Coastal Dreams B&B: Hurricane Ike Survivor

Last Thanksgiving, we spent a couple of nights with my mom at a really fabulous B&B in Galveston called Coastal Dreams (click here to read my entry about it). During Hurricane Ike, I was so worried about that beautiful old house and its gracious hostess, Lana Lander, and her trusty sidekick Mz. Pokey, but hoped that since it survived the big 1900 hurricane, it survived Ike, as well.

Good news - the house is still standing, thanks to its location at 20 feet above sea level. But for a time Lana suddenly had oceanfront property, and is still struggling to help her devastated community repair itself (coverage of this has been completely drowned out by the election and economic meltdown, but the Galveston area has indeed been completely devastated). Lana's accounting of the storm and aftermath are so poignant and harrowing (they waited out the storm in the house!), I had to share her Sept. 28th email (cut down just a bit):

"Hello All,
I am sorry for the delay in responding to everyone's emails; electricity just came back on a couple days ago and things are still real hectic around here. My mother, my sister's three dogs, Mz. Pokie and I all stayed here at Coastal Dreams for Hurricane Ike. As crazy as the decision may have been, we all had flashbacks of the 2005 Rita evacuation (the dogs included) and decided to take our chances with this one. For the Rita evacuation, there were 2 million people evacuating the Houston area in 100+ degree heat and it took us 32 hours to make it to Waco (about 200 miles away). There also was not a lot of warning with Ike; it was only two days prior to the storm that the projected path was for Galveston.

This was a Category 2 storm in terms of wind (110 MPH), but a Cat 4 storm surge. I went outside during the eye of the storm (which lasted about two hours - really weird!) and the water was one step from my porch (my house is about 20 feet above sea level). My street is about four feet above the seawall (which is 17 feet high), and the house is three feet above that. This area of the island does not even require flood insurance, although I do have it, thank goodness. It was such a surreal scene, having oceanfront property. It was also very scary. I gathered up my Mom (snoring), the dogs (also all snoring) and we moved everything upstairs. I was sure that the second half of the storm would bring more water. The winds seemed to be much worse in the second half, but the water receded and never reached the first floor.

The adventure began the next day when there was no electricity, no gas, no water, no sewer, and a typical hot humid Gulf Coast day. We had plenty of food to grill (I ate better the first week than I have in a year!). Everything you do takes so much more thought, and three steps more than it would if you had all those amenities. Having four dogs around took a lot of work also, making sure they didn't fall in the pool (nasty, nasty!), or start chewing on things that had washed up into the yard. FEMA was here within 48 hours, handing out water, food, and ice. We also had the Salvation Army and Red Cross giving out hot meals.

We drove around the day after the storm with our mouths hanging open. Houses, trees, power lines, boats, cemeteries, fishing piers, streets.....just torn up and ripped apart. There was a boat at 43rd and Broadway, which is a good 2 miles from any marina. Driving down the Seawall, the debris from the Balinese Room, the souvenir shop, and Hooters took up all five lanes and was spread from 25th to the Hotel Galvez and probably 12 feet high. It was so strange to look down there and see nothing. Nothing is on the beach side of the Seawall anymore. The 61st street pier is gone, the big one across from the miniature golf place is all torn up and barely standing. Driving down Broadway, there were downed live oaks every block. Tombstones are knocked down or floated away. We have beautiful cemeteries here and it was heartbreaking to see this.

More heartbreaking of course, are the homes. I've watched things like this on TV many many times and of course, felt sympathy for what they were going through. But this is so... overwhelmingly heart wrenching. Personal belongings piled as high as their house, making trip after trip to the curb with soaking wet clothes and furniture and anything that was within 3-5 feet of the floor. Mold set in at my sister's house (which received 3 feet of water) within 5 days, and that was with carpet ripped out as soon as we could get over there. A lot of these people weren't allowed back on the island for 12 days after the storm.

Galveston is a wonderful city, with beautiful people, and we need our tourists to come back. Please don't think there will be nothing here for you to visit for. They didn't give up after the 1900 Storm and we won't give up either. This is just another page for the history books and something to talk about over the breakfast table at Coastal Dreams!

God Bless You,
Lana Lander"
www.coastaldreamsbnb.com