Drive And Wait

If I were to tell you it took all day to change the tires on our Promaster van you would rightfully wonder what the hell we were doing all day, and the answer would be driving or waiting and mostly waiting. 

The tire shop on Balmaceda Avenue opens at nine am so we got up yesterday at 7:20. We left at a few minutes after nine from the campground and I only missed one turn so we got there at nine twenty. At 9:31 an employee showed up, opened the garage went to talk to the other customer waiting for service. Eventually another employee showed and by ten am we were inside the shop getting our new BF Goodrich KO2s installed. Slowly. 

They ordered the tires from the warehouse in the capital on Friday and they were here by Saturday but we had planned to get them installed Monday in case there was a delay in delivery. This is Chile: so everything went like clockwork. But a slow clock in this case. 

The tires cost $300 apiece including an alignment. I like these gnarly all terrain tires even though they wear fast and make noise. With them on the Promaster our heavy van goes anywhere reasonable, steep hills, gravel, wet dirt, and it’s performance on sketchy South American roads has been transformed. 

And then of course they look good, brand spanking new. 

They did their job well and hand tightened  the lug nuts and asked about the correct tire pressure and so forth. Then they did a careful alignment 

The process took three hours and we had nowhere else to be. Oh wait. We had passport photos to get. We’d done the waiting so now it was time to drive. 

I wanted a quick trim to look neat for my passport photo but I got an hour cut. And the all important beard trim. Layne sat and waited for an hour. 

So now we had out photos for our Bolivian visa and I had my picture for my passport renewal which we are now planning to get at the US Consulate in Cusco Perú.  Then it was time for lunch. Here’s the thing, having a hamburger in a food court in a mall is something we wouldn’t do in the US because we have our favorites of other places to eat. Here, a burger and fries felt a bit like home, not a daily thing but we enjoyed it. And yes it was a bit salty. 

Then we split and Layne went to Lider which is what they call Walmart in Chile. I went to Sodimac which is a Home Depot with all sorts of interesting things in a store that looks just like Home Depot. I bought a bottle of Meguilar plastic cleaner while Layne was buying anything she could see that we might  possibly need in Bolivia a place where middle class groceries are not much in evidence apparently. Not like this relatively small shopping mall in Chile: 

It looks too hot but this is the Pacific Coast so the air was cool and fresh and the sun was pleasant not burning. Rusty was snoring aboard GANNET2 with the roof fan and back windows letting in a breeze. He did far too much waiting all during the day. He got roast chicken for dinner though. And check out the parking. We parked in an empty quarter of the lot away from the store entrance. In five minutes a car came and parked right next to us. Why? Obviously it’s my irresistible  magnetic personality. 

He is a great companion, patient and always happy to see me. 

A Volkswagen bus came in and the occupants waved do I went over to talk to them. Bjorn is German and his partner Alessandra is from Milan so we talked Italian for fun. They looked in their 40s and work on the road. They are going north to Argentina like us so I hope we get to see them again because they were fun and I stupidly forgot to photograph them. Oh and they have two twelve year old grumpy rescue dogs about Rusty’s size. 

Layne was waiting for me inside the store so I had to go. We got $200 of groceries so it took a while. Then we had to find the pay station to get out of the parking lot. You pay to park in these malls. Fun isn’t it? 

Supermarkets tend to refrigerate their produce but Layne likes fruit stands when she can find them and here was this one outside Lider. How convenient. I sat and waited. 

After Lider we went around the corner and Layne waited while I ran into the Jeep dealer and picked up the transmission filter I had ordered. We then went looking for a transmission shop that would change our transmission fluid. That was when we got stuck in the most monumental traffic jam. It was one of those that had traffic lights backing each other up. We both waited. 

Then went to pick up our laundry and that was weird. She said it was ready but Layne found  the top layer was damp so she was not happy. But guess what there was a van from Switzerland dropping off laundry.

We last saw them in Nicaragua and because they are from the Italian speaking part of Switzerland I found myself speaking my mother tongue for the second time yesterday. The photos are from their Instagram. 

Giorgio…

…and Flavia retired and slowly driving south to Ushuaia. They will be in Switzerland for the summer and then back driving south in September. 

Their van is a Fiat Ducato the European version of our Promaster only it has a diesel engine, which is normal around here. We are the odd ones out. I_gracchi_i_van on Instagram. 

The transmission shop has moved unbeknownst to Google Maps and so we drove to the old shop and drove around looking, a perfect waste of time. Then they got back to us after we WhatsApp’ed them and sent their new address. 

Tuesday we will pursue the transmission maintenance plan. At least we will be riding on new tires.