Turns out that we were in the eye of the hurricane for 14 long hours!! {I always thought that the eye of the storm was the worst, but that is not the case.} A lot of us guests (who didn't have any experience with hurricanes) couldn't believe that we were still in the eye of the hurricane for that long. We were skeptical that only half of Wilma had passed, and thought the information the hotel officials (with their satellite phones and radios) were telling us was wrong.
Turns out the hotel official, the General Manager of the Hilton, Dave was correct.
The rain and wind started again, and we were all corralled back into our safe rooms at 6 PM.
With a swift slam of the door, we were trapped inside the stuffy classroom yet again. When the second half of the hurricane started up, it was much milder than the first half. We were told the first part of Wilma was a category 4, whereas the second part was a category 3.
It was now almost 6 AM on Sunday October 23rd 2005* and all of us guests were complaining of how unbelievably hot, and stuffy it was in the room and going stir crazy. We all begged for a little fresh air, just for 5 minutes! Our room leader Olga was reluctant, but she radioed out to see if it was safe to open the door for a few minutes. She never got a response, but went ahead and propped the door open just a bit. :)
Turns out, the storm was finally GONE! We were the first of the ten classrooms to go outside.
Several minutes went by and then the other rooms got the clearance to come outside.
It was such a relief to have Wilma leave us forever! :)
Looking around in our Elementary compound, it didn't seem to have much damage. We were pretty sheltered from the real damages outside of our concrete walls {with broken shards of glass cemented on the top of the wall,} that were protecting us from the looters and other crazies.
Chris and I along with another couple from our room, walked around the compound to view the aftermath. The concrete wall in a few places were blown down. The street out in front of the school was flooded.
Later that day, some of the hotel guests helped the staff remove the boards from the wooden slatted windows. Now, it was much more "livable". It was breezy and much cooler.
We were fed, but at this time the GM of the Hilton was unsure when or how all of us guests would be able to go get our luggage back at the hotel, due to all the debris and flooding on the streets. Before we left for the evacuation, we were instructed to place our other suitcases in our hotel room bathtub with the bathroom door shut.
There was this one guest, a hairy man from Israel, who had a beautiful, young, blond haired blue eyed wife....that hired a taxi driver to take them back to the hotel, so they could get their belongings.
When they returned to the compound....5 hours later, they did have their bags with them.
He said what should have taken only 1 hour...took much longer because of downed power lines, trees and other debris all over the roads back to the hotel.
 | ||||||
| Hairy man from Israel. |
While he was gone, and VERY insistent that he needs his belongings at the hotel, a few of the other guests and us wondered.... what could be so important that he needs his luggage??
I was thinking, diamonds or drugs. :)
Turns out, he is an attorney that owns his own law firm and has 6 men under him. He said he was working on a really important case and needed those documents in his briefcase. Well...there goes my diamonds and drug theory. ;) HA!
It was now around lunch time, and Jen and I finally got to wash our hair, in the comunal pool of rain that had collected in a huge barrel. Grab a paper cup and some shampoo and lather up! :) It was Freeeezing cold water! But, it was sure nice to wash our greasy locks.
The outdoor bathrooms were a mess. 5 stalls without running water to flush the toilets {that have been used by 150 women} There were a total of 308 of us guests in the compound. You cant imagine how disgusting it was in there. Talk about hold your breath before you go in, do you business fast and get the eff out of there!
Hotel staff came up with a solution to not being able to flush the toilets. They implemented a system where we would fill buckets of collected rain water and dump it into the toilets,... along with a sign that read: "PLEASE DO NOT PLACE THE TOILET PAPER IN THE TOILET!!" instead, it was to go in the trashcan. It must have been difficult for people to follow such simple instructions, because they still put the t.p. in the toilet. *dumb broads* haha
Our room leader Olga, and the other hotel staff, plus the GM had lots of meetings that Sunday. Dave, the GM said he has been contacting several different bus companies to try and get us all out of there.
The Cancun airport wasn't operating at this time, and they knew it was near impossible to get us guests back to our hotel.
The roads were a mess and blocked off and the Hilton was trashed, from Wilma.
Hairy Israel guy took pictures of the hotel and showed them to a few of us. The hotel lobby was flooded, all the sand had been washed away from the beach, and several rooms had windows blown and shattered all over the flooded rooms.
We later found out that the managers went into every single hotel room to double check that the guests did indeed put their belongings in the bathtub.
I had such high hopes that since the hurricane was over, that somehow...we wouldn't have to stay in this hell-hole for another night! Maybe we could go back to the Hilton...but that was impossible.
When the General Manager told us all that we would have to stay here another night in the classrooms, I seriously about lost it! I was going to breakdown and cry. Stay, strong. :)
But, this time is wasn't that bad, as the boards were off the windows and we could sleep with the windows open.
Later that night, our room leader Olga informed us at 9 AM Monday (tomorrow) morning.....that we had BUSES COMING TO PICK US ALL UP!!!!! hip-hip-hooray! We were all totally stoked and went to bed with smiles on our faces. {Especially me!}
......to be continued.... : )
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