After reading Luis’ last post, it is probably obvious that the Landcruiser was due for some repairs. The only way for us to afford the repairs to the body damage was to go through our insurance company.  Getting the insurance company to pay for the repairs was a lot like getting money from Ebenezer Scrooge, let’s just say it wasn’t easy.  We ended up fighting the insurance company for a week and a half before they finally gave in and approved the repairs.  It was then another week to get the repairs done.

We were in Grass Valley, CA for the duration of the insurance/repair ordeal.  Grass Valley and Nevada City (the neighboring town) are very beautiful and enjoyable towns, but not so much if you are homeless. Lucky for us, our friends Chris and Holly McGovern were willing to open their home to us for the entire two weeks! This is an amazing act of kindness (and tolerance) on their part as it is one thing to have people stay in your home for a night or two, but two weeks is quite a different story.  In fact the one good thing about our ordeal with the insurance company was that it gave us an opportunity to get to know the McGoverns better, and we feel that we have come out of it with two very good friends.

With the Landcruiser looking in tip-top shape (but not quite running tip-top shape), we headed down to  LA to stay for a few days while we wrapped up our dealings in the US in preparation for the journey south of the border. While in LA we were lucky enough to have Virginia, and her two amazing kids, Mia and Juaquin, another family that was kind enough to offer us room and board in exchange for the burden of our visit and our eternal gratitude.

Mia and Joaquin at the skate park in Venice Beach