Day 49 - the day Alan was brave

Colemu to Concepcion. Saturday 15th October (80km)

As we woke up, slightly high from furniture polish, we decided to aim to be on the road by 10.30. We nommed down a few bowls of cereal, packed up quickly, showered and hit the road. But not before we were accosted again by Steve (the motor cyclist we'd met the previous night who had been on the road for a year from Canada and who fuelled our conversation for the day allowing us to spend time debating the merits and drawbacks of both methods of transport whilst we pedalled on). Steve liked to talk - a lot - more of an orator than a conversationalist, but a pleasant 60year old chap nonetheless who couldn't understand why we didn't take tinned food with us - just in case... Have you ever carried a bunch of tin cans uphill Steve?

So we were eventually on the road by 11am after a bakery stop to grab many pastries. A quick glance at the GPS and Ant realised we had climbed over 1000m yesterday - no wonder our legs were finding it difficult today! That's like a Peru day disguised in lots of rolling lumps! We'd later also realise we were to do similar today too, but for now we just plugged up the climb out of town.
Now today was a very eventful day!


As we were climbing out the town on a fairly busy road and going much slower than the traffic (always makes it a bit more sketchy), a small shaggy dog saw us, got excited, alerted his bigger Alsatian type of buddy, then they both sprinted out their garden, towards the road to cross it and eat us...

...except at the same time a truck came the other way. Big Alsatian had the sense to stay in the shoulder and sacrifice eating us to save his life. Small unintelligent shaggy mutt had no such sense and was only saved by the fact he was much smaller than the bumper. A thump, skid and whine later and he was running (thankfully!) out the other side of the truck to continue his chase on our side of the road. But as soon as he reached the shoulder he realised he was quite shocked and had in fact just been hit by a truck. He stopped and whined a little, before trotting back to his garden, whilst bigger dog seemed to tut and shake his head.
An adrenaline buzzing moment for us, dog chase, truck, ouch, poor guy... But hopefully one that will teach shaggy dog never to chase bikes again.

A few km later we were joined by a collie. He came out his garden, stopped to look both ways before eventually crossing the road very safely, then ran alongside us as if to say 'ok guys, where are we going?'. Every time he heard a car, he stopped, looked to see where it was coming from, and got off the road onto the verge accordingly, then when safe, he continued his venture. He was a happy sole, who reignited our faith in pups - but not quite our trust - you just never know what they will do!

After about Half an hour on the road, and still on the climb, we felt a few spots of rain. Should we waterproof up? No. It's refreshing, not very heavy and cooling (after all we were sweating and overheating up this hill). About another half an hour later and we resembled shivering drenched rats, cycling under far clouds through a sheeting downpour in soaking wet kit. Oops.

There was only one thing for it - stop under a tree to eat pastries!

Bellies fuelled and waterproofs on we chugged along in weather that now resembled a cold February day. Ant was quite literally in his element. Much better to be cold and rainy than over heating. I was also surprisingly upbeat - adventure!!

Then came our first decision. Busy road direct to Concepcion, or quiet road, slightly indirect, back to coast then down. We chose option 2 and headed back across the coastal hills away from the trucks and busses towards the sea.
This was a much more pleasant road and one we could actually enjoy. But after about 20km my body ran out of sugar and my head dropped as I started to shiver (need much more fuel to keep warm in cold weather and my kit was still soaking under my waterproof - Ant's had dried - I'm sure there's some kit analysis to be done here Tom!

At my request we stopped at the top of a hill to eat more pastries and sugar up. This turned out to be an error. We stopped just long enough to get really cold at the top of a hill which would become the start of a long descent into the coastal town on route to Conception.

Man that descent was windy, cold and soaking wet and left us dreaming of all the tea shops we would probably never find in the town (got to remember this is actually chile and not north Devon - no cream teas for us!).

We shakily found the town and its plaza and hoped for some sort of warm restaurant ... And then we saw it... A coffee shop called Ambar, with a wonderful waitress who said we could put the bikes inside (wow!) so we could get dry and warm whilst we drank really yummy coffee and ate sandwiches and hamburgers!!! Dreams can come true! Ok so no cream scones but almost!

My shoes were so wet they made a puddle on the floor, so I realised a kit change would probably be sensible! Having stripped all my wet kit off and replaced it with lovely warm dry clothes, I was much happier and living my coffee! (squirty cream on top - yeah baby!).

We eventually dragged ourselves back into the downpour, ready to tackle the remaining 30km to Concepcion. As we hit the coast road we realised two things 1- there was a hideously strong wind... On our backs!! Wahoo!! 2- there was of course a steep climb out of the town just like there had been a descent into it.

We started plugging on up and into the rain and then something strange happened. A pick up with a very friendly family offered us a lift to the top of the hill. Wow! Yes please! We threw the boys into the truck and hopped in. A few minutes later and there was a gasp from the driver... Bicicletta!

Alan!!! He'd jumped off the back, obviously annoyed that we weren't cycling. We hopped out the car and ran down the road to rescue him and survey the damage before any other cars came and ran him over.

Luckily he's a tough chap and had only suffered a handle bar scrape and a saddle bump that left the saddle rather wonkey and a little torn. But wow! We seriously thought our trip was over when we saw him lying there as a casualty... Amazing. Ant somehow managed to gather his strength and bend the saddle post back to almost normal. I rescued our pastries from the wet grubby roadside and we hopped back in the truck - this time securing both boys in tightly with a rope!

Once we reached the top we, all four, hopped out and continued our venture into Concepcion. Shaken but not broken, we tackled the busy roads into the city and after a near death encounter between Ant and a stupid stupid truck, we arrived at the apartment we had booked for a few days (we needed to get some washing done and had a ton of admin to catch up with).

After a lovely Peruvian meal in a local restaurant, we found a supermarket, stocked up the apartment with all things tea and bacon, and settled in to let our little hearts (and Alan!) recover from the crazy day!