28, It's the End of the World as We Know It (And We Feel Fine)

This is the end of the road. Sincerely. The southernmost point in the whole world that it is possible to drive to by car. A remote naval outpost nearly 55 degrees south of the equator, and we made it. We actually made it. 

Technically the road ends where the naval base starts, but since the gate was open we went in and turned around…

We made it! We actually made it! And the last 1000kms were the hardest of the whole trip, fate conspired against us and there were moments when we thought we wouldn’t make it. But we did make it, we actually did make it. So here is the story of the bitter fight to the even bitterer end.

Did we mention, we made it?

Our difficult week started with this glacier, this cursed glacier. It’s a powerful curse, held deep within the ice and it strikes those who dare do wrong. It strikes immediately and without mercy. We warn you now, this blog contains graphic illustrations of vehicle dismemberment and many acts of irresponsibility. We aren’t proud, but you want the truth so here it is, the stinking dirty truth.

Ahead of our visit to this despicable ice, we camped under a bridge next to a no camping sign. The next morning, partly because we thought it funny, and partly because it was an easy way to save some money (aka steal…) Jenjen hides under the bedding as Steve pays for the one ticket to get us both into the park.  

And so we arrive at this fantastic beast of a half price glacier, stable where most in the world are receding. There are a number of walkways from which to gain great views of this monster.  Oh wait, one more wrongdoing, when we arrived we skipped past the car park instead heading straight down to the bus drop off at the main building and parked in one of the very few places down there saving ourselves a shuttle bus ride.

The ice was unbelievable, sounds of cracking and creaking bouncing off the ice like thunder. A massive 70m tall at the face, huge chunks would occasionally tear off and crash into the water sending waves out in all directions. It was hypnotic and addictive, the game of trying to guess which bit was to fall next and waiting just one more minute, one more, one more, just in case something happens.

The streaks in the ice are dirt from the time that bit of ice spent grinding against rock somewhere upstream, a perfect illustration of how dynamic a glacier actually is. Well… in fast forward maybe. The info signs told us that every now and again the ice will close up against the land where we were stood and block the only drainage from one half of the lake. This pushes the water level upwards by as much as 27m until it manages to overcome the ice damn. It really was all pretty spectacular. And cursed.

We think the curse was initiated when we (still thinking it was funny) told some British travellers about our entry fee avoidance shenanigans and they mentioned the word “karma”. From this point on we were destined to be screwed. And it didn’t take long before the curse caught us up. We arrived back into town and wanting to avoid using our spare fuel, managed to limp to the petrol station just into the reserve on the gauge. After filling, the van refused to start. Uh oh. Much time passed, it felt like the same as our problem in Santiago and eventually we got running on 3 cylinders and limped across town to park up in a small car park. Poo.

Morning came around, the investigations into “Cylinder 4 misfire” began and it appeared the injector was clogged with sand. Crap.

So the desperate walking around began in the hope that a car parts store might be able to procure us some new injectors and a fuel filter. No luck with the injectors, but we got a new filter and were given the details of a workshop with an injector cleaning machine… Take that karma, we ain’t scared of you.

Day two of being stuck and while waiting for the injectors we found the source of the sand, a failed seal on the fuel expansion tank just above the wheel letting in all manner of sand, dirt, crud, gravel, crap, rocks, water, shit and just about everything else that you don’t want in your fuel system. That explains the fuel smell after filling up we’ve been ignoring… whoopsie. A post mortem of the fuel filter was also conducted and it had ruptured like a swollen appendix.

After two days fighting with these problems we were feeling pretty good. Injectors cleaned, hole sealed up and two new fuel filters. Until we realised one injector o ring had been torn by the garage so more wandering around town began finding only one that would do, not the right one…  Anyway, all back together and we had four cylinders working again, ready to set off the next morning!

At this point, because we’re honest and truthful, we will admit that we did notice that something still wasn’t quite right. Monitoring the engine with a phone app and Bluetooth reader like a massive dork Steve did notice that the fuel trim was very high, this number shows how much extra fuel the van is having to put into the cylinders to get proper combustion. A little left over water in the tank we assumed, nothing the engine couldn’t handle…

And so we set off, leaving nice safe civilisation where you can get food, water and parts and proceeded across the nothingness filled with optimism, or ignorance? Yes, ignorance. Still being a nerd Steve noticed that during corners the fuel trim would change as the van was slowly sucking up the water still sloshing around in the fuel tank… No problem, once it’s all gone there is no way for more to enter.

As we got close to our next fuel fill Steve thought it wise to steer back and forth to help drink up all that lovely water. Idiot. Bloody idiot. Stupid, naive, foolish idiot. The engine died, we coasted to a halt beside the road and it was at this very moment that karma was laughing at us the hardest. Shit.

All this talk of mechanical boringness is boring, we know, but it’s all we’ve been doing so what else is there to write about? So began 24 hours parked a few metres from the road hundreds of kilometres from the nearest town with an engine that absolutely won’t start. Emptying the brand new filter nothing but brown sludge poured out, this is bad.

