Minnetonka Family Vacationing In Mexico Evacuated For Hurricane Patricia
MINNEAPOLIS (WCCO) -- A Minnesota family vacationing in Mexico was forced to evacuate their hotel Friday as Hurricane Patricia headed straight for the resort city of Puerto Vallarta.
The monster hurricane hit Mexico packing winds of 195 miles an hour when it hit Mexico's west coast Friday.
"That was scary. That was very scary," said Victoria Williams, a Minnetonka woman vacationing with her family in Puerto Vallarta.
Fifteen members of the Williams family were staying at Paradise Village Resort, as the hurricane gathered more and more power Thursday.
On Friday, Williams said everything around her suddenly became eerily quiet.
"It was so calm, and the water was so warm, and all of a sudden it cooled down," she said. "The leaves. The trees did not move. There was not a movement of anything."
Within hours, Williams said the resort evacuated 3,000 people, 20 at a time, to a hurricane shelter in a nearby office building. They waited out the storm with blankets, pillows, fish, tortillas, beans, water and a little tequila.
"Sometimes we traded food with other people," she said. "They were playing cards, dice, reading books and talking. It was such good camaraderie."
Hurricane Patricia made landfall Friday about a hundred miles south of Puerto Vallarta. The city escaped serious damage, but saw torrential rain for 24 hours straight.
And for the Williams family, that was 48 hours of a vacation they will not soon forget.
"We cried. We laughed. We joked. You know, what can you do?" Williams said. Her family will begin returning to Minnesota Sunday as airline service is restored. "If we can survive winter, why can't we survive the hurricanes?"
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