I lost 4 days trying to figure out what’s wrong with my car and I think now I am just about back on the timeframe I was hoping to be on.
I was hoping to be at Arequipa today, but of course that wasn’t meant to be. The day started out cloudy and it even rained a bit later on. I just didn’t feel very good about the day when I woke up, and I decided to take the car to a Mercedes Benz shop that the local mechanic knew about.
At first, I was very happy to have found out about this place. I mean, they’re Mercedes mechanics, right? Yes, but no. See, they’re Mercedes Bus and Truck mechanics. Very different from old 1980s Diesel mechanics. They did their part and seemed to know a bit more, and was reassuring in that they knew a few things about what kind of smoke coming out of the engine is normal and what isn’t, but failed to impress me with the rest. One guy was obviously the boss and the other guy did all the work. They took it for a test drive, and was telling me that the turbo is not working. Well, if he had ever driven a 1980 Mercedes Diesel at 11000 feet like we did today, then perhaps he could have told me that it’s not too abnormal. This isn’t the first time I took it up in altitude.
The temperature gauge, however, isn’t very reassuring. It keeps climbing up a bit above 100 degrees Fahrenheit, and the oil pressure gauge seems to fluctuate between 1 and 2. And sometimes it’ll just settle in as the acting RPM meter again like it always has.
So tomorrow, there isn’t going to be much that is going to stop me from at least trying to get to Arequipa. Unless the engine fails to start in the morning, I will start my journey, something that is 4 days overdue. But since I was about 4 days ahead of schedule when I got here, it should all work out fine, at least timing wise. I need to keep an eye out on the temperature gauge and I will keep the car below 70, 75 miles an hour. I filled up the tank today, and that seems to have done some good as well. I think the mechanic was telling me that as the engine uses up the last bit of fuel it tends to get dirty, which is probably why the exhaust near the end of the day got really nasty. The trip to the Mercedes mechanic here in Cuzco cost me $75. All they did was change the oil and oil filter as well as fuel filters, do some diagnostic of a car they’ve never seen before, and take out the oil pan and crush it back into shape. They said that it was so crushed the oil couldn’t get sucked in well enough and was causing some of the rise in temperature.
By the time I got back it was already 2:30PM, and Arequipa is 8 hours away. It’s too late to take off and there are no major cities in between. And even if I stayed somewhere in between, it would cost me a bit of money to stay at a hostal AND it would actually be at a higher elevation than Cuzco. So I’m going to wait tomorrow and skip through all the minor cities in between here and Juliaca and settle in Arequipa, which should be at about a comfortable 7000 feet above sea level.
So I ask the lady if I can stay here again one more night and she’s not even fazed. She gives me the keys and welcomes me back in. I cannot say enough about the Peruvian hospitality. If some ‘friend’ of a friend’s son needed a place to stay in the States, I get the feeling that it would have been a half hearted effort. But here, it’s almost like they take you in with hospitality because that’s just the way things are, nothing more. Yesterday, for example, the guy that is in charge of the small store/bar downstairs comes up and knocks on the door and brings me hot water, tea bags, a cup and a piece of pastry up, telling me that it’s just service, nothing more. This morning, when I thought I was going to leave, he gives me a heartfelt handshake, wishing me well.
Remember the mechanic that took the turbo out of the car on Monday? Well it’s Thursday and he still hasn’t returned. In a way, I am glad he hasn’t. He was probably less qualified than some of the other younger mechanics here, and I was very disappointed at how long it took him to take out the turbo part. But the thing is, I’m not the only one that’s waiting for him. There are several others by now, and all 4 of them are waiting around in the sporadic rain. We talked about the car, what I’m doing, where I’m from, and how I was waiting, just as they are, for the mechanic to return. The only difference is that he left me after having taken the turbo out. It’s like taking out a liver and in the middle of the surgery going to another town 10 kilometers away to do a heart transplant.
But they’re all very nice people, and tell me about where they’re from. 2 of them are decendents of Peruvian area, while 1 of them is from the Spain area and 1 of them is actually indigenous. So there’s a good mix of them around here, they say. I take out my laptop and show them some pictures, about how I came to be where I am today. I think they liked the map showing the GPS reading of the Central American route that I took. I really liked how friendly they were even though I am sure I answered the wrong question half the time. I remember that I have 3 cigars, and they all go around taking a puff, but one of them is a big fan of it and decides to save it for later. I have 2 cigars left, and only 1 of them is going to be the victory cigar SHOULD I reach my destination.
So tomorrow is the big day. REALLY. I have to get out of here. I haven’t taken a shower since Sunday night because even though I’m staying at John’s place for free, they don’t have hot showers here. And it’s so cold that I can’t really bother taking a cold shower, and it’s really cold shower. So I feel dirty, and I really AM dirty. I’ve been doing nothing but messing around with a bunch of mechanical stuff. And in some sense, I am glad I get to see everything that happens here in Latin America, unlike the mechanics in the states where they call you and tell you that it’s ready. I get to see them take things out and put things back together, although there is an overwhelming sense in feeling that they don’t know nearly as much as the mechanics in the states. This is at least true for Mercedes, anyway. I am sure they are quite qualified with the cars that populate these areas.