the night and falling asleep hard.

 

March 9^th – Enjoying Salmon Liquor

Surprisingly tasty Salmon Liquor

We had researched a lot about southern Chiloe, hoping to find something to see or do, but there was nothing we were interested in until just outside of the capital of Chiloe; Castro.  We packed up the van and headed north.

As per Wikipedia the Chiloe Province consist of an archipelago known within Chile for its distinctive folklore, mythology, potatoes, cuisine and unique architecture. The culture of Chiloé is the result of mixing of Huilliche, Spanish and Chono influences in centuries of isolation without much contact with the rest of Chile or the Western World. Its cool temperate climate, abundance of sea resources and large and lush forests have also played a major role in shaping life in the islands.  It was Castro where this distinctness was most evident as the communities were colourful, built with wood and had a strong local identity. 

One of our first stops was a distillery that had the only Salmon Liquor in the world (according to them) and was the epidemy of Chiloe in a drink.  We obviously tried it, among everything they had to offer as they had not received very many international visitors.  Everything was good, including the Salmon Liquor.  Obviously it probably wouldn’t be the first thing we would purchase at a liquor store but it didn’t taste like the novelty drink we assumed it would be.  The flavour was subtle and well balanced and would probably elevate a Ceaser; however, it is designed to be sipped straight.  We definitely bought a few bottles to take home with us.  Needless to say we were glad we weren’t driving much more as there heavy handed free samples had us a little tipsy.

Seaside Castro

Cute wooden houses

Castro was unlike anything we had seen previously in Chile.  It was colourful and raw.  It seemed like the people in Chiloe were, on average, slightly poorer than the average mainland Chilean community, but it didn’t feel unsafe.  We did purchase souvenirs in Chiloe much to our surprise as souvenir’s usually take up too much space meaning we typically stick to stickers and Christmas ornaments.  However, we had recently been discussing that due to the rain we have been spending more and more time in the van in “table mode” and some slippers would be awesome.  Serendipitously Chiloe is known for their handmade slippers.  They are amazing and exactly what we would have wanted and they were dirt cheap.  Too cheap to even think about negotiating the price.

Enjoying the surroundings with new slippers

The day slipped away after all our exploration so it was time to find a spot to camp for the night.  Chiloe does not seem to be well visited by the international community, and camping spots are few and far between (especially if you want to wild camp).  After a long drive down a rural road and crossing some really deep puddles that had us worried about our choices we found the perfect spot overlooking a bay.

 

March 10^th – “I’m already underwater”

A few of the UNESCO
churches we saw

Our van had been steadily become harder to start meaning we had to make some hard decisions.  We wanted to spend more time on Chiloe but mechanics and parts were 2 hours north back in the community of Puerto Montt.  As it was Sunday we knew there was no point tackling the issues in the van today, but decided that we would leave Chiloe tomorrow.  That meant we decided to do everything we had planned to do over the next two day, today, while cutting our planned trip to a rural island within the archipelago called Mechuque.

We drove to Dalcahue, known for its markets and handcrafts (where Kendra bought slippers for herself) and after exploring the community we traveled to the island of Quinchao, a very historical area of Chiloe.  We drove to various miradors and stopped to see the oldest wooden church on Chiloe.  Fun fact Chiloe is known for its wooden churches, of which 16 of them are designated as UNESCO world heritage sites. 

Outside the oldest church

Inside the oldest church

Our final stop on the island was Curaco de Velex known for amazing oysters.  They were the freshest we had ever had with many still with seaweed on them.  They were delicious so we bought more and more and more until we were stuffed.  They did not compare to anything we had ever had before.  We don’t even know how to explain these oysters, we just recommend if you are ever in the area to make a special trip and try them yourselves.

The smiles are not as genuine
as we wish they were

We drove to northern Chiloe with the hopes of booking a kayak tour for the next morning to see some Humbolt penguins.  These would be our fifth type of penguin on the trip!  When we arrived, we were surprised and excited that the weather was as good as it gets for kayaking.  We decided to take advantage of the “good” weather and take the tour.  We just didn’t realize that good weather still meant relatively big (for us) waves, and that it would be a self-guided tour.  The guy renting us the kayaks asked us if we had kayaked before, which we had, but our experience was on flat water with a foot controlled rutter.   This was not the kayak tour we had envisioned as water entered the boat, and sunk half of it within the first 10 minutes.  Paul desperately tried to bail out the boat, while saying, “I’m already underwater” then accidently dropped the bail bucket and it sunk to the bottom of the sea.  We desperately paddled back to shore and barely made it back without tipping and entirely sinking our boat.  We were not having fun…

Humbolt Penguins!

After calming down a reevaluating our plan, we ventured back into the sea only going to the first island with penguins, taking a couple pictures with our very wet phones and making our way back to the beach.  We did see penguins, but I don’t think we will be doing another kayak tour on the sea any time soon.

Our final stop of the day was cliffs overlooking a spot known for dolphins, unfortunately the weather got worse by the minute and we stayed in the van for the night.

 

March 11^th – Now our clothes are underwater!

We had hoped to stay at our camping spot as we had hoped the weather would improve, alas it never did.  We drove to Puerto Montt to a mechanic but they were too busy to see us today; we were able to make an appointment for tomorrow.

Rupert inspecting the the stow-and-go

Before we were able to speak to the mechanic we were trying to decided if we wanted to book an Airbnb or just camp tonight.  Humorously laundry service is very expensive in Chile, but booking an Airbnb with a laundry machine tends to only be $15 CAD more then going to a laundromat.  No matter our decision we knew that we needed to retrieve our dirty clothes from our stow-and-go so we opened up the hatch to our additional storage area and were met with a big surprise.  It was full of water, our clothes among all other things we had stored down below were underwater.

