4x4 Beach

Today there is a Surf Advisory caused by Hurricane Ike. It's amazing to me that storms that far away can affect the beaches here! Since the rip tides made swimming dangerous, we decided to check another adventure off our list.

Corey has been dying to take his new jeep off-road. We heard there was an area north of Corolla (pronounced Core-ahllah down here) where you can drive your vehicles out onto the beach.

We stopped in Duck, NC along the way for lunch. We ate at this great place on the water (Sound-side) called Sunset Grille. We had a lovely view from our table, and we were able to watch the kayakers and other boaters come in and out.

To ensure we didn't do this off-roading thing wrong, we read the car manual to find out what to do along the way. Apparantly it's not-so-tricky to switch to 4WD in his car! As soon as we entered the 4x4 area, we saw a few wild mustangs. The horses have been traced back to the Spanish Conquistadors and some still roam freely here. One of the local attractions boasted that you can pet a "gentled" mustang if you take their tour...not so sure what that means...

We drove along the beach for a few miles. The beaches here were less crowded, and the sand seemed to have a finer texture. You can drive along this beach all the way to the Virginia border, although you aren't allowed to cross it from the beach. We found out that there are several neighborhoods in this area as well. There were "streets" made of sand to get to the houses.

We drove back to Kitty Hawk and saw the Currituck lighthouse along the way. We're not sure if this is the actual name of the lighthouse, since some call it the Whalehead lighthouse. There are four lighthouses in the area: Currituck, Ocracoke, Bodie Island, and Cape Hattaras.

We ate dinner at Goombay's. The decor made it look like you were under water. They even had flamingos, which my mom would appreciate! Another fun day....