Nothing to Gear

So we left Panajachel, Guatemala at 6am Monday attempting to make it to my cousin Tim's house in Masaya, Nicaragua over the next two days. We vowed to drive during day light and sleep at the cheapest hostel we could find by nightfall. The first leg was a caravan with Dave and Allison from Panajachel. We thought this would allow for easy cruising. Little did we know how stressful it would become as we started to experience some car problems.

My car began to get caught in 3rd gear. It would progress normally to the highest gear, but when forced to stop due to traffic or the ever frequent speed bump, the whole car would jolt violently and get stuck, failing to downgrade or upgrade out of 3rd gear. Sometimes changes between gears would also be accompanied by an audible loss in belt traction. The gear could be reset by turning the car off. This presented a challenging situation trying to follow Dave and Allison. Every time we slowed, I hurried to shut the car off and restart it. After restarting, I could again get it up to 70 mph and keep up to them at their cruising speed until another big rig or speed bump slowed us down.

In someways, we are lucky to be getting caught in 3rd gear. We can pretty easily cruise at 55mph without too significant a reduction in gas mileage. We can even get Randal up to 65 mph for short distances without overheating! Of course, these mixed blessings were only realized after we made it to El Salvador where Dave, Allison, and their Guatemala plates quickly traversed the border while we were stuck in lines and in front of photocopiers trying to finagle a DC plated sedan across the Rio Paz (the river that separates Guatemala from El Salvador).

This would get worse before they got better though. About 50 miles after the El Salvador border, the air conditioner stopped working. Down went the windows, which provided relief when we were cruising along the Pacific Coast, but little help when we were slowed in towns and villages.

As these problems were occurring, we did what any two non-mechanically inclined individuals would do, we checked all the fluids. The transmission fluid seemed low, so that was first priority. Oil on the other hand, was good to go. Even with these evasive actions, the 3rd gear problem persisted and worsened as we continued the journey. Even after restarting the car, it is no longer possible to progress beyond 3rd gear.