As some of you may have noticed, since June, contrary to Compuserve propaganda, we have not had access to our e-mail, so if you wrote to us and we didn't respond, your message was probably kicked out of the buffer. The only messages I had were from Sept. and October. So please forgive me for not responding.

I must admit I was rather smug about the fact that all these tropical storms and hurricanes were chasing Mike all around the Gulf while I sat in the hot sun wondering where the rain was and happy that we were having absolutely no storms. For that reason, we felt rather confident that it was safe to go away for a couple of weeks. We were in Arkansas where my mother, aunt, and uncle were all in the hospital when we caught the Weather Channel and I told Mike there was a big something down by Columbia. We watched with interest but not alarm as Mitch grew and moved due north. Mike hinted that maybe we should head back. But I still had some doctor appointments set up in Houston, so I didn't really think of leaving early. Then we woke up Saturday and Mitch had turned northwest. HMMM. Might go by close enough that Roatan would get brushed by tropical storm outer band stuff. Then Sunday, when we arrived back in Houston and got on the Internet and discovered that Mitch was still moving west and getting larger by the minute, Mike called the airlines and asked if the airport at Roatan was still open. "Sure, why wouldn't it be?" He explained that a Category 5 hurricane seemed to be heading that way, but they said they hadn't heard that and yes he could fly out Monday.

Fortunately or unfortunately, by Monday a.m., the airlines had stopped flying not only to Roatan but to Belize, where he would have changed planes. Our original tickets have us flying out tomorrow, but since the eye of Mitch is located approxiately 25 miles away and not moving, I doubt we will be leaving. We have not been able to reach anyone at the resort, any other cruisers, or anyone who might have been able to do something about preparing our boat, even if it proved to be in vain. We did have some friends who were supposed to keep an eye on it and had the combination to get inside (to exchange videos and books) so we can only hope they were able to take some precautions. Our marina is just about the only protected one in all of Honduras, much less the Bay Islands. Just have to wait and see if Journey is still there at some point in the next couple of weeks.

We know we are lucky to be here and not there. I am still somewhat in the denial mode that anything really wrong can happen to Journey who has been through Hurricane Alicia and Hurricane Allison already. But considering that Roatan has been blasted for almost 30 hours by hurricane force winds (even though it decreased from 155 mph to 105 mph) that is still a helluva lot of wind, not to mention the "large battering waves" and 18-20-foot storm surge. We have heard that this morning there was 7 feet of standing water in Roatan and it looked like a large bomb had hit. Supposedly the next island over, Guanaja, almost directly under the eye, has been leveled.

We have made a lot of friends in the "grounded" community there in Roatan and have housesat for a number of people while they went Stateside. A lot of these houses are beautiful, but almost all are made of wood, with no insulation or sheetrock--just bare wood walls. Very few have glass windowss--they have shutters that often leak during the smalles rains. I can't even comprehend what 20 inches of rain blastin sideways at 105+ mph have done to them. Some of these people are retirees. We can only hope those with satellite TV got the hint early and left the island before the government shut down the airport and removed the ferries from service. We have heard that they didn't even get tourists off, so a number of the resorts are full--bad news since most of them are directly on the beach on the "bad" side or even on little cays in front of the big island. We have also heard that a number of the local "barrios" that were located on the beaches have already been washed into the sea. The government "lost all contact" with Roatan this morning so we have no new news. We are hoping some of our cruiser friends in Guatemala are able to reach those in Honduras( if they are still able to communicate and have not moved down to Guate themselves) on the daily NW Caribbean Cruisers net.

(Anyone with ham or SSB capabilities--it is 8 am CST, 1400Z at 4154 MHz). SOme of the cruisers who were anchored out also are on some of the ham nets in the am. If anyone has any contact with someone from down that way, I would be glad to hear how everyone is doing--and maybe find out what happened to Journey).

Judging on past hurricane response in these third world areas, I doubt I will be heading back anytime soon. Mike will try to go down to assess the damages--see if Journey still exists, see if our friends still exist--before he is supposed to return to work November 11. We are also looking into getting on some sort of aid/relief crew if possible. In the meantime all we can do is wait and watch that satellite picture of Mitch just SITTING there, and try to believe that all that destruction they are showing isn't really happening on Roatan, just everywhere else around it. And I am collecting job opening information just in case I have to re-enter the real world

But we are safe and I have my computer (had to get it fixed)--and Mike, of course. I can't really think of anything on the boat that I could not live without. Some of our cruiser friends have everything they own with them, though, and I can only hope that they all got into our nice protected bay and rode it out. (Well, okay, I am hoping that if Journey is destroyed some nice big motor yacht with lots of insurance smashed into her and has to pay us for her.)

So here we are, visiting friends and relatives, (anybody need a boat or housesitter???) waiting. Since we may be here for a LONG while, please feel free to try and e-mail us again.