12. Villa Amengual to Coyhaique: Birthdays, shrines & bike shop rescue.

On Saturday 8th February we bid farewell to the farm campsite livestock and great ibis, and set off east up the Rio Cisnes valley, then bearing away south down and up towards Villa Amengual. It quickly grew hot, but tall evergreen beeches provided some shade on the uphill.

We arrived in Amengual at lunchtime and found a shop about to close for siesta that begrudgingly let us in for provisions. We lunched on bread, avocado and cheese in the usual central square and then headed south once more past a few dozing cyclists. It was about now that Robbie started to notice an odd feeling in his rear wheel, as though it was no longer quite round, but we carried on regardless. We hoped to make it to Villa Manihuales for the night, 59km to the south, with little time to stop.

We climbed steadily up to Lago las Torres and then up again to the Rio Manihuales valley and the start of a long gradual descent. By 4.30pm we were low on water and pulled off at a bridge and down to the river to filter some more, wetting our hats against the heat. By 5.30 Robbie’s odd rear tyre was more noticeably feeling like someone kicking it on every turn and we stopped to investigate at a bus shelter. Removing panniers, a rack bolt fell out, which partially explained things. The wheel looked ok but possibly needed re truing, a job for the campsite. We didn’t think to check the tyre rim.

Setting off again, Hannah noticed an odd noise from her front wheel and looking down we saw sticky black tar glued to the tread. Clearly the hot conditions had partially melted some road tar. Five painful minutes were spent unpicking it as much as possible with stones and sticks, and finally we were off again.

The sun lowering, we bore round sharply to the west and enjoyed a glorious evening ride into the sunset on a gently winding downhill road passing woods, horse pastures and large boulders. The cooler air made it almost utter perfection on a bicycle and we sailed into Manihuales in high spirits. Hannah popped into a PF shop for final provisions and we arrived at the Border Rio campsite soon afterwards.

That evening we feasted on potato carrot soup and met a German cycle tourer, Felix. He had started in southern California over a year ago with his girlfriend and cycled down through Mexico and many countries in Latin America, with the odd bus on the way. Girlfriend had had to return home and he was now alone, aiming for Ushuaia before returning himself in the German spring. We exchanged cycle tales before bed as a full moon rose up above the trees.

Sunday was Hannah’s birthday and Robbie was up before dawn in the bitter cold, attempting to make a birthday card with help from his sister’s sketch pad Christmas present and guacamole for breakfast. Both went down reasonably well, and whilst Hannah phoned home, Robbie played with his spoke nipples to try to true the wheel, without much success. When the campsite owner started strimming, it was time for a swift exit to avoid hay fever. We stopped at a roadside cafe for some enchaladas for lunch and then headed off southwest towards Coyhaique.

Cloudy skies made the ride easier and soon we arrived at a split in the road with a choice of options: the direct, shorter but steeper ripio route on the old Carretera south, or a longer paved route west around the biggest hill, with more traffic. Both of us still sore from the Queulat pass, and Robbie’s rear wheel still not right, we opted for the long way round on asphalt.

Bearing west the road crossed a spectacular shallow gorge with torrents of water gushing through it and then continued up and down through rolling pasture. It gradually became more winding, and slightly sunken, reminding us of country lanes back home, not dissimilar to the Lake District. We found a spot for lunch on Ioverlander at a meander beach on the river, down below a road bridge, where dozens of Chileans were enjoying Sunday barbeques. The smells of roasting meat made our bread and cheese a little disappointing as we rested in the shade.

In the afternoon we continued southwest, eventually reaching the confluence of Rio Manihuales with Rio Simpson, and the road junction for Puerto Aysen where we turned sharply left towards Coyhaique. Bicycle Patagonia warned that this stretch of road was especially busy as Puerto Aysen was the main port supplying Coyhaique and the Aysen region, and also narrow in places. We hoped that Sunday would mean fewer lorries, but instead there was plenty of tourist traffic to dodge, and the road was indeed a little too narrow for comfort.

Robbie’s early start was taking its toll and we were both flagging. A roadside stop for bread and sprite helped a little but we decided that trying to reach Coyhaique in the evening rush would be unsafe, and we picked out a camping ground at Rio Simpson nature reserve to stop. Shortly before then we passed a spectacular double waterfall at La Virgen shrine, ideal for refilling water and basking in some cooling spray.

The campsite itself comprised several fully enclosed shelters with their own power and fire hearths. We pitched our tent inside one of them and showered, washed some clothes and cooked up dinner. Alas there was nowhere to buy any wine or beer, but for pudding Robbie fished out the not entirely whole fruitcake bought the day before and some candles from Puyuhaipi, and wished Hannah happy birthday.

We awoke on Monday morning very cosy in our little hut and packed up more quickly than usual. Leaving the camp ground, we popped over the road to see a shrine to San Sebastian which had expanded to fill a shallow cave with several chairs placed outside, forming what looked like an outdoor church. It also explained regular honking the previous evening as passing cars and trucks paid their respects.

We continued east up the Simpson valley in thick forest initially and then scrubland as the valley widened and the climb steepened. Halfway up the steepest section we met a significant tunnel. Traffic was relatively light so we tentatively entered the darkness, and nervously puffed uphill. Suddenly a sound like thunder rumbled around us and the road vibrated alarmingly as a small truck shuddered past. This was followed by a line of traffic so loud we were deafened and then a large lorry appeared ahead. We both leaped onto the raised pedestrian walkway and pulled in our bikes on the road as tight as possible. The truck thundered past and then to top it all let out a honk of encouragement right next to us. This was ear splittingly loud and left us quivering and dragging our bikes along the tunnel wall to escape.

