VIDEO CNN's Jim Morelli looks at the damage in the Bahamas and how it's affecting tourism. Windows Media 28K 80K

September 21, 1999
Web posted at: 3:32 p.m. EDT (1932 GMT)

(CNN) -- Just days after Hurricane Floyd hit the Bahamas, tourists are already heading back. The storm, which pummeled the 700-island archipelago a week ago, downed power lines and dashed wooden houses. But the Bahamian Ministry of Tourism's Web site says the islands are "back in business" and ready to accept visitors.

"We have called down there," said one passenger departing Atlanta for Nassau, the Bahamian capital, "and they told us they have cleaned up most of the debris and everything was fine."

While popular tourist destinations such as Nassau say they are picking up the pieces, it's a different story in other parts of the country.

A journalist with the Broadcasting Corporation of the Bahamas tells CNN that some of the outlying islands suffered devastating damage.

Hundreds of wooden homes were flattened or otherwise damaged in Abaco, Eleuthera and Cat islands, which took direct hits in the storm's rampage with 145 mph winds. Sand blanketed places where coastal villages once stood, boats were smashed, sunken and beached.

Residents of Elbow Cay, a tourist destination, are using an Internet message center to communicate conditions. Postings on the site suggest it might take some time to recover and complain of unfair taxation on relief supplies.

But one hotel owner on Abaco says that in the end, the tourists will keep coming.

"You equate earthquakes with California, but people continue to go back to California," says Nettie Symonette of Nettie's Different of Abaco. "The Caribbean is a most desired destination, and people will continue to go there."

CNN Travel Now Correspondent Jim Morelli and the Associated Press contributed to this report.

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