¿Qué puede hacer?

We woke up on the side of a dirt road this morning...as you do! Once we came down the ladder from the tent we saw the view of where we parked in the dark last night.

Nice place! The Coyhaique valley is really beautiful. It's a shame about all the nonsense going on in the province of Aysen between the government and the people.

We drove into town and found an Internet cafe to catch up on a few things and have a bite to eat. It turns out there's a CNN-Chile where the protests were top news. Just as well we got out of town last night.

We figured we'd be in town at least one more day so we found a little hotel with secure parking. We left Babe safely tucked out of harm's way while we went around and did some legwork.

Everyone we asked had more or less the same story. We don't know when fuel is expected. We don't know where you can get any. It seems their responses are genuine and that they too are equally affected. That said, it amazes me how many cars are still on the streets!

Despite months of troubles in the region and the recent escalation of protesting it seems that even the locals didn't anticipate that it would get this ugly. (And here we are! In the thick of it!) Zach and I came to believe that this fuel shortage must have come as a surprise. Otherwise, surely someone would have stocked up only to sell it at a profit? We would have definitely paid a premium to acquire it and get unstuck! In the end we had no leads.

On the way through town we came across a protest march.

All day I could see Zach's brain going over scenarios in his head all day trying to figure this out. It's an interesting challenge that we need to resolve. What to do? What to do?

We could go North and hope to come across a town that had been supplied with fuel since the supply to this area comes from the north. There are two gas stations within the distance we could cover on the fuel we had. But what if they were empty?

We could go East into Argentina like many Chileans were doing to find fuel. But the next big town was a bit out of our reach and there were no guarantees. Argentina has had its own issues with fuel shortages lately!

We could stay put and wait it out hoping for a fuel delivery in the next couple of days.

Or...???