If my foulies could talk, I’m sure they’d have expressed mixed feelings. Sure, they were grateful for finally breathing fresh air again after being packed away since sailing across the north Atlantic, but this was fresh water running off of them. “What is up with this?” I’m sure they’d ask if they could, “Where’s the salt water? Where’s the rolling swell? Where’s the ocean? Aren’t we supposed to be circumnavigating?”
I don’t know how I would have broken it to them, probably slowly and gently. I would have started with how good they looked, clean and bright and yellow tastefully accented with dark blue set off by strategically placed reflective markers shining as bright as the headlights stopped along the remote gravel road. They looked good, very good, even if trapped on terra firma instead of their native endless seas.
With my day-glow yellow hood in place and my headlight strapped across my forehead shining out beneath it, I created a confident and commanding presence as I walked through the driving rain down the line of vehicles towards the deafening roar that lie ahead. So commanding, in fact, driver after driver rolled down their window and asked me, in a variety of equally incomprehensible Spanish language ways, what the heck was going on and exactly how long would it be before my crew had the bridge cleared and the road open again.
In reply, I repeated, in a variety of ways equally incomprehensible to them, in grotesquely butchered Spanish, that I was not in charge, did not command the Chilean highway system, and had absolutely no idea when the bridge would re-open. Based on their horrified expressions I was probably actually speaking the Spanish words meaning a cow’s entrails would be spread across their car’s interior, but, I took it as my mission to distribute confidence and positive thoughts through the dozen cars and trucks impatiently idling in line.
After each brief conversation I smiled confidently, nodded, and moved on towards what once had been a bridge over a minor creek on Chile’s famed Carretera Austral, deep in the southern reaches of Chilean Patagonia. In my wake, car after car and truck after truck executed a three point turn and headed back through the black night, pounding rain, and washed out road punctuated with landslides the 160 kilometers (100 miles) back to the nearest town. I had no idea what could cause them to flee with such urgency.
Click here for the rest of the story: http://www.hackneys.com/travel/chile/theoperator.pdf
Hi Doug and Stephanie,
What a wonderful story.
You are a gifted writer! I laughed out loud and yet could feel Step’s horror, at being washed away.
I could feel the Chilean national pride. Magnificent scenery. Adventure is always just a bend of the road away.
Thanks for sharing!
Warm Regards,
Troy
Thanks, Troy. I am glad SOMEONE felt my horror!
What Doug failed to mention was my complete and total breakdown in the cab when he first told me we would be sleeping in that spot, up the road from the washed out road, just a few yards from the edge of a very swollen river below, a river that was being filled every second by what had to be thousands of gallons of water pouring out of every nook and cranny along the route. And, he neglected to mention (perhaps to protect my pristene reputation?) that I had several very strong drinks (Jack Daniel’s, to be exact) that night. How else was I ever going to fall asleep hovering above a river I was sure would claim our lives that night, after we had suffered from a slow, painful roll down the side of that mountain!
I have to say, I was very impressed with how quickly that road crew got there, the amazing job that the “operator” did, and most of all, very thankful that we had not been crossing that section of the road as it gave way (a real possibility had we come through in the dark, and with everyone having turned and already left).
Doug did a great job (again) of sharing another part of our adventure.