Cape Hatteras National Seashore, North Carolina - November 10th to 13th, 2021
November is a little late in the year to visit the seashore if you want to go into the water, but it is a great time of year to avoid the crowds of people. Our time at Cape Hatteras National Seashore was spent relaxing, walking on the beach, visiting lighthouses, and enjoying the sunset.
On Wednesday, we drove from Williamsburg, Virginia to Frisco Campground in Cape Hatteras National Seashore in North Carolina. The drive took us down the length of most of Bode Island and Hatteras Island. We crossed over to Bode Island at Kitty Hawk, so, of course, we had to stop at the Wright Brothers National Memorial.
The memorial is the location where Wilbur and Orville made those first four powered flights along with Kill Devil Hill, the sand dune that the brothers used to perform many glider tests. Inside the visitor center is a museum which includes a replica of the original flyer. Outside are five stone markers indicating the spot where the flyer launched from and the four landing spots of each of the flights. On top of Kill Devil Hill is a large monument. At the top of the monument is a marine beacon, similar to a lighthouse. The wooden living quarters and airplane hanger that the Wrights used while they were here have been reconstructed.
Left Buddy (LB) was not expecting the area to contain so much vegetation. He was expecting mostly sand. One of the informational signs indicated that grass was planted in the 1920’s to stabilize the soil. So the area back in 1903 had more visible sand, which meant the brothers lugged their gliders up the large sand dune to conduct their experiments.
We found the memorial quite interesting. Walking along all the stone markers of the first flights gives you the sense of scale of those flights. Walking up the paths to the top Kill Devil Hill also gives a sense of scale and of how much effort it would be to haul those gliders to the top, even though you are walking on pavement instead of loose sand. From the top of the hill, you also have a great view of Bode Island and the ocean.
Not far from the Wright Brothers National Memorial, we found a nice little ice cream shop called Scoops Homemade Ice Cream. The ice cream sustained us until we reached Frisco Campground to make dinner in the dark. The shorter days and going off of daylight savings time makes it hard to reach the campground before dark. But it gives us a reason to use our headlamps, right?
On Thursday, we explored Hatteras and Ocracoke islands. Our first stop was the beach.
From the campground, we walked over to the beach. There are two boardwalks leading a couple hundred yards over the dunes to the beach. The camp sites are set back in a grove of scrubby little trees. So, even though our camp site is not far from the beach, we could not see it or the ocean from our Red Tail Lodge (our van), but we could hear the surf. However, being nestled in the vegetation made us feel like we had the campground all to ourselves. Being the off-season, the campground was far from full. The only time we saw another person in the campground was when we drove the loop to leave.
The beach by the campground is nice, with lots of seashells in the sand. When we were there, a group of people on horseback came onto the beach. One of the young ladies was dressed in a long, gold sequined dress. We’re guessing they were doing a photo shoot on the beach.
A few other people had driven their vehicles onto the beach. Driving on the beach requires an ORV permit. Walking over to the beach was good enough for us.
Next, we drove over to the Hatteras Lighthouse. A nearby visitor center enabled us to purchase our sticker to add to our sticker collection on our refrigerator. Next to the lighthouse are the two light keeper houses. One of the houses contained a small museum about Cape Hatteras. Unfortunately, at this time, we could not climb the lighthouse.
After a quick tour of the museum, we headed over to Lighthouse Beach, the site of the previous location of the lighthouse. The barrier islands are constantly changing shape, as the sand builds up in some spots and is eroded away in others. The Hatteras Lighthouse, which was originally built in 1870, was moved 2900 feet in 23 days in 1999, moving it back 1500 feet from the ocean.
Lighthouse Beach appears to be a popular spot for surfers. We enjoyed watching them trying to catch a wave. The waves seem pretty strong in this location. A few large fishing boats were sailing not too far from shore.
We decided to head over to Ocracoke Island. To get there, we needed to take the free ferry, which is part of US 12 highway. We got in line at around 11:45 am. A boat was just letting vehicles off at the dock. Then it sat there. LB saw a maintenance truck pull up. And it sat there some more. At 12:15 pm, another ferry boat arrived. It unloaded and then sat there for a while. It then took a load of vehicles that were in line before us. Around 1:15 pm, they let us on the first boat that had been sitting there for an hour and a half. Yay! Well, not so fast. We pulled out of the dock, turned around, and then docked again. All the vehicles were off-loaded. The boat was having mechanical issues. Fortunately, another boat arrived and they put us on that one. Now it was 1:45 pm. Finally, this one took us all the way over to Ocracoke Island.
The ferry ride itself is just over an hour. The channel the ferry follows is much longer than the distance between the two islands. Right Buddy (RB) enjoyed going up to the observation deck and snapping pictures of the wildlife, scenery, and other boats. The ride itself was worth the wait.
So we got to Ocracoke just before 3 pm, over three hours after we first lined up for the ferry. Luckily, we only had a couple points of interest we wanted to see, the Pony Pen and the Ocracoke Lighthouse.
The Pony Pen contains the horses that are descendants of the ones that used to roam wild on the island. They are now cared for in pastures surrounded by wooden fences and wooden barns to provide shelter. RB was hoping they were in a more natural setting, but it was still worth a quick stop.
The Ocracoke Lighthouse is in the middle of the village. Built in 1823, it is the second oldest lighthouse still in operation in the United States. When we arrived, the park ranger outside the lighthouse was busy telling stories about the lighthouse, the light keepers’ lives, and the area. You could walk inside the lighthouse, but not climb the tower. However, the ranger was rambling on for so long that some people left before they had a chance to peek inside. Everyone was too polite to interrupt the ranger and his interesting stories. We stood there and listened for what seemed like half an hour. A few minutes before 4 pm, he finally stopped talking and let people step inside the lighthouse. He was locking up for the day at 4 pm.