Sometimes we feel like we can not catch a break.

Our guess is that the water came from when we drove through the very deep puddle a couple days ago on Chiloe, but we were also concerned that it was due to a plugged drain causing water to enter the van flowing to the lowest area of vehicle, which would be the stow-and-go.  Regardless we had a lot of wet things that needed to dry out and a lot of things to investigate.

  We booked an Airbnb and spent the rest of the day washing clothes and relaxing.

 

March 12^th - The Haunting from San Pedro

The 2-hour walk back to the Airbnb
helped clear our heads

Bright and early, we arrived at the mechanic and dropped off the vehicle, we then spent the morning walking back to the Airbnb.  Our hope was by the end of the day we would have a well running van and be planning our future drive towards the Argentina border.  Unfortunately we learned that would not be an option for us.

While we sat in the Airbnb doing more laundry we received a text from the mechanic.  It was not the fuel injectors that were causing us issues, it was the fuel pump.  This is the same issue we had on the Lagunas Route in Bolivia and the issue we assumed was corrected.  Frustratingly we learned that the fuel pump does not exist in Chile meaning that the mechanic in San Pedro lied to us.  He had “fixed” the fuel pump and charged us for a new one.  It is great that it lasted 10,000 kms, but if he was honest we could have ordered one long ago. 

The joys of
shipping parts

Our only option to fix the van was to order parts.  Ideally we could have stored the van at the mechanics shop but the mechanic didn’t have room for the van, so Paul grabbed an Uber and headed back to the mechanic.  He then spent a bunch of time asking questions of the mechanic and ordering parts (after confirming with the mechanic he was ordering the correct ones).   His thought was if the van has to be in the shop and we have to order parts anyway let’s get everything fixed now.  One thing the mechanic was confident they could fix was our ABS speed sensor issue which prevented us from using cruise control.  Hopefully when the van gets fixed we will be able to use cruise control once again.

After getting the van back to the Airbnb we were exhausted.  All this news was pretty emotionally draining so we decided not to do anything else today.

 

March 13^th – Investigating our water excursion

Our biggest concern, right now, is that we have a drainage issue in our van causing water to pool in our stow-and-go.  We hope our issue is caused by holes in the stow-and-go, likely caused by gravel roads, speed bumps, among other things, but don’t feel like driving around looking for puddles to prove our theory.  Luckily, for troubleshooting purposes, Puerto Montt is known for rain so we kept on checking to see if there was any accumulation of water after large rain storms.  We then grabbed our water container and dumped 5 liters in each drainage area and waited for water to accumulate.  Thankfully none did.

We couldn’t be happier to have holes in our stow-and-go as this was something we could fix ourselves. 

To celebrate we jumped in an uber and headed downtown to the well reviewed microbrewery for some drinks before we walked to the tourist section of Puerto Montt known as Angelmo.  This area is where you can buy various souvenirs and fish.  These souvenirs are similar to what is found in Chiloe but with a slightly higher price point.  The fish was delicious, as the area is also known for great seafood restaurants, using fish purchased from the market below.  We ended up having a great meal looking down at the water and the various sea lions hoping for some scraps from some of the market vendors

March 14^th – The fuel pump is failing us

It was time to leave our Airbnb, we packed up the van and started driving to a hardware store to pick up supplies to fix the holes in our stow-in-go.  We wondered how to spend the next week waiting for the parts to arrive and discussed going to Argentina, exploring the region around Puerto Montt or just driving to the far more touristy town of Puerto Varas. 

No pictures taken today, so here is a
picture of a sea lion we took yesterday!

After we started driving towards downtown we learned all our plans had to change.  Our van died in the middle of downtown, but at least we were able to start it once again.  We had no idea how many more kilometres we could drive before we were in the same predicament as we were in Bolivia, unable to start the van at all.  We decided to book an Airbnb with parking for the next 8 nights.  As we drove to the Airbnb the van stalled one last time before we parked it, hopefully until we have the parts in our hand.   

It was disheartening knowing that we would not be able to, or at least willing to, drive around the area.  Our plan now is to take it easy, and schedule relaxing time now rather than in Buenos Aires after the van had shipped.  This will allow us to explore Uruguay after shipping rather than before. 

We spent the evening exploring the neighbourhood of our new Airbnb, one thing we like about this Airbnb is its proximity to restaurants and grocery stores, however, it doesn’t have a kitchen and is no where near downtown.  Looks like we will still be relaying on the van to do some cooking.  Either way we are excited to make the most of the next week or so!

 

March 15^th – Meeting up with fellow travelers

Over a year ago in Guanajuato Mexico we met up with Tausha and Josh.  We were sick at the time with Covid, but they gave us food and medicine to improve ourselves.  We’ve stayed in contact over the last year and were so excited to learn that they would be arriving in Puerto Montt today on a cruise.  After messaging back and forth we had a plan to meet downtown. 

We spent hours catching up and chatting until the cruise ship was preparing to leave the area meaning we had to hustle to the cruise ship port to say our final goodbyes.  Spending the day over a few pints with friends definitely was a highlight of the last few weeks and helped us forget any issues with the van we were having.

 

March 16^th – Start of a week off

The next week or so is going to look different from the normal daily blog updates.  As we are planning on spending as little money as possible we do not have any plans on doing anything interesting or of note.  In general, we will be at the Airbnb cooking food purchased from a supermarket 10 minutes on foot away while completing a few tasks online/around the van.  If there is anything to report we will probably summarize it in the start of our next blog post.  Hopefully the next time we right will be about how the van is up and running and we are making our way to Argentina.