I am new to this board. Honestly I am not much of a DYI car person.

This weekend I was driving from Vegas to San Diego when my 2004 1.8T A4 (95k miles) died in the middle of the highway at 70m/hr. I pulled over to the side of the road and notice all the radiator fluid was rapidly leaking out. The car would not start. I took it to the closest mechanic. We both guessed the water pump had died.

Upon closer inspection of the timing belt area it seems as the water pump broke in such a way that the may have locked the timing belt and cause the engine to mistime. I noticed a lot of rubber residue around the belt and crankshaft. The mechanic told me that it's likely that valves may have been bent inside the engine.

He estimated around $800-$1000 to replace the pump and timing belt. I have no idea what it would cost to fix the bent valves or how to even figure out if there are internal engine issues. The majority of this cost is labor from having to pull out the whole front of the car.

At this point I am at a loss, I am not sure if I want to spend $1000 to get the pump and belt replaced only to find out the engine needs to be rebuilt or worse. The car is otherwise in a really nice shape, new tires, fully loaded

Is there any other way to find out if there is internal damage? Does any of this sound reasonable?