Made it into Florida – ready for some Sunshine and looking forward to our warm winter months!
…and Crunch! We were traveling south on I-75 almost to Ocala. Our Google Maps suggested an alternate route to avoid a traffic accident up ahead – so we took the new route. We were now on 301 – which turned into 441, a very busy 4 lane highway with lots of entrances and exits. All of a sudden we saw red lights up ahead! Cars and trucks were breaking, we saw some cars swerving to miss other cars. We immediately stomped on the brakes as did the car in front of us. Unfortunately she “dead-stopped” in the middle of our lane! Even with the brakes locked up on the truck and on the trailer, I just couldn’t get stopped before hitting her rear end. IF ONLY 10 MORE FEET! We think we would not have hit her if we had a bit more room.
We learned that she had a pet cat in a cage which flew into her front seat when she stopped – so she was concerned about her cat. She could’ve keep moving with the traffic, but…. [Also learned that if we had a dash cam we could have replayed the incident and possibly not gotten a ticket]. Oh well – this is an “adventure” right!
We’re praising the Lord for watching over us! No one was hurt, and no other cars were involved. The traffic kept coming, so we had to move off of the highway into the median to get out of the way. We called our insurance companies and the Highway Patrol. While we waited, a Deputy Sheriff stopped to see if everyone was alright. Then we waited – and waited – finally called the highway patrol again, they said it could be a “little while” they were busy. We waited over an hour and a half before they showed up, and then it took another almost hour to write it up.
We cleaned up as best we could and she called a tow truck for her car. Our truck was drive able – It was good to get going again! We were finally headed to our next stop at Southern Palms RV Resort in Eustis, FL
UPDATE
Our insurance told us to take it to Gerber Collision Services for an estimate, which we did in Eustis, FL while we were camping there. Their estimate was done in about 7 minutes (!?!) and came in at around $3,000. Our insurance said we could get it fixed any where we wanted so we took it to a local Chevy Dealer (VanGannaway – a fun name!). They seemed very experienced and spent a good amount of time looking in and around the damage and found that the previous estimate was not inclusive of everything there was to be replaced. Also there was a check engine light on by now – they found the louvers for the steering cooling system were damaged as well. They also would have priority for new parts as they ordered them – so it was a good decision. The insurance was agreeable to pay whatever it cost.
We’re patiently waiting for all the parts to come in. Still waiting on the grill – ugh! There was a GM strike about six months ago and parts are not all ready yet. It’s so sad to see our truck without it’s “teeth” 🙂
OOPS! We learned that we didn’t have car rental on our insurance – not good! We had to rent a car in order to get around. We got the “best deal” on a weekly rate, but so far we’ve had the rental for over a month – yikes!
Total time with our rental car was 7 weeks – whew…no words!
Finale UPDATE!
February 17, 2020 – After 7 weeks, reunited with our “new” truck again! We got the call on the weekend, but couldn’t make the trip until Monday. We had to learn all over again how it drove – sweet times!
The timing was perfect, we needed to head north in 6 days. We weren’t sure what God had in store for us. Glad this adventure is over and all turned out grand!
