December 2, 2018 – December 8, 2018

Driving so many kilometres, often on rough roads, means that there is almost always something that needs to be adjusted, repaired or replaced. Probably about 50% of the time when we arrive at a camping spot, one of the first things Derek does after we are set up is get his tools out and work on something. The fridge is finicky and doesn’t always work, screws rattle their way out of the camper and need to be tightened or replaced, one time the electrical connection for the solar panels on the roof was loose or filters need to be replaced on the truck. Sometimes it is more complicated, like when we noticed that the camper batteries were completely discharged and not being charged as we drove anymore. The computer chip governing the relay had quit and so Derek wired a manual bypass… we now have a manual switch in the cab that we need to remember to turn on for charging camper batteries when we start to drive, and off before we shut down the engine so that the fridge doesn’t end up draining the engine batteries. He is one handy guy!

For the last few days, a dash warning light, accompanied by a chime, had been coming on, indicating that we had a lamp out. Problem was, it would come on and then go off again before we could stop and get out to see which light was malfunctioning. If it had come on, and stayed on, there would have been just one chime and we would have been able to see which light was out, but with it being intermittent flashing on and off, the chime would sound sometimes several times per minute. Very annoying. We concluded it was probably the headlamps which come on automatically when we drive and because none of the other lighting systems (brakes or signals) were on when we received the warnings.

We camped for a couple of nights in the small town of Las Lajas. We walked to an auto supply store for new headlamps, assuming they were the problem, but the ones we bought didn’t fit. We returned them and in the next town, we found the right headlamp bulbs, and after we arrived at a camp along Lago Alumine, Derek again removed the headlights and replaced the lamps.

The next day we drove through a remote area of Mapuche owned land, and were happy to not hear the warning chimes. We left the soft sandy roads, and headed down some backcountry gravel roads, when suddenly the warning chimes began again. Now we noticed that when Derek would tap the brakes the chimes would stop….maybe it wasn’t the headlamps after all. Yup that Derek, pretty handy. Back to the drawing board.

We camped for the night at a beautiful free spot, in the centre of an oxbow giving us river on 3 sides of the truck.

We headed towards Parque Nacional Lanin, getting peeks at Volcan Lanin long before we arrived at the park. At our campsite (Piedra Mala), out came the tools. Derek took apart the taillights, and after several tests found an open circuit in a connection for some additional backup lights that had been wired in the bumper, the problem was found……and this time it stopped the chimes for good! Yeah. No more incessant ding, ding, ding, ding as we drive bumpy roads.

We hiked to a small waterfall near our camp one day, and then most of the way to a lookout for Volcan Lanin, turning back a few kilometres short of the lookout as the volcano was completely covered in cloud. We did turn around on our way out to see the volcano almost completely free of cloud cover. That’s the way that goes!

We had both been feeling a bit out of sorts with the trip the last few days. We were tired of things breaking. Even more so though, we were concerned about the continued hard starting on the truck. We were driving by things that we normally might have stopped to check out, concerned that if we turned the truck off, it might not start again. But at least now the lamp out signal had stopped flashing, and, as always, getting out and doing a few hikes in nature helped get us back in the groove of things.