Wilma Picture Day

Today I'm going to do something a little different. I'm going to give you a short break from all that reading! Instead I am going to regale you with some of the better Wilma damage pictures from the island. I highly recommend clicking on them to make them bigger. The detail is worth it. Ready? Here we go!

Remember I said that we when we got back to the island and reached the end of the ferry dock we found nothing but sand? This is the main street along the bay, looking north. The street had been plowed a bit here but I think they just gave up for awhile. The sand was very wet and heavy.




More of the road sand. This pictures also illustrates how enduring palm trees are and how suited they are to this climate. There were a lot of broken branches but most of them survived. The only ones that dies were the ones that lost their growing top. That bit in the middle.



If you walked to the end of the plowed area in the picture above and turned around, this was your view. The sand was just too deep at this point to be removed. Both sides of the road had been cleared for a bit and scooters were able to get through.






These are garbage bins. The openings in them are about four feet off the ground. The curb on the right is actually a small wall that helps keep the beach sand from blowing onto the road. Not very effective against the winds of Wilma! By the way, a lot of this sand was originally in Cancun, about 8 miles away. Part of the reason they had to pay over 11 billion US Dollars to pump sand in from the ocean bottom. And the reason many think is responsible for the beach erosion we are experiencing here on the island. Digging up all that ocean bottom changed the way the currents flow.







One of the beachside restaurants. Notice what a good job the netting did of keeping the palapa roof in place.



Same thing here.

Here we have one of the local fishing boats. They pulled it way up onshore to keep it safe from the water. Guess they didn't figure on all the sand!

Finally my favorite picture of all the ones I took after the storm. These are full grown palm trees. They are probably around 15 feet tall. I think it adequately serves to show just how much sand got piled up here.

That's it for now. I will be sprinkling a few more pictures in as we go along, but I wanted you to get a real feel for what it was like physically here. C'mon back Monday for the next exciting chapter and see what I have to bitch about now!