Originally Posted by
Terry
The zones right on and near the water in Tampa, where I live just outside of, are being evacuated.
The missus and I were actually on our way to Key West Tuesday for a Tuesday through Friday stay, had stopped for lunch in Key Largo around 1PM, took a close look at the storm track and estimated time of landfall. We called the hotel we had booked reservations for and told them we wouldn't be coming. They told us it was just as well, because they were in the process of calling customers and cancelling reservations since they were going to start boarding up the hotel Wednesday and were going to leave the Keys themselves by Thursday AM at the latest.
So we left Key Largo, turned around and went to Naples to stay for the night. We left our hotel in Naples Wednesday at about 10:30AM. We went to gas up the car. The gas station we pulled into had 12 pumps, with 3 to 4 cars waiting for each pump. We topped off the car, and just as I was finishing pumping the guy filling up next to me had about $5 in when his pump shut down: out of gas. We passed several other gas stations on the way to the highway and it was the same scenario, with 50+ cars waiting in line to get gas. We hit traffic in Venice, just south of Sarasota, at around Noon. It took us 3 hours to go 25 miles. Traffic let up outside of Tampa.
Wednesday night we went out to the local supermarket. Thankfully, we always buy bottled water for the month at the beginning of the month, so we already had 4 weeks worth in the house before we went down to the Keys. We go to the local Publix supermarket - a fairly sizable market - and there isn't a drop of bottled water in the place. Not a single Pop Tart in the place. Every single can of Chef-Boy-At-Dee ready to eat canned meals were gone. Every C and D battery was sold out. Every jar of peanut butter and jelly was sold out. They DID still have plenty of canned veggies, various Apple and Fruit juices and processed lunch meat (bologna, etc.). As we were getting the bologna, a fellow shopper walked up to us and quietly said if we wanted to get bread we'd better get it quick. We went down to the bread aisle and in the middle of the aisle were two employees with four large rolling racks full of pre-packaged sliced bread they had brought up from the back. There literally must have been upwards of 70 shoppers who descended on the bread aisle. No pushing or a riot scene or anything like that, but within less than 10 minutes a couple hundred loaves of bread were gone. The employees didn't even have time to put any of the loaves on the shelves.
Yesterday (Thursday) we went out and found a WalMart that had gotten some Chef-Boy-At-Dee canned stuff in on an overnight shipment, as well as Pop Tarts and the like. So we're fairly well stocked on emergency rations should we lose power. We're very close to several local/county storm shelters should that eventuality come to pass. We have all our crucial papers/documents together. Both cars are filled with gas. Nothing to do for the next 48 hours but wait.