MYRTLE BEACH - Hurricane Charley caused a big hassle for travelers visiting Myrtle Beach.

“At least we had a few good days, but I feel bad for the people that got in right before the storm,” said April Harter, a visitor from Columbus, Ohio.

Harter and her two friends were supposed to fly out Saturday, but Charley had different plans.

Brittany Gotter, a friend of Harter’s, has a brother with an apartment in Myrtle Beach, which provided shelter for the group as they prepared to weather the storm. The friends said they heard Saturday morning their flight was cancelled and they were stranded in Myrtle Beach.

“I don’t know what we would have done without my brother,” Gotter said. “We were stuck in traffic forever, and if they’re going to evacuate, they should reverse all lanes out.”

Others were not as fortunate to have family in the area, and were thrown out of their hotels and ordered to go inland. Jeff Oechslein, a meteorologist from the Ohio Valley, was in the area for vacation and was unable to catch his flight out of Myrtle Beach.

Oechslein and his friends drove to Charlotte to catch a flight home instead of trying to go back to the beach. Many other tourists who were at the Grand Strand for the week had similar stories to tell of being forced out of town with nowhere to go.

“I’d be ticked if it ruined my whole vacation,” Gotter said. “If your vacation is shot, what are you going to do, there’s nothing to do inland. Are you just going to come home after traveling from far away?”

Others saw the hurricane in a different light.

“It’s like I’m hoping for a snow day,” Sarah Gatchell, an employee of Liberty at Broadway at the Beach, said. “I usually don’t have the weekends off, so it would be really nice if I had it off.”

Many residents did not want to bother with evacuating unless it was a serious threat.

“If I had to, I would,” Kyle Gotter, Brittany’s brother, said. “But if it’s heading for us with 170 mph winds, I’ll go, but if it’s around 90 mph, I’m staying.”

When Charley hit the Grand Strand it was relatively weak, but it still caused many problems for the area.

“There’s not much you can do,” Harter said. “You just have to ride it out.”

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