North Carolina Outer Banks

TUE July 13

Left Lejeune and headed for the Outer Banks and for the shortest way to get there from here you take a ferry. This is why I’m on this trip, pretty country, driving slow and enjoying the beautiful USA. The GPS said it was only 65 miles from Lejeune to Cedar Island where I had a reservation on the 12:30 PM ferry but it also said it would take 2 1/4 hours to drive it, that’s averaging about 30 MPH but I don’t have anywhere to be really and I’m just relaxing, driving and soaking it all in. The first half of the drive was pretty much through pine forests and the second half across marshes on causeways with marsh grasses on both sides of the road with one stop for a drawbridge, me and the Marine convoy that I suspect was heading for an auxiliary field near Sealevel NC.

Got to the Cedar Island – Ocracoke Island ferry early but that just allowed me to walk around and get some exercise before a 2-hour ride, about 20 miles on a flat sea, then I drive the 14-miles on the island to catch another ferry to Hatteras Island where I have a reservation for the night, and hopefully a seafood supper if I can get a recommendation for a restaurant.

The 2-hour ferry was again relaxing because I couldn’t speed it up so just enjoy seeing the shrimp boats, dolphins, other ferries and the Ocaracoke light house light followed by a half hour drive to the next ferry, 35-minutes, and para-sailors and a few sail-boarders. So, all-in-all, it took me 8 hours, minus 2:35 on ferries, to go 116 miles, just relaxing.

Tonight I went out to the supper I was looking forward to and to remember an anniversary. I had a glass of ice and a beer and a glass of wine, love to Mom, and a very good crab and shrimp dinner.