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the waitress brought over two beers , gesturing to a guy sitting in the bar who ’ d bought them for us . We smiled and waved thanks .
Such a gift cannot be refused , so we weren ’ t going anywhere fast and got chatting about how much we liked the country and how everything here seemed to have the fresh energy of new beginnings about it . We had met several people who spoke perfect English and had told us how their family had fled the country and they had grown up in the United States . But now they felt it was safe to return to their beloved El Salvador to build a new life .
After some quick errands in San Miguel , we left town through green fields , past men on horses herding their cows ’ home for the evening . It was getting late , and we were heading to a likely spot to pitch our tent by a river . Suddenly Aidan pulled over , a puddle forming under his bike . The coolant had exploded , and the engine light was on . We had seen this before . When the plastic water pump cogs on these bikes get chaffed down , the pump fails , coolant explodes out of the reservoir and the engine overheats . It ’ s a common failure on the F650GS , so we carry all the spare parts and Aidan was confident we could fix it before dark . He began unloading his bike and I sped off to buy new coolant and engine oil before the shops closed .
When I got back our luggage was strewn all over the floor and a curious local kid had joined Aidan as he was struggling to get the clutch cover off . Once we were in , the cogs all looked right . It seemed we had jumped to the wrong conclusion . Come to think of it , we hadn ’ t seen where the coolant had exploded from .
Putting the clutch cover back on was a little difficult . A little pin with teeth on one side needs to line up exactly with a part inside the clutch cover . It sits inside a ball bearing and loves to rotate at the slightest vibration . With no way to hold it in place , you just turn it into position and wriggle the clutch cover back on with the same difficulty as getting it off . By the time everything is in position the pin has moved . There is nothing you can do , except take the cover back off , reposition the pin , and keep trying .
It was very frustrating ! Our curious helper had long gotten bored and left . After a dozen or so attempts , it was completely dark and had started to rain . We threw our tarp over the bikes and kept on working by torch light .
Suddenly I saw two pairs of feet shuffling among our stuff . Diving out from under the tarp we found two guys with bandannas over their nose and mouths , and hoods pulled deep over their eyes . Local field workers sometimes do this against the cold
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