In the summer of 2021, the Outer Banks, also know as OBX to the cool kids, hosted 159,000 visitors.

The average for December is usually under 10,000.

We’re not antisocial or anything, but—

Okay, yes we are.

We’re antisocial.

So let’s go to the Outer Banks!

We left New England in an ice storm on Christmas afternoon and had an uneventful drive to Milford, Delaware.

I’d now love to regale you with all of the fun things you can do in Milford, Delaware:

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To be fair, it was Christmas night at 10pm when we arrived.

In Delaware.

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After spending Delaware, Maryland, and Virginia listening to the Queen’s Christmas Day speech (and her big old snub to Harry and Meghan, but I digress) and a variety of Stuff You Should Know podcasts, (turns out there’s a lot of stuff we don’t know), through the magic of the internet—we’re in the Outer Banks!

And everything is closed.

That’s an exaggeration.

90% of things are closed.

Here’s what’s open and worth doing.

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1. Free Sunset Cruises! (It’s a Ferry. But Still.)

To get to our camp spot, we must load the Scamp onto the ferry and take a spectacular sunset cruise to the island of Ocracoke.

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(Note: the ferry ride is not billed as such, but if you get your timing right, you too can stand outside your car amongst other people’s vehicles and listen to their overly-loud talk radio shows, while you watch the birds swoop along the waves and the sun sink into the sea).

Free sunset cruise, 5-stars.

Passenger entertainment—variable.

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2. S-words

We backed into our reserved spot at Ocracoke Campground to a sand (S-word #1) dune-filled backyard, and climbed up to the beach (novel idea, that) to see if the stars (S-word #2) are as spectacular as we had heard.

But since I’m seven in my soul, what I really wanted to do was go to bed.

I am absolutely a morning person. It is the best time for everything.

Luckily, the morning brought an equally impressive sunrise (S-word #3) migrating birds, dolphins, and a startling realization that I had never seen a dolphin outside of an aquarium.

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Score one for mornings.

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3. Headless Pirates

After the sunrise show, the only thing on the agenda on our first full day was an 11 mile run.

Disclaimer: we pretend to run. What we actually do is run, walk, run while swearing about running, walk some more, complain and run, and then attempt to justify walking by whining about the weather/wind/dogs/people on the trail/last night’s dinner.

We “ran” into the town of Ocracoke to Teach’s Hole, famed for the defeat of the Dread Pirate Roberts.

I mean Blackbeard.

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(Until this moment, my experience with Pirates was limited to the Dread Pirate Roberts, those of Penzance, and the “of the Caribbean” varieties).

In the 1700s, Blackbeard (who’s real name was Edward Teach—not nearly as intimidating) was notorious for the chaos he caused up and down the Carolina coast. He would set his beard on fire to freak out his enemies. Much to the chagrin of the settlers on Ocracoke, he would also throw wild pirate parties for days in the Ocracoke inlet.

Legend has it that a lieutenant of the British Royal Navy named Robert Maynard battled with Blackbeard (presumably because he was not invited to the parties).

It doesn’t go well for the pirates. Blackbeard was stabbed 25 times, and shot 5, before being subsequently beheaded.

Legend also has it that Maynard then stuck his head on the bowsprit, and then Blackbeard’s headless body swam around the lieutenant’s ship before finally succumbing to the deep.

Happily, our run did not encounter any pirates (or beheadings, for that matter).

Unhappily, Teach’s Hole was only the halfway point of the run.

When we got back to the camper, we proceeded to sit.

All afternoon.

Note: You can also bike the same path, and in the winter, traffic is close to non-existent. (Except when the ferry is loading and unloading— then, it’s a live-action Frogger game).

And you’re the frog.

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4. Hang Glide Under the Tutelage of a 25 Year Old

Jockey’s Ridge State Park is home to the largest sand dunes on the East Coast.

And also home to Kitty Hawk Kites Hang Gliding School.

What better way to see the dunes up close and personal (more on that later) than trusting that the 20 minutes of ground school instruction you received while in the car on the ferry ride over is enough to prevent you from plummetting to certain death?

I’m exaggerating. It wasn’t just 20 minutes of video. It was also about an hour of in-person instruction by a guide too young to remember when hang gliding caught on in popularity— “way back” in the 1970s.

Way back.

Hang gliding was magnificent.

It was awesome in the original, Merriam & Webster sense of the word: causing feelings of fear and wonder.

I-am-a-soaring-bird-embracing-the-freeedom-of-flight awesome.

Each student received instruction through five flights, and even when I “flared” too early, and thus crashed my third flight, I still thought it was awesome. (When I got out from under the kite and realized I wasn’t bleeding, concussed, or otherwise severely damaged from falling 15 feet out of sky and landing face-first in the sand).

The good news is that it was all caught on camera, to be preserved for posterity for all time.

Then the camera broke.

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5. You, Too, Can Feel Like You Have Accomplished Nothing in your Life

The Wright Brothers National Memorial is all things flight. Take the incredibly informative walking tour, check out the museum, and learn how a couple of bicycle builders refused to give up and went on to change the way we travel the world.

I am forever indebted.

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You need to climb the original dune to check out the monument, and it’s worth it.

After a day learning the basics of hang gliding, I believe I now have a crush on the Wright brothers.

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6. Early Settlers Just Needed a Brewery

Ocracoke Island is home to the 1718 Brewery, thusly named because 1718 was the year that Blackbeard lost his head in the sound. We may have visited —every night we were on the island — to partake of their Mexican Dark Chocolate Stout.

