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1 Ocracoke Island, beach...
Ocracoke Island, NC
August 21, 2003
We spent the day of August 21 on Ocracoke Island, and it was wonderful. Below is an overhead view of the island...
We stayed the night of August 20 at a small motel, Edward's of Ocracoke, and it was very nice. They had arranged our room easily, and the key was in the door the note on the office door said; down-home service...
The porch has rocking chairs, laid-back. We found a nice place for dinner, Capt. Ben's Restaurant (established in 1970), and had a good seafood dinner. I got myself a small shot glass for my collection.
The next morning, we found a small place, the Pony Island Restaurant, just a short walk away for a good breakfast. They had the largest piece of country ham! with my eggs I'd ever seen. We had to do "take out"...
There's this great walking tour map, which you can see
here, that we used in our wanderings. It was in the Ocracoke Island brochure I had gotten mailed to me before the trip.
This older island isn't overbuilt like some other parts of the Outer Banks, and it's small, you need to park your car and walk around, or they rent bikes, too.
After breakfast, we drove to the British Cemetery, where four British sailors are buried from a sinking in 1942 of a British ship by a German submarine. Then, we parked at the National Park Service lot, and visited the island's museum --a must see. Very nice use of an older home from 1900, with great antiques, and history of the island...
We walked to the Ocracoke Lighthouse around Silver Lake Harbor, stopping in a few shops along the way. The lighthouse isn't accessible for climbing to the top, but it's a beautiful old structure.
Nick and I drove from town out towards the Cape Hatteras end, and found a great beach. This photo above in this album is a shot of the waves. All of the coastline was wonderfully empty, since school had just started up in NC. The island is part of the Cape Hatteras National Seashore. We didn't have enough time on this trip to include the lighthouse there in our travels; so, we agreed we would come back next year and visit that.
One of our guides said Ocracoke Island beaches are the 6th best beaches in the country. I agree.. open to all, uncrowded, lovely small waves, good shelling and swimming. Perfect!
