Before I forget our vacation, I thought I would share a few pix with you.
We were gone for almost two weeks, the longest vacation I have had for years! In fact, we drove much of the state. We flew into Raleigh and spent two nights in Chapel Hill at Jeff’s older daughter’s house and then we all drove to the south coast to spend three nights at Oak Island. Then we drove back to Chapel Hill, and the next morning, Jeff and I drove to Asheville to visit his younger daughter and her family. We spent two nights in Asheville that felt like a very quick stay, and then we drove back to Chapel Hill. After spending another night in CH, we fly back to MA once our very delayed flight took off. I felt like I was almost constantly on the go!
Although we covered a lot of ground, I will focus on our 3 day stay at the beach on Oak Island.
Oak Island
Oak Island is at the southern end of the North Carolina coast. It’s very close to South Carolina. The island is a long, slim-ish barrier island. My concern is that some years from now, it may no longer exist as the sea level rises. Nevertheless, the majority of the houses – especially those along and close to the beach – are built on stilts.
The AirBnB that we rented with Jeff’s daughter and her husband was an older, modest house. It looked like it was built in the 1950s or 60s.
On the lower level (not on stilts!) was a smaller, one bedroom apartment. Although Sonia and her husband that thought they might stay in their own private space downstairs, the apartment smelled so musty that it was impossible to stay downstairs.
I should have taken a photo of the open plan living room, dining area and kitchen because that was the nicest space. Instead, here’s a photo of our rather funky bedroom. But I appreciated the king size bed!
Here are a couple of other, more attractive neighborhood houses.
The area we were staying at had 3 streets that ran parallel to the beach. The houses appeared to be middle-class houses, by and large, and probably about 70% of the houses were rentals.
This is the beach that was about two blocks from our house. The temperature of the ocean was about 75 degrees. In Gloucester MA where I usually swim, the water is a chilly 60-65 degrees. The warm NC ocean was a pleasure!
We went to a local restaurant on our first night at Oak Island, and we managed to get a seat indoors just before it rained.
After dinner, the post-rain sunset was beautiful!
The next day, we took a ferry to Bald Head Island. Unfortunately, the weather was quite overcast, and the photos weren’t so impressive. There are no cars allowed on BHI, so like everyone else, we tooled around the island on a golf cart. It was fun. We stopped for a short walk along the wetlands area below.
Before heading back on the ferry, we stopped at one of the Bald Head Island beaches. The dunes were beautiful, the water was warm, and many folks on the beach had a shibumi, a large sun shade that protects at least 6 people from the sun’s rays. The shibumi, crafted from recycled plastic with UPF 50+, is easy to assemble and works with, rather than against, the wind. The only drawback is the $270 price tag. The shibumi is manufactured in the U.S. In fact, I think it was designed in North Carolina. I’ve never seen one in Massachusetts, unfortunately.
On Sunday, back on Oak Island, the sun returned, and we drove a couple of miles down the island to an area with a beautiful, almost empty beach. Great for picking up shells!
Later that day, Jeff and I took a sunset walk. I managed to capture some gorgeous views.
So this was the “new” to me part of our trip. Have you been to Oak Island or Bald Head Island?
I live in NC. I inherited some land near Oak Island, in Boiling Springs Lake. I am not a beach person. BHI is is sort of a snobby place. A former friend and her siblings have homes there. They were supposed to build a port in the are, Southport. However because of the people on BHI and others in the area stopped it. It could have been a very lucrative deal to have a port. NCl lost many contracts because of this. I hope you had a good time. NC hassome of the nicest beaches in the US.
Ah, I forgot that you live in NC! I will check a map so see where Boiling Springs Lake is as I didn’t notice signs for it. Bald Head Island seemed to be filled with daytrippers, like us, when we were there. Many islands can be snobby places, to some extent. When I was young, I always rented a place with other friends on Fire Island, a barrier island off of Long Island. Actually, I can understand why BHI blocked the port. Years ago Venice (Italy) allowed cruise ships in their beautiful harbor, and the ships and the tourists have dwarfed the city. Sometimes it’s difficult to balance financial progress with concern about the quality of life. We had a good time. It was nice to see other beach besides our beaches in Gloucester, Ipswich and Beverly, and experience the “perfect temperature” ocean!
