Lake Titicaca, at 12,500ft and covering 3,200sq miles is another one of those essential wonders for the travelling motorist. Here we boarded brightly painted, rather ramshackle looking, though no doubt efficient, two car capacity ferryboats, and chugged unceremoniously and rather lazily across crystal clear water to the other side where we would start our Special Stage. The Stage was on drumming uneven cobbles which soon gave way to a well-rolled tarmac following the shoreline of the lake to our hotel which was very nearly Paradise and we three, Sue, I and Hero, could easily have rested for a few days as tomorrow would be another 350 miles of the hardest driving we would experience on this rally. The Peruvians had made us very welcome, allowing us to waft through the frontier unchecked and with no ceremony. The completion of paperwork would take place at our hotel the following morning; very civilised.
‘The road we are using is the only practicable way across the Andes and a lot of it is not good’ – so started our Road Book for day 14. The road to Arequipa involved crossing the High Andes on a dirt, rock strewn road whilst traversing the highest desert known to man: The Gonzalos. We were, as usual, among the last cars to set out on this perilous journey, but this time unbeknown to us, we were also followed by Hector and Natalie driving their Porsche 914 behind whom came Ian and Dick straggling in their BMW 2000ti with completely wrecked rear suspension. If there was going to be a bad day this was going to be it the trial of strength between machine and mountain, between man and his mind. ‘Todays stage is quite incredible. After 11miles of real desert at 13,125ft the stage narrows and climbs, sometimes quite bumpily, to the finish at 14,764ft. It has to be the highest stage ever run! If you have a problem do take great care! The air really is very thin here – TAKE YOUR TIME! Road conditions can change overnight so only the worst bumps we found are shown – for sure there will be others’. The Road Book again.
The rutted road started very badly and very soon we had a rear puncture, almost unheard of from our big reliable Michelin tyres, and realising that I had set the pressures too low at 18lbs front and rear, I soon brought these up to a creditable 30psi. It was my habit to have softer tyres for rougher roads, though 35 front and 40 rear is preferable on good fast roads. Sometime later with the Chrysler ahead and out of sight, a clunking came from the front right wheel: it was simply the bolt holding the additional oil reservoirs to each front shock absorber had come loose and was becoming trapped between the wheel and suspension arms. I soon removed it and after taping up the pipe to stop sand getting into the unit, continued the journey.
A real anxiety overrode our feelings for this wild and beautiful landscape which, in a way, added to our stress since part of the reason for these motoring journeys is to be able to stop and stare at the landscape which in this case has not changed since the Spanish colonised it from the Inca Indians over three and a half centuries ago. For 220 miles the long, rough road, which either climbed or descended abruptly, gave us glimpses of a large remote world untroubled by man. This road is best described as a track and was obviously designed for hooves and feet and had not changed since those early days, consequently we constantly expected to hear a catastrophic crash from underneath the car at any time which I imagined, if and when it came, would be a broken axle or a completely collapsed front suspension unit. The high desert section had such fine sand that we really expected to belly-out and be stuck there awaiting, maybe for days, the arrival of a large lorry and we began to talk about how infrequently the road must be used as we never passed another vehicle in either direction. It is fair to say that if we have ever been frightened that something would really go wrong with Hero, it would have been up there.
With the harsher ride from the harder tyres jarring every sinew and loosening every nut and bolt, we triumphed over that high desert and by late afternoon were descending with the sun in our eyes, avoiding boulders as best we could though seeming to hit more than we missed yet having to stay on the road at all costs, and frantically worrying about the suspension movements which we were sure could take no more of this pounding.
Mercifully by nightfall we were relieved to be off the mountains and filling up at a petrol station where we found the Landcrab with its suspension bottomed out; the Aussies, Les and Gordon with a broken front spring, the Mexicans with a knocking engine and failed electrics and further up the road Alberto’s Mustang parked in a lay-by with the army boys Escort. We pulled up alongside Alberto to ask what was going on and he imperiously advised us that he was helping the army boys damaged Escort despite the fact that we had caught him napping on our arrival whilst it was his mechanic, Gordon, who was the one helping somewhere under the engine of that Escort! Alberto, the perfect cad, must have given Terry Thomas coaching for his part in ‘Monte Carlo or bust’.