I wonder how Topsail, Carrabelle Beach Resort, Ho-Hum Park and the Apalachicola area are doing. The Panhandle is one of my favorite areas so far in my travels and I am hoping everything and everyone is well. We met some very nice folks at Ho-Hum in a tiny 14 ft trailer who full-timed and I hope they are OK.
We hope to return to the Panhandle this winter as well after touring Texas this fall.
My BIL lives on St. George Island but is in NC right now. He's going back to his house tomorrow to check for damage and clean up. There is no power right now and they don't know for sure when it will be back up.
The bridge was closed but is now open but you can only get on the island if you have a permit to be there.
Rte. 98 was flooded and I would imaging that Ho Hum has significant water damage.
We always stay up the road at Carrabelle Beach but they are on the north side of the road so a little higher up...but the storm surge is pretty devastating.
Neither web site has listed any info on their conditions.
I would hope that anyone camping at any of these parks, including the state park on St. George, would have evacuated by now.
ESF 10 – Hazardous Material
o State Park Closures:
- Camping & day use both closed: St. George Island, Bald Point, Ochlocknee River, San Marcos, Torreya, Ellie Schiller Homosassa Springs
- Camping only closed: Big Lagoon, Blackwater River, Henderson Beach, Rocky Bayou, Topsail Hill, Grayton Beach, St. Andrews, St. Joseph
o Additional Closures: Big Bend Seagrasses Aquatic Preserve office, St Joe Bay State buffer Preserve, Apalachicola National Estuarine Research Reserve
Apalachicola being a favorite place of ours we've always wondered how that part of town along the river would fare in heavy weather. I seem to remember they expect about 4 to 6 feet as their high water - - if I remember that right. Though with 10 to 20 inches of rain coming down the river and storm surge being pushed ashore maybe I just wonder whether I've got that memory quite right.
That restaurant on the river almost seemed like maybe it was on some sort of a barge or something. There is almost a gang plank into it. But that's a real sketchy memory. Guess next time we are over through there I'll have to get some good notes. Or just dig out some old pictures maybe.
I would hope that barrier island out there would prevent too much of a storm surge from coming up into river. But I would not want to be anywhere near those campgrounds along the ocean with weather approaching. Even salt spray would likely come back to haunt you in the future.
Sometimes when traveling in those Gulf Coast states I wonder about how far inland they have those evacuation signs. Are they just to keep traffic moving or are they really in the danger zone? Maybe we ought to find out before heading into those areas again.
We were forced to evacuate from Topsail on the 24th as a precaution. The area received nothing more than rain storms really. From what I understand, they would rather error on the safe side which made sense - it just stunk that we had to move on down the road.
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mister_d wrote: We were forced to evacuate from Topsail on the 24th as a precaution. The area received nothing more than rain storms really. From what I understand, they would rather error on the safe side which made sense - it just stunk that we had to move on down the road.
We were there as well and had to leave. However, since I live in Panama City, we just drove home and came back on Tuesday. The rest of the week was beautiful there. Nice breeze, water was great!
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In reponse to your question about how far to evacuate. I was born in Panama City and lived there until I graduated high school. We evacuated to Dothan, AL when necessary. Trouble is Dothan usually got tornados and heavy rainfall if it was a bad storm. We had to leave because of high tide flooding the yard and making our well and septic tank unusable. We had power outages too but since we didn't have any a/c anyway it was no big deal.
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