What beautiful pictures you’ve taken. I hope you filled out the form on AirBnB to let others know of the musty smell. That would be difficult for me to stay in.
It’s wonderful that you could spend so much time with Jeff’s daughters.
Jeff’s daughter booked the rental (I think it was through AirBnB, though many places on Oak Island were rentals through a local company). I know she had planned to complain about the smell downstairs since the space was essentially unusable regardless of one’s sensitivity to scents. It was awful down there!!
Oh how fantastic! I’m so glad you got to go to such a beautiful place! Sorry I’ve been absent for so long. Things have been unreal.
I’m so happy to hear from you again, Gabrielle! No pressure on commenting, lol 🙂 I’m sorry that things haven’t been good at home. I hope they improve very soon!
Thank you!
xoxo
I grew up in that area. Caswell Beach Yaupon Beach and Long Beach, later to be a part of Oak Island was a great place to live in the 60 and 70’s . Like every coastal area it has grown so much. There is still some of the small town feel when you visit. Loved the pictures, it felt like a wonderful hug from home!
Thank you, Karen! It was my first time visiting Oak Island. It still felt like a small town to me! Hopefully, we will go back next year to celebrate Jeff’s daughter’s anniversary since her wedding happened during covid!
I live here. This was not originally an island, and is much larger than what you describe. You exaggerate the rentals, and didn’t seem to enjoy the positive parts of the island. Please tell your friends what an awful place this is, less people equals better Island life.
Yes, you are right. I was writing just about the several mile strip along the water. There I would say I was quite accurate about the number of rentals, not the town as a whole. I know what you mean about keeping the area to yourself!
We go to Sunset Beach, NC every summer for our vacation! Very near Bald Head Island. I am glad you enjoyed it.
Thank you, Ann, for your comment and letting me know about Sunset Beach! I will check it out on the map since I am not from the area. The beaches are so beautiful with WARM WATER!!!
Oh my god! Definitely saving this spot for when we happen to be in the area 😍
It’s a lovely spot that’s great for family vacations!
Family has had property here for 50+ years. This used to be an amazing family place, quiet, just enough good restaurants and family play activities. The town has allowed developers to demolish every good family thing to do off the beach and has allowed monstrous houses to block views of houses that survived hurricanes like Hazel, Floyd, Hugo. No we see the backs of houses instead of lovely dunes and partial ocean views. It is completely overrun with tourists now. Not like us who consider ourselves a part of the community a d take care of the beach. People who liter, illegally trample the dunes we work so hard to preserve and seem to have absolutely terrible manners. I feel so sad for the folks who live here full time now. It’s very difficult for them. Now add to that paid parking at thr public accesses. Just ruining itself to try to be like every other beach town. Sad.all of this im.sure will continue thanks to the myriad of bloggers like you who visit and then post about it for the world to see. You may think it’s a great place, but it is a shell of it’s former self and you are helping to further destroy it.
Come to my beautiful town, Gloucester MA. It’s the same, Allyson. The discussion among residents for decades has been about the future: tourism vs. the fishing industry. Right now, tourism including AirBnBs, folks from out of town buying luxury homes and condos and leaving them empty much of the time, daytrippers on cruise ships appears to be winning as fishing seems to be waning. Been to Europe lately? Same thing. I thought Oak Island was nice, a change for me because of the warm ocean water from our beautiful beaches in Massachusetts. I write about all the places I go because my readers, some of whom don’t get to go anywhere, enjoy reading about my occasional travels. Your are casting blame at the wrong person. What you should be doing is going to your local town meeting or run for office in your town to change back the zoning laws and figure out a way for the local residents to earn a living rather than renting out their homes.
Such beautiful picks. I have parents who live on Oak island, so I visit often. Sure it has grown but its still has a small town feel. Although, I DON’T agree with the paid parking, big mistake.