We were hoping to find an ice cream shop in the village before heading back. However, we couldn’t find one that was open. We even asked the park ranger at the lighthouse. He only knew of two ice cream shops. One closed at 4 pm and the other was closed for the season. So we headed back to get in line for the ferry.
We were hoping the wait for the ferry would go faster this time. On the way over, we talked with someone who said they come over quite often. They commented that the longest they’ve ever had to wait for a ferry before was one hour. Our luck on the way back was not any better than the way over. We got in line at 4:15 pm and didn’t get on a boat until 6:15 pm, well after dark. During our two hour wait in line, the birds were gathering in the trees alongside the road next to us. This gave RB a challenge trying to catch pictures of the birds who did not want to sit still for her. Since we couldn’t see anything in the dark, the ferry ride was not as much fun this time.
Luckily, we have everything with us in our Red Tail Lodge. When we were waiting in line for the ferry the first time, we were able to eat our picnic lunch in the van. This time, we ate our dinner during the ferry ride. However, it was not the dinner we had planned since we didn’t want to cook inside the van while we were on the boat. So LB had cold leftover pizza, crackers, and cheese. RB had a roast beef and cheese sandwich on a flour tortilla, followed by a peanut butter and blackberry preserves tortilla, and an apple. The blackberry preserves were something we purchased while we were in the Smoky Mountains. Not the most delicious dinner we’ve ever had, but it sure beat waiting until we arrived back at our campsite to make dinner in the dark, again.
It was also nice that we had a good cell signal while on the ferry. RB got some work done and LB watched some YouTube videos. So the time was not wasted. By the time we got off the ferry it was 7:30 pm. Was an hour and a half on Ocracoke Island worth the six hours to get there and back? We didn’t mind the time. There was nothing else we had planned for the day. We are not beachgoers, fishermen, or boaters which seems to be the majority of the people visiting Cape Hatteras. However, if the weather forecast didn’t call for rain most of the next day, we might have given up sooner and tried again the next day.
A rain storm passed through Thursday night and lasted into Friday morning. We hung out inside the van until the rain stopped. After lunch, we ventured over to the beach. For about an hour or so, we strolled up and down the beach, looking at seashells and watching the birds in the surf. A few people were fishing while others were collecting shells.
There were quite a few dead puffer fish laying on the beach. We’re not quite sure why it was only puffer fish. Perhaps the remains of other fish are quickly picked clean by other animals while they leave the puffer fish alone since puffer fish are toxic to most animals.
The beach was relatively clean from trash, but LB did manage to pick up a small collection of garbage to throw away, including a plastic garbage bag to contain everything else. After throwing LB’s treasure into the dumpster and cleaning up, we decided it was ice cream time. That meant packing up the van and driving about 15 minutes into the town of Buxton.
We drove around to a few ice cream shops, but they were all closed. Then we noticed a sign on Angelo’s Pizza shop that said ice cream We went inside to investigate. Sure enough, they had Blue Bunny hand-dipped ice cream and milkshakes. Not the best ice cream in the world, but it will do. Once our ice cream craving was satisfied, we headed back to our camp site to set up our Red Tail Lodge once again. It only takes about ten minutes: pull out the leveling blocks, drive the van up onto the blocks, turn the passenger seat around, put the window vents in, set out the door mat, take the cutting board and container out of the sink, and take down the cargo net. Was it worth all that just to eat ice cream? Yes, ice cream is that important.
The rest of the afternoon was spent working and relaxing. RB walked back over to the beach in time for the sunset. It was gorgeous. The beach runs east and west, so it is a great spot for both sunrises and sunsets. The sky lit up in spectacular colors all the way from the west horizon, out over the ocean, to the east horizon. Hopefully RB was able to capture the essence of that beauty in her pictures and video for others to enjoy, including LB.
A surfer came out to test the rough waters. RB watched him for a while. The seas were pretty rough and the waves were strong. However, the surfer never really seemed to catch a good wave.
We cooked dinner in the dark again, using our headlamps. Several of the planned meals required cooking on our butane stove (paid link). We had been using the Instant Pot (paid link) more lately because we were struggling to find more butane canisters (paid link). None of the Walmarts or other stores we stopped at had them. We finally found a supply at a Bass Pro Shop in Hampton on our way from Williamsburg to Cape Hatteras. So we were back in business cooking on the stove again.
The drive on Saturday from Frisco Campground on Cape Hatteras to Jordan Lake State Park in North Carolina was lovely. Starting off the day, we walked over to the beach one last time to watch the sunrise. We debated about getting up that early and had not set an alarm. However, our bladders served as our alarm. Since we needed to get up anyway, we thought we might as well walk over to the beach. The sunrise was not as stunning as the sunset the day before, but it was still beautiful.
On our way out of Cape Hatteras, we stopped at the Bodie Island Lighthouse. The visitor center was closed due to staffing issues, but, more importantly, the restrooms were open.
From Bodie Island, we crossed over to Roanoke Island. From the highway, we could see condominiums with yachts parked in boat slips just outside their doors. Now that looked like a life of luxury. We wondered how much those cost the owners.
November turned out to be a great time for us to visit Cape Hatteras. The scenery was beautiful and the weather was warm enough for us to get outside to enjoy our surroundings. The only thing we missed while we were there was the lack of open ice cream shops!
Check out our related video: Cape Hatteras National Seashore, North Carolina
(RB)