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Stress free travel
Autumn and Adam Bremmer with their babies Christopher John and Emmett – with thanks to Kelci Parks of the Fort Bragg Advocate.
Expecting a relaxing seaside vacation, Autumn and Adam Bremmer took their two toddlers and ventured to Cabo San Lucas, Mexico, for a long birthday weekend.
What they encountered stretched their survival skills and endurance as they struggled to stay safe, escape the devastation and get home.
Most family vacations never encounter these challenges but you’ll hear the whole story in the podcast interview below.
Hear the full story on the Gathering Road Podcast:
Want to listen on your MP3 player? Click here to download…
Hear more travel stories of adventure, courage and wanderlust each week on The Gathering Road Podcast. Also available on iTunes and Stitcher.
Tips to ride out a hurricane:
- Make sure that your room is away from the waterfront and the open sea.
- Avoid flooding by staying in an upstairs room
- Pack the mini fridge with ice and turn the cold temp down as much as possible to keep food cold should electricity fail.
- Stockpile water bottles and fill the bathtub with water for emergency use.
- Close curtains and lock glass doors and windows.
- Pile furniture against the curtains and windows.
- Travel with close-toed shoes in case you need to walk through polluted water.
- Help your neighbors – It will help avoid panic and reduce risk of other social unrest.
- Always pack your medicines and necessities in plastic baggies. Have them ready to grab should you need to evacuate quickly.
- Travel with an LED flashlight and make sure it’s charged.
- Charge up all electronics well before the storm hits.
- Carry extra baggies and pack one with toilet paper.
- Carry protein bars, nuts and dried fruit in a baggie to keep energy up until meal time whenever traveling.
- Keep your distance from animals that may be hungry, sick or injured unless you’re prepared and trained to help them.
- If you find transportation, make sure they have fuel to get you to a safe place or airport.
- Consider bringing a satellite phone and solar battery charger to more remote destinations.
More tips for disaster preparedness for drivers on this Trip Wellness post
Adam carries baby Emmet outside as the flood waters start to recede.
Help the recovery:
There’s lots of ways to help the recovery in Cabo San Lucas. Make a donation to a reputable charitable organization such as:
RedCross.org and you can read about their work in Mexico here.
Wavesforwater.org – Project Odile
Living Life Elevated.com – different charities and relief efforts to join
Look for donations centers for clothes, baby supplies and canned food perhaps instead of just sending money.
The clean-up begins.
Follow the disaster
Your tourist dollars will make a huge difference in recovery efforts and you’ll stretch your travel budget too. If you’re able join the relief effort and volunteer in the rebuilding it would make any family vacations unforgettable and fulfilling.
Great tips here. We often schedule beach vacations during hurricane season, and on more than one occasion we were evacuated in advance of a storm. But many of these tips are things I hadn’t thought of, so thank you!
Traveling during shoulder seasons has its risks. As one travel buddy says, ‘Follow the disaster.’ I like that better than being part of one! It’s an uncertain world though and we just need to be prepared. I think what Adam and Autumn did with their two babies was incredible. Thanks for the comment.
Lots of helpful tips here should the unthinkable happen. Having access to a good source of local news in your own language when you travel will help you to keep abreast of current affairs, and prepare for predicted natural disasters.
Great point about having access to solid local news would be so much help in a natural disaster but often communication channels are some of the first casualties.
I do hope I never need this information.
Me too but a little forewarning can’t hurt.
These are great tips! So many of us expect our vacation paradise to be perfect, but natural disasters are a very real possibility anywhere, but especially near a beach.
Lots of great tips here. No one really expects anything to go wrong on vacation, particularly if it’s a paradise destination, but Mother Nature doesn’t play favorites. Glad they made it out safely.
Thanks, Betsy, no one works disasters into a vacation plan. A little prep and a lot of fortitude helps. I wish we could say this kind of natural disaster was unusual but it appears that weather patterns at least are shifting wildly. Stay safe and thanks for the comment.