The fuel pump was struggling, like a fish left on the dry pavement, so Steve fitted the spare but it had seized. Oh man. They aren’t designed to ever be taken apart, but when you’re stuck a thousand dollars in towing fees from any town it’s amazing what’s possible with a pair of plyers and our on-board air compressor. POP, it blew apart in all directions landing in the lovely clean sand….

It was cleaned up, put back together and still no fuel pressure… then Jenjen found an o-ring hiding in the shrubs…. Ah.

Forced apart, again, o-ring installed, fuel pressure achieved and nope, still not running and now our battery is flat too. Oh, and it’s getting dark.

After a troubled sleep, the desperate times called for desperate measures and Steve took the entire fuel tank out, no simple task.

Desperate times calls for irresponsible measures and 20L of petrol is dumped into the desert. Hang on you say, that doesn’t look like petrol! Well no, the question is how did we even made it as far as we did running on what actually looked like the result of eating raw chicken marinated in Indian sewer water?

If you’re wondering that is the corpse of a dead skunk, a fitting analogy to our situation you might say.

All back together, eventually, and still nothing. We have clean fuel, fuel pressure and a new fuel filter. This was getting infuriating. So Steve pulled all injectors, emptied them out and changed the filthy and wet spark plugs for the old worn out ones he couldn’t quite throw away like the good hoarder he is. Glad the little bit of sunshine had charged our batteries enough for a second of cranking, the engine STARTED. After 24 hours of trying everything we could think of, the sound of our engine running again bought tears of joy to our cold and dirty little faces.

That was a horrible, desperate 24 hours. It’s hard to explain the feeling of being stuck somewhere so remote and far away from comfort with every attempt to revive the van failing, failing and failing again. We felt totally helpless. No internet, no phone, just us with a handful of tools and a lot of head scratching, swearing and aforementioned tools being angrily thrown at the ground.

So onwards we travelled, finally, and we restocked on fuel filters and beer happy to finally be over this curse. Then Steve managed to smash a 1 litre beer bottle over the rear seat soaking the seat/bed and wasting a perfectly good beer. Dammit karma, dammit stupid Steve!!!

We finally camped in a location of our choice, then it started raining and we never thought we’d get back up the hill with our current luck… but we made it! The curse is finally broken? We’ve paid our dues perhaps?

 

A ferry crossing and we’ve reach the island of Tierra del Fuego, nearly the end of the road, so close. Attempting to tempt fate again, we pretend we didn’t know we had to pay for the ferry but a helpful worker reminders us just before everyone disembarks. Talk about not learning a lesson.

The roads are pretty boring, everywhere just looks the same as everywhere else, almost like every corner is a mirror image of the previous corner.

Side note: The uphill warning signs have a silhouette of a car clearly drawn by a child, but then we found THE CAR.

Tomorrow is the day, the day we plan to reach the southernmost city in the world, Ushuaia. The place we’ve been telling everyone we’re going to for the entire trip. Come on Westy Rick, don’t make us into liars. Well, any worse than we already are.

We are woken by a young cow angrily tearing open the sand bags we’re camping next to. With these levels of anger, it can only be puberty. He then proceeds to walk up to the fence behind which are hundreds of sheep in a desperate attempt to make friends but these sheep turn away and walk off clearly shunning this poor troubled cow. You remember how clique the playground can be. Upset, he starts scratching himself on the road signs before walking over towards a chemical toilet. Next time we look, and this isn’t made up, he is stood aggressively head banging. Next time we look, and this also isn’t made up, the chemical toilet has been tipped over and he’s run away. Those hormones.   

And after a long day, a very long day, we did make it to Ushuaia. Winding over the mountains we descended to this city that is only 1000kms from Antarctica, the end of the world (in the non-apocalyptic sense), fin del mundo. We were still suffering engine problems, it wasn't idling but we resolved it a day later with a hard reset of the ECU and fresh spark plugs. Finally he's runnin' right! 

But what good would getting here be without a welcome party? Jenjen’s friend Mercedes had generously flown down to meet us and joined us on some pretty extreme hikes the morning after some pretty extreme celebratory drinks. Actually that’s a complete exaggeration, we were all far too tired for a late night and celebrated like adults, drinking in a van parked on the seafront.

The hiking took us along a wet and blustery coast, and then the next day up to a glacier high above the town.

Ok so we already showed you a glacier that was much nicer than this one which is all covered in rock and piddily in comparison. Why do we bore you so? Well this one was unofficially accessible, after 4 hours of hiking up we literally went the extra mile and walked around to explore inside the melting ice. It was as incredible as it was foolhardy.

After a very pleasant 3 nights sleeping in a public carpark at the ocean we said goodbye to Mercedes and made our way out to the end of the road, 90km of gravel track past all kinds of wildlife and rugged terrain to find the naval base. They didn’t have any ships just a couple of dogs and a radio mast but otherwise it was pretty exciting.

Done. From Canada to the most Southern point accessible by car in the whole world. 232 days, 35,000kms, 4,450 litres of petrol and 15 countries. This was the toughest and most bittersweet week.

We awake to a mere 1 degree Celsius inside the van, turned the nose around and now we’re heading north. We’ve got three weeks to get back to mid Chile for shipping so we’re not done yet.

But we did it, we made it.

See for yourself.