Wayfer Not's Hurrican Experience in Mexico

[Nottawayfer]

We got in to Playa del Carmen on Sunday, October 16, for our vacation. We had been anticipating it for several months. We love the water there and looked forward to snorkeling daily. It was all good for the first 2 days. Then on Wednesday, we saw on CNN that the hurricane was headed for us. We talked to our tour rep to see about leaving either that day or Thursday. She said that the standby list was too long, and that we could not get out at all. Our vacation was through a chartered flight. We were freaking out that we had to stay and ride the storm out. At that point, CNN was covering mostly about Florida and evacuations there, but we didn't hear much about Wilma and her plans for the Yucatan Peninsula. We spent the whole day trying to get information on what we could do. We were told by the tour company that we needed to stay at the hotel. Hurricane Emily had hit a few months previously, and it was obviously OK. For people who have NEVER experienced a hurricane, that was not much hope for us.

Thursday morning came, and we tried to get information from the hotel as to what we needed to do. The front desk staff said to check the bulletin board every few hours for updates. We got no updates until 5:00 p.m. that day telling us to go to our rooms, put mattresses up against the sliding glass door and stay there after they served supper in the restaurant. It was very disconcerting to not have much information or help. They were boarding up the hotel windows, tying up everything that would possibly move, and they gave us a sack lunch after supper that night. They expected to be able to give us food after it was all over. We were on the bottom floor of a two story building. My sister and her husband were in the floor above us, so we decided to move our belongings up to their room and bunked with them for the night....or so we thought it would be just for one night.

The winds started howling like we had never heard by 10:00 p.m. that Thursday night. We lost CNN on the television, so we had to try to sort out the Mexican channels and try to decipher pictures they were showing. It sure wasn't like American TV. They brought additional food to us at 11:00 that night because they did not think they could get us more the next day. We sat in our room trying to imagine what the storm would bring us. We didn't know what was ahead and had absolutely no information available to us to help us prepare our minds.

Friday morning we still had electricity, so I took a shower in hopes that the storm would blow over that day and we could go on with our vacation. Half way in to blow drying my hair, the electricity went off, and I lost service on my cell phone. This was tough as our family was our only source of information through my cell phone.

The four of us sat in our room the whole day wondering what would become of it all. We went out in to the hall of the hotel. Our building had 16 rooms in it on 2 floors. There was a main hall down the middle and then other shorter halls leading to doors of the rooms. We went out and couldn't believe the velocity of the wind. We had to be very careful as the wind would occasionally blow rain and strong wind down our halls. It was like that the whole day. The Germans down the hall were drinking all of the tequila (the rooms had a fifth of tequila, rum, vodka, and whiskey in each room along with a mini fridge full of beer and soda) and Corona in their room. Then it appeared they were having a pajama party because they came out in the hall with just pajama tops and underwear on.....different culture I guess? The English across the hall were very friendly people and came out to the hall to chat every so often. There was another older couple from the Holland who spoke no english and just stood around when others were conversing. We all slept almost the whole afternoon because I think it was causing a depression in us. I went to bed wondering if it would end by the morning.

We woke up Saturday morning, and nothing had changed. We still had no electricity, but we still had water so we all took cold showers that day. The humidity was terrible and there was no fresh air in our rooms because the air system was not working. We had to try to keep the front door propped hoping that a little wind would come in to move the stale humid eair. The storms were still howling and were as strong as ever. I began to think it would never end as it had been going for well over 24 hours now. We decided to change our day and play some scrabble and Phase 10. It did help the time go by. The end of Saturday was still the same as the beginning of the day. I really started to wonder if this storm would leave us. We felt like prisoners by that point. But by now I knew I was safe in our concrete builiding, and that allowed me to have some peace about the situation. It just appeared Wilma did not want to leave us.

