Happy 2nd Anniversary Hurricane Emily

2 1/2 years ago Matt and I went to Playa del Carmen Mexico (about 45 minutes south of Cancun) and we absolutely LOVED it! Our resort was awesome (all inclusive) I got to swim with dolphins, people were great. It was the BEST vacation we had been on. We loved Mexico so much that we decided to go again about 7 months later, only we decided to go to Cozumel instead. Tiny island off the mainland. A few days before we were to leave a tropical storm started brewing. The day we were leaving it was turning into a hurricane. We still went because the hurricane was still in the middle of the ocean and we thought it may bypass us. Our plane was pretty empty, even one of the flight attendants said that the flight to Cozumel is normally booked, but with the hurricane a lot of people canceled ( smart move) We land in Cozumel and its real sunny, nice and hot. We thought there was no way a hurricane was on its way! Our first 2 days were great, we layed out, went swimming and we met a couple (Jane and Jason) whom we still talk to!

By time Saturday came things were getting really serious. Emily was on her way and headed straight to Cozumel. I started to freak out, we tryed getting a flight home, but EVERYTHING was booked. Out hotel contact (Ruben) was not much help! We found out information before he did, it was pretty funny! We had plans to go to dinner at an outside restaurant (outside from our resort) with Jane and Jason, so we got ready and waited in the hotel lobby for the cab to come. This was all planned thru our resort and we sat there, waited, waited and waited. We went up to the desk and asked where the cab was, it was canceled due to Emily. No one bothered to tell us, and we had to make the reservations thru the hotel. Needless to say we were mad and hungry! As we were walking back to our little bungalo we saw the maids taping the sliding glass doors in all of the rooms. I guess so when Emily hit, it would help keep everything in tact and not shatter. Later on that evening we received a note under our door saying we would be evacuating the resort on Sunday (the next morning) and we were not allowed to bring any of our luggage! I was really panicked, and I bought new clothes to take with me on this trip, so I literally folded all my clothes so small that they fit in my little duffle bag that I was allowed to bring! I had my contacts, glasses, make up, camera and all my clothes in this bag! Matt asked me why didn't I just bring that instead of my huge suitcase!!! I called my parents that night because they were glued to the weather channel and let them know what was going on and I would call once I was able.

The next morning we got up bright and early (we wanted to evacuate as soon as possible) we met Jane and Jason and we all got to ride on the same bus to where they were taking us. We thought they would take us somewhere inland where it was nice and safe, but NO! Things are a little crazy in Mexico, we literally went about 5 minutes up the road to the "convention" center. They said this was the safest place for us to go. All the windows were boarded up, we got a pillow and a little sheet. We walked into this huge room where there were hundreds of beach lounge chairs. That is where we had to sit and sleep! It wasn't so bad at first, there weren't too many people there, the air conditioning was on and we had plenty of room to spread out. Well, we were one of the first people in the building and didn't think there would be much more people coming. Well, yeah, a lot more people showed up. We literally had the entire island of Cozumel in this one building. Our spacious area quickly turned into no space at all. We were stacked one by one by one by one. We could hardly move. It was seriously that bad, if we had to get up we tripped over people. There were 1,300 people in the convention center and Cozumel's convention center is no where near what our convention centers are like here in the U.S. It was just one big room and with 1,300 people the big room turned into a tiny closet! But, we were safe and we had food, water, pop, bathrooms etc...

On Sunday we hung out at the covention center, they played movies for us and like I said, we had a/c. That all changed very quickly! As the storm was getting closer winds started to pick up and the power went out. This was around 9 pm, we had no a/c, no lights because the back up generators went out too. We were all boarded up, they locked us in and started passing out candles! Can you believe that! They passed out candles with people stacked on top of eachother with all the sheets, clothes, pillows etc...I was scared to death, thinking we were going to die because this place was going to go up in flames and we were all boarded up and locked in. FINALLY one of the people in charge figured out passing out candles to 1,300 people was not a good idea and took them back. HALLELUJAH! I felt so relieved when that happened. By this time it was getting so unbearably hot we could not get any comfort. I eventually dozed off so did Matt, Jane and Jason. But, when Emily acutally hit it was a category 5 hurricane. I woke up when the hurricane was actually hitting. I could tell because my ears were popping so bad and it felt like I was under water and could not hear. I am guessing it was because of the barometric pressure changing.

After the storm hit, the next morning everyone was getting up to see the damage. It felt so good to go outside. Even though it was still 90 degrees outside, it felt like it was 50 degrees compared to how hot it was inside the building! People were passing out and getting sick. Things looked pretty bad, trees were down, glass everywhere, powerlines down. It was a mess. We just wanted to get back to our resort so we waited and waited and waited to hear when we could go back. There were a bunch of people able to go back to there resorts even though they had no power, water, etc...But it sounded a lot better than staying at the convention center. Finally late in the afternoon we heard word that we could not go back to our resort because it was completely demolished! Yes, demolished, there was nothing left of it they said. So, we were stuck in the convention center another night. I was dreading it so bad. The toilets werent' working, so if you had to use the bathroom you had to go on top of whatever else was in the toilet and then take a huge bucket fill it with leftover water and dump it down the toilet. NO WAY! I just didn't go to the bathroom, I let myself sweat our anything I had! There was a phone place right down the road that got there power back up that evening so I called my parents to let them know I was safe and ok. There was a little store right by the convention center so we went there and walked around a bit to see if we could find anything interesting. Matt and Jason bought beer and I bought some type of bagged chips or something. I was scared to eat any meat or anything that could have been sitting out when there was no power. When we got back to the convention center the power was back on, and there weren't that many people left because it was only our resort who couldn't go back. So, it was a lot more comfortable that night.

The next day we were shipped to Playa del Carmen YEA! We arrived at one resort and they had no power or rooms available that could accomodate us. We went to another resort and it was the same thing. We finally went to a third resort and they were able to get us a room, had power and the pool was open! There beach was closed, but we didn't care at this point, we just wanted a shower! These resorts are all owned by the same Iberostar company, which was also our original resort, so that is why we got to go to another resort. By this time we had only 2 days left of our "vacation" so we made the most of it, layed out, swam, relaxed, went to dinner and were able to enjoy ourselves a little bit. But, I have never been more relieved to get on an airplane going back to the U.S.!!!

So, that was 2 years ago today that Hurricane Emily hit! I am glad I survived. It was definitely an experience I hope NEVER to experience again!!!