Battered by Hurricane Odile, tourists limp home from Cabo

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A man walks on a street where most power lines and light posts have been knocked down by Hurricane Odile in Los Cabos, Mexico. (Victor R. Caivano / Associated Press)

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A kid walks by a souvenir store damaged by Hurricane Odile on San Lucas’ main street in Los Cabos, Mexico. (Victor R. Caivano / Associated Press)

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Mexican soldiers try to stop people from looting a convenience store destroyed by Hurricane Odile, in Los Cabos, Mexico. (Victor R. Caivano / Associated Press)

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Maria Ramirez, left, puts the shoes on her one-year-old niece Maritza next to the remains of their home that was destroyed by Hurricane Odile in Los Cabos, Mexico. (Victor R. Caivano / Associated Press)

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Raimundo Diaz Cruz, left, and his wife Graciela Castillo, right, salvage wood beans and bricks to rebuild their house after it was destroyed by Hurricane Odile in Los Cabos, Mexico. (Victor R. Caivano / Associated Press)

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Strong winds blow palm trees on the beach in Los Cabos, as Hurricane Odile turned into a Category 4 hurricane. (Victor R. Caivano / Associated Press)

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Tourists sit on the concrete stairs in the service area of a resort after the designated shelter was destroyed by Hurricane Odile. (Victor R. Caivano / Associated Press)

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Tourists watch the ocean swells generated by Hurricane Odile from inside a swimming pool at a resort in Los Cabos, Mexico. (Victor R. Caivano / Associated Press)

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Tourists rest inside a shelter at a resort in Los Cabos, Mexico, as Hurricane Odile batters the Baja California Peninsula. (Victor R. Caivano / Associated Press)

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Waves in Cabo San Lucas. Hurricane Odile swirled menacingly toward Mexico’s Los Cabos resorts on Sept. 14, forcing authorities to evacuate high-risk areas and open shelters as the powerful storm threatened. (Ronaldo Schemidt / AFP/ Getty Images)

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The waves in San Jose del Cabo, Mexico, as Hurricane Odile swirled menacingly toward Mexico’s Los Cabos resorts. (Ronaldo Schemidt / AFP/ Getty Images)

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A family from San Jose cover themselves with pillows as they sit on the concrete stairs in the service area of a resort after the designated area for shelter was destroyed by winds in Los Cabos, Mexico. (Victor R. Caivano / Associated Press)

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A view of an empty street in Cabo San Lucas, Mexico, as Hurricane Odile made landfall. (Ronaldo Schemidt / AFP/ Getty Images)

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A child eats a piece of bread as families rest in a school serving as a shelter after being evacuated from their homes in Los Cabos, Mexico. (Victor R. Caivano / Associated Press)

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Strong waves hit the coast. (Oscar Ramirez / EPA)

By Harold Pierce

Sept. 19, 2014 3:42 PM PT

A group of Newport Beach residents who were stranded in hurricane-torn Baja California have arrived home safely, but scores of others are still marooned on the tip of the battered peninsula or slowly making their way back to the United States.

Jeff Reed, a 29-year-old groom-to-be, hitched a ride on a military plane to Tijuana on Tuesday evening with 15 friends who were attending his bachelor party outside Cabo San Lucas. Hurricane Odile hit late Sunday, damaging the vacation rental where they were staying and sending them to a hotel Monday night.

“A cab driver who we saw dropping people off on the street … said we should go to the airport. They were loading people onto these old beat-up military planes,” said Andrew Nahin, 26, who was part of Reed’s group.

The hurricane left Cabo San Lucas International Airport heavily damaged, and commercial flights have not yet resumed there. The military flights are part of an effort to get stranded tourists to Tijuana or Mexico City.

All 16 members of Reed’s group crammed into a van for a ride to the airport, Nahin said Wednesday. “It was sweaty, hot. We were all miserable, hungry, dehydrated,” he said.

Nahin and fellow partygoer Murphy Megonigal described storm-ravaged Cabo San Lucas as “utter chaos,” with riotous conditions, rampant looting and overturned cars. Business owners with shotguns and rifles stood guard to try to prevent looting, they said.

The group had to climb over a downed “arrivals/departures” sign blocking the road before they could get to the airport entrance at 9 a.m. Tuesday, Megonigal said. After about eight hours of waiting in humid 90-degree weather, the group boarded a plane.

“We finally pushed our way through and got onto one of those evacuation planes, and they took us to this Tijuana military base,” Nahin said.

Meanwhile, four Newport Beach men who were stranded in Cabo San Lucas during a fathers-and-sons fishing trip were still trying to get home on a bus ride through Mexico that they say has turned disastrous.

When John Lenell and his son Kevin, 19, boarded the bus at 3 p.m. Wednesday, they were told the ride from La Paz to Tijuana would take about 20 hours. Their fishing buddies, David Ewles and his son Jack, 18, also took the ride.

About 26 hours later, the group had traveled 500 miles and was stuck in Guerrero Negro, halfway between Tijuana and Cabo San Lucas, said George Logan, who was on the fishing trip and caught the last flight out of Cabo at 3:15 p.m. Sunday, about eight hours before Hurricane Odile made landfall.

“The bus ride has been one of these bus rides from hell,” Logan said.

Harold Pierce writes for Times Community News.