Destination: Outer Banks

Pier on The Bogue Sound at Waters Edge RV Park, Newport NC

From Wilmington, along the North Carolina Coast, we rolled toward our next destination, a little blip on the map called Newport. It's actually a town along the Bogue Sound, which seems to be more like three places in one. There's Newport, then Morehead City, and finally Beaufort. These towns are and were based on fishing (and boating), now mostly of the sport variety, and then mostly of the food variety. Our headquarters is the Waters Edge RV park in Newport. The place sits along the main road, Highway 24, and from the road, at the entrance, you can't tell that it extends all the way to the sound, ending in a nice dock that juts out a long way over the water. From the dock, you're looking across at Atlantic Beach, lined with beautiful homes, vacation condos, and hotels. Not knowing what really to expect around this area, we reserved a spot for a week. Our stay ended up at just shy of a month! Why? Well, it's a place filled with cool towns all around, and we saw that we could indeed tour the entire Outer Banks (OBX to the locals) region using this as our base. At first we thought we might have to move up north to cover it all, but it's really easier to do it this way (and besides, we loved the folks at Waters Edge RV Park... fellow RV'ers, make a note-if in the area THIS is the place to stay awhile. Joanie, Linda, and Mr. Tom made us feel right at home! Highly recommended!).

Iconic Hatteras Lighthouse

Ferry landing in "downtown" Okracoke

  Our tour of the Outer Banks started with us driving Smarty a little over forty miles to the ferry terminal at

Cedar Island. From there we drove onto the ferry for a two hour ride to Okracoke, our first actual landfall in the slip of movable earth called The Outer Banks. Okracoke used to, of course, be a fishing village. Now it's a sleepy little summer resort town, full of inns and restaurants. We spent the night at The Edwards Inn, after walking the quaint streets and having a good local fish dinner. The next day, we drove up to the next ferry terminal on the north side of the island and took the ride to Hatteras Island, past the famous diagonally striped black and white lighthouse and on through the upscale area of Nags Head, and finally to our night's stay, this time in Kill Devil Hills. This is the Kitty Hawk area, and we were both anxious the next morning to head over

Actual spot where first plane flew

Wright's monument

to the Wright Brothers National Memorial and Museum. We spent the whole morning there and stood at the place where their planes took off for the first time. It's quite unique and contemplative, and it made us think about how far aviation has come in such a short time, as a big jet airliner casually flew overhead. On the third day, we started heading to home base and drove off the islands and on to the mainland. By early evening we were back in Newport.
 Our favorite new town that gets put in a special category for us, is New Bern, North

Pepsi's birthplace..downtown New Bern

Carolina. Ever hear of it? Maybe it sounds vaguely familiar? Well, aside from being the birthplace of Pepsi Cola, it is one of the prettiest small towns we've come across anywhere. From the waterfront to the downtown, the place oozes charm. There's some serious history here too. Many buildings and homes date back to the mid 1700's and the Tryon Palace, which goes back to 1770, and was the home of the first provincial governor of North Carolina. It's a mostly upscale little town, with a vibrant and walkable downtown, filled with neat stores and restaurants. A couple of our favorites, out of a bunch to choose from there, were The Chelsea in downtown and Persimmon on the water. In fact, we visited Persimmon twice during our month in the area, something we almost never do. Oriental is down the road from new Bern, and on the advice of a local, we drove over there one day. It's known around here as the sailboat capital, and there were hundreds, maybe thousands, of them everywhere. Oriental reminded me of the same laid back feel that Okracoke has. A place where it would be easy to spend a week...or a whole summer, just chillin'.

Persimmon restaurant in the moonlight

Our month went by like a flash, and before we knew it we were turning our attention towards The West, at least The Western side of North Carolina. We'd decided to go back to Asheville for the entire summer. Our reasoning was simple. First, we've gotten to the point where we like to leave summers traveling...to the tourist travelers and families. We have all year to explore, so why not let them have one less rig to contend with during the busy months. Next, we had entertained going out West to Santa Fe, but the water is scarce there now, and it's very dry. Third, we love Asheville. It has the hippie charm of Santa Fe. It has cool weather in summer, lots of outdoor venues, and the food! A special place indeed. So the summer of 2014 is WNC time for us. We plan to explore places in the area that we haven't had a chance to see yet, work, and enjoy the mountains. H2's big engine is revving now as I'm finishing up here, Mary Ann's at the wheel, and off we go from the wonderful North Carolina Coast to the beautiful mountains!

M A kicking back in Oriental