As water lapped at their porch Monday evening, Old Mandeville’s Craig and Anne Danos sipped wine and joked over a dinner of broccoli with cheese and fried chicken.

Hurricane Gustav was just another storm for the couple that’s lived on Gerard Street since 1996.

“I went swimming in the street today,” Anne said, sipping a glass of red wine. “We can’t be too scared. It was almost like celebrating that water didn’t come into our house.”

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The Danos are just one of several home and business owners who saw chest deep water swallow much of Olde Mandeville’s Lakefront this afternoon.

The water rose at least 5 feet since 11 a.m., when Lakeshore Drive could be driven on, Craig said.

Earlier in the day Mandeville Police set up barricades on Monroe Street, about five blocks north of Lakeshore Drive west, to Sunset Point, to block sightseers from entering into the flood prone area.

It didn’t work. Dozens of people sloshed through the water, some with beers in hand, others carrying small dogs in their arms, while dodging groups of ants floating in the water. A few kids, smiling and giggling, even dove into the waves cresting down Gerard Street that were so large it nearly engulfed a shiny new black Corvette.

“I can’t even get over this,” said Gary Willis, a Magnolia Ridge resident who came to see the surge. “I would have never dreamed this would happen here.”

Willis, who moved from Grand Isle after Hurricane Katrina destroyed his home in 2005, weathered another blow today when a 40-foot pine sliced through his home.

Still, he remained in good spirits, joking with passerbys to watch out for “that alligator” as he pointed to nearby waves. There was no such alligator.

Asked if he was discouraged at suffering through another storm three years after Katrina, he laughed.

“Are you kidding me? This is fabulous,” he said, referring to a storm surge that didn’t match Grand Isle’s in 2005.

Others however, weren’t so thrilled.

Kacey Webster of Covington sloshed through the water toward the doors of her employer, Lucy’s Retired Surfer Bar on Gerard Street, and peered inside. Water about a foot deep churned inside, the only sign of life inside a paper napkin with forks unwrapped on the counter, seemingly abandoned before a meal. Outside patio furniture knocked into other chairs and tables floating in the water.

Rips also had water inside, but it was not known if anything else flooded.

“I loved working here,” she said with a sigh. “It’s great working right off the lake. I guess I’ll have to look for another job.”

Meanwhile, Craig and Anne Danos sat on their porch and watched the dozens of sightseers trudging through the water while waves from Lake Pontchartrain slammed into the Lakefront levee.

They also kept one eye on their porch steps.

“When that last step is covered (with water) we know we need to go,” Anne said.

Thankfully that scenario only happened once – during Katrina -- since 1996, the year the couple moved in.

Two feet of water rushed into their home during that storm event. Craig, just last month, finished renovating the home.

“This is our home,” Anne said. “We’re not leaving.”