As planned last night we were up and moving by 7:30am and made good progress south on slightly less twisting road than yesterday. The drive was simply spectacular as it passed through wide and deep valleys. There were sheer drops mere feet from the road way. As has been the case on most Colombian roads the scenery is spectacular but there are no places to pull off the road so any effort to enjoy the scenery has to be done from the moving vehicle. This does not make for good photographs.

At 10:30 just a few miles north of Pasto as we pulled up to a toll booth Bernie's vehicle simply died, no engine. We pushed it back from the toll booth and started trying to diagnose the problem, but no good. Asking at the toll booth we discovered that the company that manages this section of road provides free roadside mechanical assistance so we called. Within 20 minutes two green coated mechanics arrived and took over the effort. About an hour later we were on our way, dirty fuel filter they said, continuing the climb into Pasto. BUT - two miles further on a steep grade it died again. Nina and I drove back to collect the mechanics before they went onto their next job and pretty soon we had four vehicles parked on a narrow steep section of the highway. We used the Tiger and a very suspect length of steel cable to tow the sick vehicle to a parking area a few hundred yards up the highway; this turned out to be the local depot for the mechanics; and settled in for an afternoon of vehicle diagnosis.

After a number of hours of unsuccessful effort by almost everyone at this road depot it was decided to call a tow truck and move the sick RV into town where better equipment might find the problem. While the mechanics had worked on the RV, we had made friends with the armed security guard, the driver and paramedic that manned the ambulance, and the driver of a gravel truck that turned up partway through the proceedings. The atmosphere was more like that of a picnic than a roadside emergency call.

The tow truck turned out to be a tilt tray truck that would carry the stricken RV. Getting it loaded was quite an exercise and at one point the front wheels of the truck were 2 ft off the ground. Driving with the heavy RV was even more of a exercise, I expected to see the truck flop on its side any moment. But we eventually arrived at an Esso/Goodyear garage and a new set of mechanics got to work. It was about 5:00 pm by now and the garage manager said they would work till 7:00 pm tonight and then start again tomorrow. Just before 6:00 as the shop was being locked up a mechanic emerged holding the ignition coil, no funcion, that's the problems. Before they closed the RV was running, but not reassembled.