Sunday morning we woke up to a reprieve from high winds. It was just tropical storm winds with rain. We woke up hearing the whistle indicating it was OK to come out. We all decided to venture outside. It was still a little windy and rainy, but it was wonderful to get out of our rooms. We had spent from 7:30 p.m. Thursday night to 7:30 a.m. Sunday morning in our rooms.

They opened up the restaurant for breakfast. The hotel lobby was full of people anxious to get in for breakfast. They called up only families with children first. Then they called people 60 and over, then 50 and over, then 40 and over. My husband and I were surprised at the call for 40 and over. But we took advantage of it and went in to save a table for us and my sister and her husband. It was mayhem in the restaurant. They were running on generator and using gas grills. It was buffet style, and the Europeans were pushy and inconsiderate of what we had all gone through. They didn't recognize that there was a line and that each of us would get an opportunity to get food. I saw people taking whole plate fulls of bacon and sausage. I couldn't believe the greed. I was so thankful to have food and that the storm was over, I just hoped there was enough to cover everyone that needed to eat. I was disgusted by the attitudes I saw in crisis by these people. In our minds we were no longer at the all-inclusive resort we originally came to, we were still in a crisis situation. We had no idea of the damages or what was to come in the next few days.

Later on Sunday, the English and European tour companies started coming to the hotels to notify people of what was happening. We never saw our tour rep that day. We walked around the resort taking pictures of the damage, and then went to the beach to see what had happened. When we first arrived at the resort, it beautiful full of lush green trees and beautiful palms. There were several building on the resort, but you could not see them because of the lush foliage. After the storm, we saw every building through the tattered broken trees which had lost every leaf on them. Every palm tree had sagging branches. Building had occasional broken glass or tiles removed, but it looked pretty good for enduring so many hours of Wilma's damaging winds. We saw 2 of the 4 kitties that resided outside.

The beach had lost quite a bit of sand, several feet in some cases. A bulding close to the water had collapsed, a dive shop was full of sand. We had heard that Cancun was still going through the storm and was sustaining more damage than we had. We knew it would be several days before we got out as our flights were out of Cancun.

Monday was a day of "What do we do?" It was finally sunny that day, but our minds just wanted to go straight home. We searched for our tour rep. We went to hotels across the street to see if there was any sign of her. We went to the stores to get in touch with family to tell them we were OK because the hotel phones were down. I had limited cell services. We had no internet, no fax, no television. Nothing. We felt trapped. We heard some of the English and European tour reps were starting to bus their people to Merida, about 250 miles away to fly them home. We so wanted to go home. We never saw our tour rep at all to find out what was available for us. We spent the whole day trying to find a way to get out. That is kind of hard with limited cell service. My sister's mother in law called us and we asked her to call the home office of the tour company to tell them our rep had not been to visit us and to find out what was going on. We found out the airport would be closed until Wednesday, but no flights were schedules, and the tour company was not offering to bus us to Merida. It felt hopeless. We could receive phone calls in the hotel, but we could make not calls out. My sister's mother-in-law, Pam, got in touch with the local tour rep office and reamed the tour rep for not coming to see us. She was a flake French girl who is a pathological liar. She told Pam she had been to the hotel several time looking for us, calling us in our rooms, and that she left messages for us at the front desk. But at least one of us had stayed in each room at that point "just in case". The other two would scout out information. We spent 2 days getting our own information.

When our families called, we asked them to see what it would cost for us to get a flight out of Merida. Then we tried to convince the English and European tour companies to take us on their buses there. Many of their buses came back because of flooding in the road on the way there. We felt abandoned.

We talked to other people at our hotel who used the same tour company who felt the same way about the tour rep. I ended up getting through to the local office of the tour company to complain about the girl and told them they needed to send another rep. Then all of a sudden the rep finally showed up at 7:00 that night to scold us about Pam's confrontation to her. We got back in her face and told her we were around and that she didn't leave a message, and that we needed and depended on her to update us even if she didn't have anything new to share. We needed to know she was not kicking us to the curb. I wanted to poke her eyes out as her attitude was condesending. Basically she had started out with an attitude from the beginning because we bought our tours for the trip on the internet before we left instead of booking them through her. She left that night saying we would have a meeting in the morning at "9:00 a.m. sharp". The other tour companies were leaving notes for their people on bulletin boards. We got no notes. We went to other hotels and saw notes from other tour reps for the same company we bookd through and got information that way.