At last light appeared and we were free. We veered into a layby, sat down and ate cookies to recover from the ordeal. Another cycle couple appeared from the opposite direction and whizzed downhill through the tunnel happy as Larry, no traffic in sight. We watched enviously and summoned strength to climb the rest of the hill, hoping for no further tunnels of Doom.

It wasn’t long before we reached the alternative original Carretera road’s Southern junction, shortly after some roadworks involving engineers perched on the edge of a suspension bridge. Beyond this was one final straight to the top and more roadworks with a stop go sign set to stop. We waited behind another cyclist for at least 5 minutes and wondered how long these works were as cars gathered behind us. The sign was flipped to go at last and we let the cars go before sailing off downhill. 500m on we reached a viewpoint with Coyhaique spread out far below, and pulled off to enjoy the view and some trail mix. The lights changing once during our break, we waited for another stream of downhill traffic and tagged on the end. Despite going as quickly as possible we soon lost sight of them and then saw cars coming in the opposite direction. Fortunately the road work was very dispersed and we simply sailed through the cones and continued downhill. Some time later we realised wet cement was being laid between concrete blocks and we had left a series of neat tyre marks behind us. As the last uphill car passed we sheepishly moved back to the correct side of the cones and carried on, trying to avoid the gaze of any workers.

At the foot of the hill we exited the works and began climbing up into Coyhaique town, which was perched on the side of a steep valley. We had picked a campsite with good reviews not far from the centre but hadn’t checked the topography. Turning off the road we began descending very steeply towards the river, and continued down a good 100 vertical metres. Now very hungry for lunch, we stormed through the campsite gates and straight into a very large and barking German shepherd. Emergency halt and gentle reverse eventually appeased him and we tentatively walked out bikes around the hound to a picnic table nearby for some urgent cheese and cake.

The campsite was beautiful with lots of Apple trees and a small stream flowing through it, though busy with tents. After registering, we found a spot over the stream, pitched up and showered. Both our bikes in need of tlc, we unloaded everything from them and pushed the lightened machines back up the hill in search of a bike repair shop. This took some time as there was disagreement in its location between Google and mapsme. Finally we found it, provided a description of my wheel problem as best as possible in broken Spanish, and requested a general service for Hannah’s and then went off to search for cash and food shopping.

Coyhaique was pleasant enough, blocks of streets tiered along the hillside with a central round plaza and streets radiating off it. However there was also plenty of traffic and the first signs of Chile’s recent disruption, with many shops and all banks partially boarded up. With tourists happily walking around it was impossible to imagine violent protests but clearly they must have happened. All banks were now shut so instead we bought food from a large supermarket and fruit and nut specialist store. Leaving all this in a locker we returned to bike shop and awaited the prognosis with anxiety.

The mechanic had Robbie’s bike on a stand and immediately showed us the problem: a large split in the rear tyre along the rim. He said no fix was possible and presented his only 700mm tyre, a narrower 32mm width. We had ummed and ahhed over whether to bring a spare tyre for some time, having bought one in Cambridge, and in the end it was the one spare we didn’t bring. Incredibly frustrated at our decision and the short life of the supposedly indestructible schwalbe marathon tyre, we thanked the mechanic and decided to try some other bike shops tomorrow.

Hannah’s bike was fine, with brake cables tightened, and we slowly made our way back down to camp and to cook dinner. Just as we were about to eat an English male cycle tourer sidled over to us and said hello. He travelling north, we swapped tips on where to go, and he told us tales of tentbound endurance on a Puerto Williams trek south of Ushuaia. Eventually we discovered we were both from Cambridge and had some mutual friends! We agreed to go for dinner the following night at a nearby cerveceria and being more experienced, Richard suggested the tyre failure may have been due to low pressure. We did some online research to corroborate this and vowed to pump all tyres up tomorrow.

On Tuesday morning Robbie headed back into town in search of bicycle tyres whilst Hannah did some clothes washing. The first shop had an enormous pile of tyres which looked promising, but almost all were narrower 26″ and the assistant disappeared upstairs in search of a 29″. 5 minutes later down he came with two options, neither of which looked amazing but Robbie picked the toughest looking and hoped it might last us the trip.

Robbie proceeded to the central square to wait for Hannah and saw Richard wandering by. They both sat down and chatted whilst rather bizzarely, some belly dancers began busking nearby. Before long, Richard’s other half Jeanette appeared, followed soon after by Hannah, and we passed a lovely restful hour in the plaza.

At 2pm Jeanette had a massage booked and we needed lunch. We went to cafe peligreno on their recommendation for pizza, cake and iced coffee before heading to the bank for cash. A few other last minute supplies and we also managed to find a jumbo sized box of whey protein for Robbie. Chores done, we sailed down the hill to the campsite, showered after a queue and then went in search of the cerveceria. We found it on the other side of the valley after a very narrow one car at a time rope bridge and joined R and J for rather too much beer and burgers. Stumbling back to the tent we clambered inside letting half the midges of Chile in with us and fell fast asleep, happy in the knowledge that our bikes lived to ride another day.