Back on the road!!!

Flying back into Panama City on Monday morning Chris carried a replacement starter motor and bendix for Nigel's car (plus another 24 spark plugs!). An hours taxi journey from the airport to our agents, Boris, house in Colon, found Nigel already prep'd his car ready for the new starter motor. This had involved cleaning out all the damaged parts from the fly wheel bell housing using an extendable magnet and releasing the manifold. The actual fitting took about 30 minutes and we were ready to go!!! The car started "first piston up"! 100 meters down the road we all stopped rrealising that Nigel had all the documents for the car and if we were stopped Chris and I would have nothing! Quickly fixed and we were off again.

 

 

We had decided to push on past Panama City and we booked rooms at the San Carlos Surf Resort 150km from Colon, north of Panama City. The journey was straightforward on the main duel carriageway back to Panama City. We then decided to take a cross country diversion to miss any traffic on the outskirts of the city. This proved more challenging as we found ourselves in the biggest traffic jam in Panama a consequence of the roads and flyovers being constructed on the route we had chosen. Sometimes the gods are simply against you and you just need to suck it up!

 

We crawled slowly through the traffic jam with Ham’s Lagonda sitting at 99C for most of the jam, being managed by keeping the revs reasonably high to keep the fan moving and the water circulating. The Rolls quietly ticks over and Nigel’s Lagonda seems to have a radiator that could keep Hades cool! Finally we were through the jam and the open road soon saw the temperature of cars and drivers cool down.

 

The San Carlos Surf Resort is a small beach resort run by Americans Burma, Brooke and their 10 year old daughter Tash. Burma seemed to have absolutely no connection to his namesake which was a bit strange but hey…It suited our needs perfectly, a great beach, pelicans flying up and down, cold beer and air conditioning. A bit of sea swimming, a bit of body surfing, more cold beers and a really cool beach location.

 

Chris, Ham and Rory all slept like babies having still been on UK time. Nigel and Tobs having had a fantastic time in the jungle bird watching and on the Panama Canal were all refreshed ready for our first full day.

 

Admin wise there is quite a lot to do with our challenge of Costa Rica (no right hand drive cars) and Nicaragua which despite not allowing right hand drive cars have given us a special exemption. We have arranged a truck to meet us on Thursday morning at the Panama/ Costs Rica border in-case we aren’t allowed in. Burma c ertainly thinks with a littke oiling of the wheels we will be driving through Costa Rica. George Blau the president of the Costs Rica Classic car Club who has been extremely helpful in arranging a truck when asked if we would be driving through Costs Rica said “to be absolutely honest Richard……I have absolutely no idea”. So time will tell.