I live on a boat on Clear Lake, near Clear Lake Shores. I am a 66 year old lady with heart failure and spinal arthritis. As we watched the news of the approaching hurricane, we became apprehensive, as it appeard to be headed just to our south. I work in an office that is just a block off from the bay. We spent Tuesday getting files and computers ready to be moved off site and/or to the upper level. On Wednesday, we decided to leave here - which was, I believe, our designated day to leave. We saw news reports of heavy traffic, and decided to try to get out a back way, headed to New Braunfels. I had my car and dog, my friends had two trucks, 3 kids, 6 dogs, 2 birds and a cat. We were going to caravan, but my car broke down in Alvin, so the dog and I jumped into one of the trucks and proceeded to head towards Austin. I am not familiar with the roads around Galveston/Houston, so I was never sure where we were. We tried to take a road that would lead us south if I-10, but the cops had it closed off. We had to join the rest of the parade. It took us a whole 24 hours to get to the north side of Houston, from 646 near Alvin. We got off the freeway to find gasoline. We st in line at a gas station for a couple of hours, actually fighting for our place in line, as others would crowd in their vehicles. At one point, my friend called in a security guard so that we could get to a gas pump. The station was accepting cash only. The gas pumps were painfully slow! We finally got filled up with gas and took off onto I-10, I think - where traffic was bumper to bumper. I have a severe tailbone problem and wasn\'t able to help dirve, as I could not sit for more than a few minutes. On Thursday night, we pulled off the highway and pulled into a shopping center to catch a nap. We parked outside a starbucks, hoping they\'d open, they didn\'t. There was an Einstein\'s bagel shop open, and they were doing a land-office business! Lots of refugees getting food and coffee. We fought our way back onto the freeway on Friday morning. Still only one side of the freeway was open and traffic was barely moving. We were still in Houston area. Later in the day, the highway opened both lanes and we were moving a little better. Our other truck was running low on diesel, and was a ways behind us. We kept in touch by cell phone. We got off at an exit to look for diesel for that truck. We found a station that had diesel, but there were no containers available. Luckily, a Walmart was open, so my friends went in there and came out with a lot of plastic containers, into which they pumped diesel fuel! We knew it wasn\'t safe and the owner of the station was aware, but knew the desperate situation that existed. The other vehicle was running low on diesel, so we pulled off to the side of the road until they could catch up with us, probably a couple of hours. At this point, there were dozens of cars pulled off the highway, out of gas. It was the middle of the night and scary. They finally caught up with us and we put in the diesel we had with us and got on our way again. We pulled into New Braunfels at about 6 am on Friday morning, with a gallon of gas left in our tank. Luckily, there was a station open there where we got fuel and a sandwich. We had had nothing to eat except for snacks we had brought with us and the bagel that morning. We had an RV, so went to a campground. I had my dog, and opted to sleep in a tent, so that the family with 3 teens could all sleep in the RV. I slept on the ground, with just a quilt under me. I was in such pain I could hardly walk! After enduring this for a couple of nights, a motel room became available and I moved in to that. While we were at the campground, the hurricane news had Rita headed straight for the nose of my boat! I thought I would never see my house or my car again! I can no longer remember days, but we were relieved to hear that the hurricane had spared our area, but we wept for the ones who were damaged. That was a nightmare trip, those 39 hours. It was little consolation to know that we were part of history! \r\n\r\nI had several calls from friends who stayed behind to tell me that my boat was ok. The water in the lake had been blown totally out of it, and all the boats were sitting in mud! When the storm surge came in, it merely raised the boats up to their normal level. How amazing! In some of the marinas, when the water level feel, the boats got caught under fixed docks, and when the water came up, they were crushed or damaged. We were lucky, as we have floating docks in our marina. \r\n\r\nThe funny part is that after Katrina, I offered my boat to refugees from LA. Nobody took me up on the offer, but they would have had to evacuate again. What a summer it was.