Tuesday morning at 9:00 there was still no rep. 9:15, 9:20, 9:25 went by and still no rep or any information. Others were leaving and we had nothing. I went out and prayed to God that my cell phone would work. After 20 tries, I got through to the tour company. I told them the girl had set a "9:00 sharp" meeting and she was no where to be found. They said she had left for the hotels already and should be there. I went back to tell everyone. 15 minutes later a guy from the same company shows up to tell us our regular tour rep isn't coming and that he has no information as the airport is still closed. He wore his sun glasses the whole time as everyone complained about our regular rep. He was just as worthless IMHO. He also informs us we will have to pay for the hotel from when our original trip ended--WTF! Our original trip had ended on Sunday.

A friend in California calls us and we ask her to call the main office of the tour company in California to see what information they can give about flights from Cancun. We find out that a flight is leaving tomorrow (Wednesday) at 4:20 p.m., but it will be first come first served. We felt we had to leave early the next morning to get there so that we could leave ASAP. Our first worthless tour rep came to announce the flight out the next day. She took everyone's names and guaranteed us that we would leave the next day. That was not comforting to us as she had lied much. We prayed that everything went smoothly. That night they brought in survivors from Cancun who had been in sub-par shelters in Cancun ghettos. The stories we heard were horrible (no food, no water, no facilities, Mexican gangs, etc.) It made us ashamed we were even complaining. Some of them had moved from one shelter to another 4 times.

The English people across the hall were supposed to leave at 7:00 a.m. the same morning. They got up and left only for their bus to come back. They said the airport was still closed....We were sweating. Our bus was showing up in 3 hours to get us. It came and they let the Cancun people go first--rightfully so. Then a second bus came to get us. We picked up several others and then headed for the hotel.

We got to the airport exit to see guys holding signs for "Avis", "Hertz", etc. I thought to myself that I would not leave a car on the side of the road with a guy holding a sign. The line in to the airport was huge. We found out that we could not enter the actual airport until an hour before our flight was to leave. It was about 12:30 at that time, and our flight left was to leave at 4:20.

We saw truck of Mexican Federales with guns driving throughout the place. We still were praying that nothing went wrong at this point. At 2:30 we heard our plane landed and that we would be able to go in then. We had to take care of boarding passes, turning in our Mexican tourist cards, and siging a sheet with our name and birth date on the bus.

We drove through the airport to see all of the car rental building torn to shreds. Cars were smashed by signs and other things. When we finally got to the front of the airport at 4:30, we were lined up in to two lines. The airport was fairly empty since all of the people were held back from entering until their flights left. We walked right in to security and right to our gate to board the plane. It was a huge sigh of relief to get on the plane. Each seat had a pillow, blanket, a huge bottle of water, and headphones for the movie. The whole plane cheered as we took off. We went to Laredo, Texas to fuel up and then headed for Oakland, California.

It all seems so surreal. I am now thinking about how I can recoup some of the money. Thank God I bought the insurance. Had we known more details about our flight and when we were leaving, maybe we could have enjoyed the last few days at the beach. It's the past, but my mind is circling with things right now. I think that we sometimes go through things to help us learn things. I am still trying to figure it all out right now.

[GeorgeStGeorge]

I've got a co-worker vacationing in Cozumel who has been stranded because of Wilma. With any luck, he'll be back this weekend. I wonder how his story compares to yours. Glad you're back. Happy birthday!

George

[Nottawayfer]

Oh man....I heard Cozumel really got pounded. The bars at our resort were not serving alcohol one day in respect of those who died in Cozumel from the hurricane. They were closer to the eye than we were. Cozumel is about 50 miles east of Playa del Carmen. I hope it all works well for your co-worker. The flights out of Cozumel all go to Cancun first.

