What a Ride!

Sent to Virginia!

Well after finishing up our claims in northern Alabama, they sent us to Portsmouth, VA. We have about 33 claims up here, so we will be here for about 2 to 3 weeks. Hopefully after we finish these claims we will have time to do a little sight-seeing in the area before we head back to Lake Charles.

They had live music here at the rv park and I will post some pictures when I get a little time.

We hope to be going back to Louisiana, then again they may send us some where else! :)

Until next time!

 

Some more work!

I have never mentioned it before in my blog, but back in December of last year, Sue and I took classes and certifications for being Licensed Independent Insurance Adjusters. We got licensed in Texas and Florida. We did this in anticipation of a busy hurricane season. In case anyone wished to know what a licensed adjuster does, well here goes!

After a catastrophe such as a hurricane, tornado or hail storm we get deployed (called out) to work the insurance claims. We go out to the property and scope out the damages, we then input them into a software program called Xactimate and it comes up with costs to repair the damages. We then call the insured and go over the damages with them, their deductible, etc. We will then cut them a check if it is in our approval range, if not we submit the check for approval. There are a few more steps involved, but that is the gist of it.

Well we got a call on Sunday, May 1st, from Pilot Catastrophe Services to go to Birmingham, Alabama to work the damages that were done by the tornados in northern Alabama. We left Monday morning early, swung by Lake Charles to see some of our kids and grandkids. We stayed one night and then headed to Birmingham, AL. We then spent 4 days of training by Pilot Catastrophe Services and Allstate Insurance. They gave us 24 claims that were all in the Huntsville, AL area and upward towards Tennessee. We have since worked all those claims and are hoping we get a few more.

If we don’t get any more, we will be heading back to Lake Charles, sometimes the middle of this week. We will try to do some tourist things in the area over the next couple days while we are waiting for more claims.

Until next time!

Cathedral Caverns State Park

Since we finished up our claims here in Alabama and we are waiting to see if we will be going to Missouri we decided to do some of the tourists thing here. This morning we checked out Cathedral Caverns. It is about 5 miles from the RV park we are staying at here in Woodville, AL.

A shot taken of the entrance to the caverns from the visitor’s center.

The visitor’s center.

As you can probably tell, there was also a school field trip at the same time we were there! I thought that might make it a little more difficult to hear the tour guide and I was right!! :)

The tour lasted about 1 1/2 hours and it goes about 260 feet down and 4000 feet in length.

Here are a few photos.

A look back out toward the entrance while we are heading down the cavern.

They said this a shark’s tooth inbedded in the ceiling from a mega-shark.

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This is where they filmed the Disney movie “Tom and Huck”.

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Vampire Teeth!!!

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Who knows what tomorrow may bring!

Until next time!!!

Great Mexican Food!

Sorry about the delay in posting. We have been busy, but I will try to get everything caught up.

During our last couple weeks at Tye RV Park in Abilene, TX we had the pleasure of being neighbors with some real Mexican chefs! They were in Tye working on a pipeline re-inspection and re-coating project. We got to know them and they were teaching us Spanish and we were teaching them a little English, even though their English was pretty good. For Holy Saturday we invited them to eat with us for some shrimp and crawfish etouffee’, and strawberry pie. That’s is when we found out that Gustavo owned 2 restaurants in Mexico. Starting from right to left, Sue, Gustavo, Ricco (Gustavo’s brother), Jose’ (Gustavo’s brother in law) and Eric (Gustavo’s son).

Sue had mentioned to them that she really like Chili Rellenos, so they offered to show us how to cook them. The following weekend they showed us how. Here they are preparing them in their motorhome.

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We didn’t realize it, but chili rellenos are a lot of work! They came out great and we enjoyed them. The next day Gustavo wanted to try cooking some shrimp etouffee’ for his bosses who are also here in the rv park. We said he could do it on our motorhome and invite his bosses to come over.

Here they are preparing the etouffee’! Eric peeling the shrimp and Gustavo saute’ all the vegetables. Jose’ cooked the rice in their motorhome.

After we ate, Ricco washed the dishes.

Between last week’s Chili relleno cooking and this week’s etouffee’ cooking. Gustavo made a trip to Los Angelos to get sworn in as a US citizen! Gustavo proudly showing off his certificate with his family and bosses. They are all US citizens except for Jose’, who will be getting sworn in during the next couple months. Congratulations Gustavo!!!

Sue and I with Gustavo.

While we were cooking the last couple weekends, I took the opportunity to take pictures of the low flying B1 bombers and C130s (they maybe the new C134s) over our motorhome.

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These jets were during touch and go’s. I don’t know what kind of aircraft it is, but they were pretty quick!

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We only have a couple more days here in Abilene and we should be heading to Lake Charles.

Until next time!