Day 21: Matthew Aftermath

Sorry I haven't been keeping up on the blog.  You can take that as a sign that I've been busy and having a great time!  You may remember that I was in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, and was supposed to visit South Carolina on my way to Florida.  Well, Saturday, our travel day, was the day that Hurricane Matthew was supposed to hit the Southeast hard.  

Driving into that didn't make much sense...

We decided to stay in Pennsylvania and visit Hershey...you know the chocolate place!  

We did that, and it was great.  I'll blog about it later, but right now, I want to share what I saw on Sunday, Oct. 11, driving through North Carolina, South Carolina, and Georgia

the day after Matthew ripped through the South...

We left early in the morning...4:00 AM, from Hershey.

I was wondering what I'd see once the sun rose.

I was surprised to see a perfect blue bird sky!

I expected the day after a hurricane to at least be rainy, but no.

There was no sign of a hurricane at all...in Maryland, at least.

But then we got to North Carolina...

This is how close some of the fallen trees were to the road!

Crews had worked through the night to clear them from the road, at least,

but the rest of the trunks were still there.

In North Carolina, our route took off the freeway into some small towns.

That's where we could really see the damage.

See those power lines?  You know what's hanging on them?

The tin roof from the Exxon station!

 These trees had just missed the houses.

These owners had cleared their land of most of their trees.

We saw other houses that got direct hits from uprooted trees.

The towns were without power, because of the trees crashing on power lines.

Most gas stations were closed.  

But we managed to find one using a generator to power its pumps.

As we went south, we could see the water level rising.

Our phone got flash flood warnings, but because we had gotten an early start

we were ahead of the high water.

At some parts, the water was starting to cover the road!

Keep driving, Dad!  We have to stay ahead of the rising rivers!

There were lots of homes like this and worse.

People had huge challenges ahead of them!

Stopping at a rest stop made me think of all the little things 

that people would have to clean up.

Check the background of this picture, to the left of my Dad.

Yechhh!

Seeing this changed my understanding of hurricanes and the damage they do.

Coming soon, pics from Hershey, PA, the Amish Country, and...

Disney World!

SEE YOU NEXT TIME!