To Penas

After a day of rest in the quiet it is time to get moving. For starters, we are out of food. We head back the way we came to begin with - at least the rough road is now downhill and thus a little easier to navigate. Though there are many large ponds and small fords. Alice is still wobbling- so sacrifices dry feet for safety.

As soon as we descend a little, we get views of Ancohuma once more. Maybe it was there all the time whilst we sat in the bank of cloud?

Once down we follow a quiet road (on tarmac!) to the village of Penas. Alain has hit a few rocks and a speed bump and his front wheel is no longer true. It’s a broken spoke which will need to be fixed. Unfortunately the break is in the nipple screw head and on the brake disk side - so its going to be a bit of work. As there are just a few more km to go we decide to continue and sort it once we arrive.

In Penas, we find a room and set about resolving bike and food problems. There is one small shop, but with no fruit or veg or coffee or rice or sugar it does not exactly solve our food problems. Alice luckily finds a large bunch of bananas and some onions in the free food box and we set to work on the bike.

Problem one is to extract the broken spoke. We don’t have a tool for the brake disk so its a lot of manouvering and bending - a rather nice 3D puzzle - except that honestly we would prefer to be having a hot shower. Then for the new spoke. As its an awkward corner we have a kevlar spare spoke as a new toy. (A strong cord that can be tensioned). Its a bit harder than we had hoped to get tight so the wheel is better but not exactly true. Hopefully enough to get Alain to La Paz.Okumaya devam et