I haven't heard how many died from this storm. I just kept hearing the locals says it was the worst they've seen.

[krys]

I am also glad all is now well with you. Thanks for the story.

[coolchef1248 @adelphia.net]

wayfernot

thanks for the very interesting story

but

in my small state of maine mind

i ask this

why would anyune want to go to a place where you storms are going to happen in storm season??

[act2]

Sure glad that you all made it out of Mexico safely and are now back on American soil, United States of American soil, that is!!!!

[Second James]

a buddy of mine & I leave for playa de carmen the 8th...& back hopefully the l7th...it is a great place to go & we're pretty anxious to see if they're getting things ready for us! We had planned on going the 25th thru the 3rd of NOV..but canceled & re-scheduled.

Wayfer Not...where were you guys staying? We're right off of 38th Calle near shangri=la..

we tok the ferry over to Cozmel last year..I think they said it was l8miles, as you can definitely see it from the beach front.

[Nottawayfer]

Coolchef,

We took our chances going during the storm season. I think it was my waybrain convincing me that a hurricane would never happen when I was there. :lol: I will NEVER go to any Carribean destination again during the storm season. I will only go during January through April from now on. And I will watch the weather activity more closely. I should have been reading Raf's Tropical Storm/Cone threads. I would have reconsidered going had I done that.

Second James,

You should reconsider going to that area for at least several months. It is not pretty now. All of the lush foliage in the jungles are now completely gone. The jungle now looks like a bunch of dead sticks. It's like seeing the forest areas in the midwest during the winter. Cozumel got hit really hard too since it was closer to the eye of the storm. We stayed at the Riu Tequila in Playacar which is just south of Playa del Carmen. Playacar is a major resort area. If I were you, I would wait at least 6 months before I even went there. They have MAJOR cleanup to do. Almost all of the palms had to have the tops cut off because the frohns were sagging completely downward. The beaches need sand........ There is a lot of work to do.

[Belle]

WN! I'm so glad you made it home! Hopefully they'll reimburse you for your expenses since the travel company obviously fell down on the job.

Hurricanes are very scary and the sounds and force of the wind is indescribable! Thankfully your hotel was built to withstand such force! Being that close to the shore, I can't believe they actually expected people to stay on the first floor - Kudos to you for moving up to the second floor! I know that cabin fever, extreme boredom and wanting to sleep all the time feeling all too well.... -_-

Please don't let this one experience keep you from travelling and especially from travelling during hurricane season! We can't live our lives in fear and hunkered down all the time. Look at how many months and YEARS that area HASN'T been hit by hurricanes.....same with Florida.

Sorry, coolchef, but I think your attitude is an overreaction. By your logic none of us should live in Florida because of hurricanes, California because of wildfires, mud slides and earthquakes, Okalahoma because of tornados, New Orleans because it's so vulnerable, etc. The past two years have been extremely atypical hurricane seasons. Nature and the cycles ebb and flow - even Disney engineers, when building the Orlando theme parks built them on a 100 year flood plan whereas most homes are only built on a 10 year flood plan. That's because they KNOW there is at least a 100 year cycle in the weather patterns so they plan for it.

I missed a trip to Hawaii one year because I wasn't allowed to go during hurricane season..... Not one da*# hurricane came anywhere near Hawaii that year. To say I was upset and extremely peeved would be an understatement. Someone's fear kept me from being able to go. I just think it's ridiculous and an overreaction to the possibilities. If we are vigilant and aware, there's nothing to be afraid of and absolultely no reason why we should move or avoid places just because of the possibilities. B)

[Nottawayfer]

Please don't let this one experience keep you from travelling and especially from travelling during hurricane season! We can't live our lives in fear and hunkered down all the time. Look at how many months and YEARS that area HASN'T been hit by hurricanes.....same with Florida.

