Crazy set of events here. I'm on vacation at the beach and I needed to get the hood open. Pulled the lever, and I felt something release, but the hood is still down, it didn't pop up at all. I can hit it, press down, etc, and it doesn't pop up to let me get my hand in there to release the latch.

What do I do? The mechanism seems to be above this plastic shield, and there's no way to get to it. I should probably wait till I get home next week but now I'm concerned if anything happens... (We jettisoned party of our catalytic converter heat shield in the Carolinas, somewhere on 77... )

Any ideas?

Mazda 5, 2008, 165k...