Hurricane Nora 2021

 We honestly didn't know Hurricane Nora was headed this way. We have watched hurricanes and tropical storms come through every year.  When landfall is focused in on this part of the coast Sayulita barely blinks. We always respect the storm, prepare and thankfully we are usually spared any real hit and effects. Stress out about such things? After 10 years?  No, not really and if you looked out the window or walked around town last weekend one would not see or feel anything different with a storm approaching.

I only really heard a storm was on the way from seeing a Facebook post from a group in Puerto Vallarta. Maps, time tables, estimated paths of the storm put Nora in our area on late Saturday night.  A tropical storm elevating to a category one hurricane. I tucked in Ashley's plants that were outside, put away the cushions on the roof terrace and made sure the roof drains were clear of debris for what would be a wet overnight.

The wind and rain started late afternoon and it was no worse than some of the summer storms we experience here every year. Gusts and heavy rain usually arrive and leave within an hour our so as mother nature cools things off but this time the wind and rain was hanging around and didn't feel like it was leaving anytime soon.  I made my rounds each hour making sure leaves and things did not clog up the roof drains as things intensified outside. Alex was safe in a neighboring town with a friend so Trace and I had some dinner, listened to the storm outside, occasionally looking out over town and the ocean and were happy that the power was holding as was cell phone service. Part of our house is open to the outside so we had to occasionally mop up rain that may have come in from the wind blowing the water sideways. 

We were stuffing our faces when we started to hear loud thunder which was odd. The atmosphere is so scrambled that thunder and lightening don't occur often during this kind of storm. The thunder became louder as Trace and I looked at each other across the kitchen island and suddenly the thunder sounded like it was coming in through the roof!!  We ran over to look up towards the roof of the clear story which has a fairly transparent polycarbonate roof system.  We saw that the blue polycarbonate shade shelter protecting the front terrace had ripped free of the screws holding it in place and had flipped over on top of the clear story.  

The blue roof panels tucked safely away from the wind.

The wind was ripping and blew the approximately 16'x 4' blue plastic panel towards the back of the house where I tried the best I could in-between wind gusts to wrangle the thing into the narrow space between our house and the neighbor's garden wall.  This whole exercise did not impress Trace one bit as he watched anxiously as the wind and rain over powered anything his dad might try to do to with the large plastic sail. I was super concerned about what would happen if the panel got free and blew around so I kept trying and was finally able to tuck the long panel down enough to not blow away.  As the storm blew around us we returned to our dinner as I hoped the same roof system that protected us and the interior of the house would hold up and then moments later a second terrace ripped off following the same path as the previous panel.

The terrace framing with anchor screws still in place.

Fortunately this panel found its twin and like two spoons stacked in a drawer the second panel settled in along side the other with just a little maneuvering.  Then suddenly it stopped!  The wind and rain both stopped and all was calm and we walked out onto the roof terrace and watched as our neighbors emerged as well to see what was up.

We could see the wind ripping still above the ridge behind and to the east of us but the wind had taken on a new direction and it was totally calm down where we were.  This certainly eased my concern about more critical parts of the roof blowing off.  At this point power was out as were phones so there was nothing we could do but sit this one out for the night as the rain began to fall heavily outside again but this time we were protected from the wind.  In bed and listening to the rain and wind at 8:30pm.

You could see the curving rotation of the storm clouds out to sea.

After getting up a few times during the night to check on the drains responsible for moving water off the roof the evening was mostly uneventful.  The next morning Trace and I woke up and with a break in the rain decided to go see the effects of the storm on town. Town faired reasonably well but power was out and many visitors were out wandering around looking for something that might be open or sitting on the beach with their luggage having planned to spend part of their departure day on the beach and had to check out of their accommodations. 

Mostly debris, trash, eroded beach and nasty water greeted those on the beach but that didn't scare off the surfers who bravely found waves at the river mouth in town.  Power was off and on as were communications for a few days and town and beach still needs a serious clean up but is getting better bit by bit.

One thing we did see more of were back up generators in use the day after the storm.  Something we had not seen much of in the past.  We knew several stores had them to keep their coolers cold but many places had them running out of the sidewalk to be able to do business even during a power outage.  The large complex across from us with 4 small residential towers and event palapa has been lit up like a Christmas tree with their back up system and had been the only location with serious power on this end of town for a couple nights.  Each year we discuss getting a generator since each time the power grid goes down we seem to have recently filled the refrigerator but each year goes by and we forget we ever had the conversation.  There is always next year. 

Puerto Vallarta

Puerto Vallarta was not as fortunate as they experienced flooding, building collapses and fatalities due to the storm.  Very sad to hear the stories just down the road a few kilometers from us where several of our friends live, paddle and go to school.

There are, however, still many places in Sayulita where you wouldn't even know there was a storm a few days ago.  Let's hope this is the last big weather event for 2021 and we have more mornings like yesterday but there are still two months left of storm season.