Sorry, coolchef, but I think your attitude is an overreaction. By your logic none of us should live in Florida because of hurricanes, California because of wildfires, mud slides and earthquakes, Okalahoma because of tornados, New Orleans because it's so vulnerable, etc. The past two years have been extremely atypical hurricane seasons. Nature and the cycles ebb and flow - even Disney engineers, when building the Orlando theme parks built them on a 100 year flood plan whereas most homes are only built on a 10 year flood plan. That's because they KNOW there is at least a 100 year cycle in the weather patterns so they plan for it.

I missed a trip to Hawaii one year because I wasn't allowed to go during hurricane season..... Not one da*# hurricane came anywhere near Hawaii that year. To say I was upset and extremely peeved would be an understatement. Someone's fear kept me from being able to go. I just think it's ridiculous and an overreaction to the possibilities. If we are vigilant and aware, there's nothing to be afraid of and absolultely no reason why we should move or avoid places just because of the possibilities. B)

Belle,

Our hotel was actually across the street from the beach. The hotel chain has 4 hotels total in Playa del Carmen. They are all built from concrete and steel. They all held up very well. The 3 hotels actually on the beach required the bottom floor people to move up the to the top floors. Our hotel was across the street from the ones on the beach. We liked the hotel better than the others even though it wasn't "right on the beach". All hotels did well. It didn't look like any of the bottom floors at the ones on the beach got any flooding. Every hotel had the typical small flooding from the winds driving the rain down the halls. We all spread our bedspreads out in the hall to keep the water from coming down the hall, and then we used towels in front of our actual room doors. The most water I know anyone sustained was a few inches in their whole room. They couldn't keep the water out.

I understand your thoughts about not letting things keep you from doing what you want. However, I really don't want to ever encounter a situation like this again. It has been an extreme dissapointment to not get to finish a vacation I paid for. We only got 2 days to play there, and we were there for 10 days. I am extremely thankful it wasn't a worse scenario for us and that we are safe. However, it was very frustrating to be at the mercy of the Mexican officials. It was frustrating to be at the mercy of a flaky pathalogical liar French girl. I still want to poke her eyes out! It was all I could do to keep from smacking her.... But I will just send my comment to the president of the company about her. I already complained to her manager, but I think that is getting nowhere.

Thank God it is all over. Thank God it wasn't worse.

I only wished I had gone to Hawaii. We were talking about doing that first, but we couldn't find an all-inclusive resort there. Should-a, Could-a, Would-a....it's all bygones now.

[coolchef1248 @adelphia.net]

wafernot

i sure am glad you made out ok

your next vacation come to maine

you can stay in our guest cottage for free[on the lake]

but you'll have to put up me and my bride haveing a few cocktails around the fire at night

oh and did i say gourmet meals??

[Nottawayfer]

wafernot

i sure am glad you made out ok

your next vacation come to maine

you can stay in our guest cottage for free[on the lake]

but you'll have to put up me and my bride haveing a few cocktails around the fire at night

oh and did i say gourmet meals??

Thanks coolchef,

I've never been to Maine. I did a vacation once in Boston and Cape Cod. That's the closest I've been. Does that mean you are cooking gourmet meals since you are the chef? I hope so. I don't cook on vacations...LOL! That's why we do all-inclusive. :P

[Raf]

Knowing what you went through makes me glad the storm was such a fast mover once it got to South Florida. Let me assure you, going home FROM the storm damage sure beats going home TO it every night. :(

[Nottawayfer]

I agree wholeheartedly Raf. I feel sorry for those who have had to deal with problems to their property as a result of the hurricane.

[coolchef1248 @adelphia.net]

wafer not

please know you and yours will always be welcomed at camp in maine

it is year round

no out house etc

just a comfortable to be and i say it again you are welcome

did i mention a fierplace too

get up here this winter!! help us feed the deer and go xcountry sking

Edited October 30, 2005 by coolchef1248 @adelphia.net