We took a drive to the beach to see what the effects of the storm was there. The closest beach is at Banganeck as the crows flies 12 km but as the road goes 25 km which takes an hour to drive because it is two-track sand roads which can only be driven in 4x4.
It is usually extremely quiet there with hardly ever any people so we like it as a nice, quiet sober beach. All there is is a nature conservation research station for sea turtles and other sea life.
The main road towards Black Rock and Mabibi.
On the way there we saw lots of water in places where we never saw water before.
Over the two-track sand road we found a huge tree that had fallen over the road and we had to turn around and find an alternative route.
The trees and bushes along the road were really sagging as if they had been pushed down or sidewards by the storm and branches were hanging lower than before because the vehicle was scraped like never before. We even lost one of the jerry can holders (extra fuel containers) which was on top of the vehicle as we never realized it got ripped off as we struggled through some of the overhang which never used to be a problem. It made us think of back at our tents we enjoyed the protection our trees gave us but realized the more how dangerous the trees could have been. For this we also thank the LORD because if it wasn't for the trees we would've been paragliding. But He also kept us from any large broken branches or trees.
As we got to the beach it was spring tide high water. And still the storm marks were high above high water spring tide marks. The whole beach changed in appearance. It seemed like the sand which used to form the beach was just eaten away.
Sometimes up to 2 meters deep. The first part of the beach is partially protected in a bay like area and here it appeared fairly normal. But around the head on the other side of the research station the storm caused havoc.
Where we are standing used to be the usual beach.
Turtle eggs were laying around that were supposed to be buried 2 to 3 feet under the sand. We even found places where the eggs were still showing halfway dug out in the sand.
The researchers are probably very sad because of all the damage. But so it goes in this fallen world. Where there used to be nice sandy sloping shores there was now a drop off like a cliff and bare rocks where the sand had been washed away.
This part of the coast is a wetland park reserve and a world heritage site with few people living right by the ocean where the storm was the worst. Mercifully not much damage was done though some people we minister to did lose their roofs and parts of roofs on houses that were not very well built. But even many people with well built houses got water in their houses because of the wind just driving it in any place it could find. Just Saturday night a friend said he measured 400 mm that would be more or less 16 inches of rain.
Right now everything is back to normal. And we still thank the LORD for all His goodness, sparing us and many other vulnerable people.
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