The morning was spent at Richard’s watching the news. About noon there were 10 of us who, after much prayer and God's leading, decided it best to head east. We caravanned in three vehicles, drove through Arcadia and stopped in Okeechobee (to use Kevin's mom's bathroom and visit for a short few minutes), then headed for Jupiter where the plan was to stay at the home of our friends, Ted and Chris, for at least a few hours before heading back. We'd been in touch with them throughout the storm preparations and knew we were welcome to spend the night if necessary. After having dinner just south of Jupiter, the wind began to pick up and we heard it was heading east, so we decided to head south! We then took Alligator Alley back across the state and headed up 75 toward Ft. Myers, making a big circle ahead of the storm, then snuck up behind it as it was leaving our area. What an adventure and what testimonies are coming out of this. Always along the way we stayed in touch by phone with each other, praying as we went for the Lord's leading on every turn. We were, of course, anxious to get back home and......?

Headed back into Port Charlotte (we’d seen quite a bit of wind damage along 75 coming up through Ft. Myers) we decided to stop at Dan and Linda's home first since they were out of town vacationing on their way to our convention in Dallas! (9 more of us had our airline tickets to go to Dallas on the 18th, but ended up canceling our trip) Paul and Jessica, who were with us in the van, had their house keys since they were house sitting. We were not prepared for what we saw in their neighborhood of Deep Creek--total devastation. It was around 10 pm and we were some of the first vehicles probably to venture back in there. It was very difficult to maneuver around the trees and drive over downed power lines. Their home lost most of its shingles, all of the pool cage, windows blown in, and glass and water damage throughout most of the home. We had a battery operated lantern to see around. From there we made our way to Richard's home where the neighborhood was also very devastated though not quite as bad as Deep Creek. Richard's home was intact with only one window blown in, yet not broken, and a huge tree in the front yard was uprooted. He also lost 75 shingles off of his roof. At this point (midnight) we left the kids at Richard's while Paul and Jessica went with us to check on our home. Most of the homes in the neighborhood are mobile homes as well as some condos across the canal from us. Many of the homes had quite a bit of damage, trees uprooted, roofs taken off and the third home you see when you enter our little area called El Jobean had the entire front yard uprooted with all the trees crushing that home.