Things begin to go wrong...

8th Jan, Wild camp NR Villa Santa Lucia to wild camp by river (24.6M)
We´d heard reports that it was going to rain soon, but hadn´t quite realised the significance of that statement. We woke this morning to grey skies but ate breakfast and packed up in the dry. We then had about 30mins of cycling in the dry before the 3 days of rain began.
Initially the rain didn´t really matter, we were warm, the roads were still cyclable and the views still good. However the rain just didn´t let up and the views gradually disappeared as the mountains were completely covered by cloud. In a brief break off the bikes we got cold so we pushed on. There was one brief reprieve in the rain and views of the valley opened up in front of us. We had a lovely descent and then as it levelled out and I tried to change gear, I realised I couldn´t. No movement in my right (rear cassette) gear-shifter at all. We stopped and Gareth looked it over, but no obvious cause or solution. The rain started up again so we decided to cycle on, me just using my 3 front gears. Very hard work on some of the ascents but generally I managed them, just a couple where I had to push the bike past the steepest parts.

The rain was persistent and after probably another 40mins of cycling when I ended up falling off my bike as I tried to stop because my left bike shoe wouldn´t release from the pedals (I´d lost a cleat screw days ago, but had been coping until now), we decided to investigate a camp pitch next to the river, which was the reason for me trying to stop anyway. There was water and it wasn´t visible from the road so we set up the tent, got ourselves in it and relatively dry. Unfortunately we´d got a bit lax with packing our kit up in plastic bags properly (our pannier bags are the non-waterproof kind) and fair bit of it was damp or wet. Importantly though we both had warm dry clothes and sleeping bag. We got the stove out and had a very welcome cup of soup and other nibbles before Gareth looked at my shifter. Diagnosis terminal, as both of us suspected but had hoped otherwise. A small spring had snapped inside and the mechanism jammed. No chance of repair, probably anywhere but certainly not on the side of the road.
Nothing for it today but to hole up in the tent and hope that the rain will have eased by the morning. We knew that there was a bike shop in Coyhaique, 300km away and that the options were trying to hitch, one or both of us trying to get a bus or continuing the cycle on the remaining gears that I have. We planned at least to try cycling on to the next village tomorrow and see how I got on, then either continue or bus from the village to Coyhaique if needed.