Mini World Adventure Part 8

South Venezuela near the Brazilian border.

Gradually we went back into the forest and hit disaster, on a bumping decent Jack lost all its drive. Luckily there was a wide verge beside the dirt road in this part of jungle and we managed to get the car onto it. 

I stripped the cars clutch, transfer gears to trace the fault, I checked if the pinion for the final drive on the main shaft of the gearbox was tight, but could find no fault. We had no alternative but to rebuild it to make it safe and tow it the 2000 miles to Caracas. 

We tried to tow from Jill but as it was so bumpy and up and down through the forest we kept breaking the tow rope so we decided to try pushing it up the hill and letting it coast down the other side.

Luckily we had fitted ‘Roo bars’ and mesh when in South Africa to the front of both cars so it didn’t cause any major damage. I can remember being overtaken by a army truck going up one hill whilst pushing it and then to their surprise overtaking them going down the other side.

When at last we got to tarmac road we bought a steel rope and towed the car, but had to stop at regular interval to let Jill towing to cool down

Every 2-300 kms we came to a checkpoint and discovered it was illegal to tow cars, when you are told this a gunpoint with young conscripts twiddle their guns like cowboys it is a bit worrying, but we managed to persuade then we would fix it in the next town and managed to get the car all the way to Caracas telling each one the same story!

I hardly remember anything about the country as it was such hard work concentrating. I do remember eating Capybara a very large rat like rodent at one village and seeing some large Cayman in the rivers.

Caracas is a large and dangerous city, we arrived late one evening and for the first, and only time, we slept in the cars on a garage forecourt.
The next day we located the Kuhne & Nagel agent who sorted out getting the cars to Miami and safe accommodation for us. We stayed in a hostel and managed to get flights that both the car and us could travel on together, but as it was Christmas eve nothing would be flying for the next couple of days.So we spent Christmas in Caracas,on the beach in the sunshine,eating barbecued chicken and fried plantain, it was the only time I have swam in the sea in December!

 All the fuel had to be drained from the cars before we could fly, it was easy with Jack and we had to guess just the right amount to allow us to get Jill to the airport. Of course after clearing customs in USA we did not have enough petrol and ran out just outside of the airport. Luckily we saw a Kuhne & Nagel van, 

as petrol is very cheap vans run on it in America and we managed to persuade him to let us siphon off a couple of gallons to get us to the nearest 'Gas station'. We found a British Leyland garage in Miami and they were very kind and allowed us to leave Jack there over the New Year period and as we could do no more we drove to Key West and spent New Year’s Day in the Everglades National Park.

After the break we found a campsite off one of the freeways near the docks where the flying boat took off and landed. I worked on the cars in the garage, fixed the fault and within a couple of days we were ready to go. 

We had to rush to Los Angeles as the boat to Singapore only left once a month and it was going in 4 days. 

2500 miles in 4 days in 2,by now,very worn Mini's. Jack especially needed oil every 100 miles, but at least we could put our foot down on devent tarmac or concrete roads. We go into the habit of tucking the Mini's in behind the 32 wheel American trucks and letting them drag us along,saving lots of fuel. This was going very well until a highway patrol stopped us for speeding,not sure why as we were going the same speed as the truck?

Luckily the ticket only lasted whilst we were in the state of Texas and within an hour we have moved onto New Mexico.








We tried to eat at one of the truck stops on route, but they refused to serve us as we did not have 32 wheels,even adding up all the spares and both cars the best we could manage as 12!

We made Los Angeles in three and a half days driving 20 hours a day, and loaded the car onto a ship bound for Singapore.
We now had three weeks whilst the ship made its journey,for a couple of days we hung our hammocks in a park in Long Beach,much to the amazement of the locals and Police, who thought we were crazy as local drug gangs used the park for whatever these gangs do,we never had any problems or saw any trouble.
Unfortunately Mary could not come over due to exams but Tony's wife and children did and we hired a car and drove to the Baja California the finger of land off the west coast of Mexico. We camped rough in the scrub land miles from anywhere to save money.It was a bit of a lonely time for me and made me very homesick,but gave me time to think and getting the two Mini's around the world was now very personal.