Outer Banks Brewing Station in Kill Devil Hills also offers up an excellent winter warmer. And it’s the first wind-powered brewery in America. (We were mid-gale when we stopped, so that seems like a smart business decision).

Swells’a Brewing Beer Company in Kill Devil Hills has a surfer vibe, all white wood and hang-10 references. But they had a beer called the Lil Betty Oatmeal (stout) Creme Pie, and I’m seven in my soul, so that was entirely drinkable.

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Lost Colony Brewing in Manteo is just around the corner from the Lost Colony of Roanoke. Not to be outdone, nearby Outer Banks Distilling makes Kill Devil Rum.

Rumor has it that the rum, (and the name of the town), came from a rum that washed ashore from a shipwreck that was so strong it could “kill the devil.” Their pecan-honey rum must be derived from the original recipe.

But it was New Year’s Eve in Manteo, and we were waiting to see Breaking Grass, an excellent bluegrass band at the Pioneer theater, so we had to try it all.

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If you’re going to Manteo, you need to tour the grounds of the actual birthplace of the country, and take a wonderfully guided walking tour of the Lost Colony of Roanoke.

It’s the first attempted English settlement in the New World, where a group of around 115 settlers mysteriously disappeared in the late 1580s. 

Obviously, they needed more breweries.

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7. If I Had a Pony, I’d Ride Him on my Boat.

I am afraid of two things in my life.

Having my blood drawn, and horses.

These are ponies.

P-O-N-I-E-S.

Lie.

These are horses!

Horses that came over with the Spainiards in the 1500s. Because crossing the ocean for months at a time in a tenuous-at-best sailboat wasn’t challenging enough. Once, these horses-that-are-not-ponies roamed free over the Ocracoke Island beaches.

Since 1959, the National Park Service has protected me them in a “pony enclosure.” For their safety (and mine).

They are called ponies, or “banker ponies” (yep, took me a minute to remember they were on the Outer Banks, and not George Bailey Building and Loan bankers) because of their size.

Take it from this equinophobe, they are horses.

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8. Let There be Light (houses).

The Cape Hatteras lighthouse gets all the love down here. It’s the tallest in the country, so superlatives win again.

But it wins in my book because they moved it.

Wait, what? Yep, in 1999, they moved a 4,400 ton (that’s more than 8 million pounds) lighthouse 2,900 feet inland away from the eroding seashore.

They moved a lighthouse.

Call me easily impressed, but I love marvels of engineering.

Not to be outdone, the Ocracoke Lighthouse is the second oldest operating lighthouse in the nation, and because I’m me, I had to research the oldest.

The oldest operating lighthouse in the USA (and the adjective operating is important here) is in Sandy Hook, New Jersey.

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There’s also the Bodie Island Lighthouse, which I have dubbed the “unluckiest lighthouse.”

Bodie was originally built in 1847, but because it’s construction was overseen by someone who had no lighthouse experience whatsoever, it quickly developed a dangerous lean, and was then rebuilt in 1859.

That’s when it was blown up by the Confederates in 1861, to keep it out of the hands of the Union soldiers.

That’s dedication to the cause.

The current lighthouse was constructed in 1871, and it immediately had to contend with flocks of geese crashing into the lens, and being improperly grounded against lightning attacks.

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9. People are Weird

People are weird, and the Outer Banks are no exception. Sorry, OBX.

Futuro House:

If you ever wanted to live in a UFO, you should make time to drive by the Futuro House. There are less than 100 of these prefabricated houses, designed by Finnish architect Matti Suuronen, in existence.

The Mother Vine:

The Mother Vine is also on Roanoke Island, and, at 400 years old is believed to be the oldest grape vine in all of North America.

Maybe the original colonists weren’t looking for breweries after all, but wineries?

Oversized Novelty Chairs:

The easiest way to lose weight in your photos. Sit in a chair that engulfs you. You don’t even need to raise the camera lens.

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Biscuits and Porn:

Self explanatory.

You can get biscuits (smothered in cheese, as big as your head, so— healthy) and porn.

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And now, 650,000 Reasons to avoid the Outer Banks.

May I present the Cenchrus spinifex–

Otherwise known as the coastal sand spur– or, as we called them, the “spiky balls of death”.

These little balls of agony are the seeds of a perennial grass that grows on the dunes —and you don’t even notice them.

Well, not at first. Not until—

Until they embed into the softest part of your foot, you know that spot, just under the joint of your middle toe?

Yeah, that spot.

Then you notice. Or when you throw down a towel to sit in the sand and the spikes penetrate the towel and embed in the back of your knee.

Or when you think you have picked every single one of them out of your camping mat and so you confidently take off your shoes (so as not to litter the camper floor with mounds of sand) and then force your entire body weight down on one, through the arch of your foot.

Then you notice.

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The sand spurs are not really enough reason to avoid the OBX. (Even though, really, there are 650,000 of them, which might even be an underestimate.)

The islands are beautiful, and in the winter:

• Perfect for solitary sunrises.
• Flat for running (if you have to).
• Horses, if you don’t have irrational fears.
• No tourists. Like, tour guides want to answer all your questions.
• Full of adventure. Attach yourself to a wing and learn to fly. And fall. Sand is good for your teeth, right?
• So much history. And grapevines. And beer. (Those don’t really correlate, but whatever).
• Giant aluminum sea life on posts, and other random weirdness.

Happy New Year, OBX…

…and Happy Trails!