HSC Men Make Their Return!

Stephen and the Hampden-Sydney men returned to the beach in mid-May for their second annual visit!  Stephen is a newly minted Wake Forest graduate and the rest of the group continue to further their education at Wake Forest, Penn State and other schools scattered around the country.

It's Windy!

We arrived on the last day of March for a 10-day Easter/Spring Break vacation.  The weather has been absolutely outstanding!  Every day has been in the upper-60's to mid-70's without a cloud in the sky.  The winds have gotten progressively stronger each day and have been gusting up to 35-40 mph.  If you are planning to come down to Hatteras sometime this summer, you can be assured that the ocean will be here waiting for you!

Bodie Island Lighthouse Restoration Project

I spent the last 3 days in Buxton painting a door and doing other miscellaneous projects around the house. On the way home I stopped to take a picture of the Bodie Island Lighthouse surrounded by scaffolding. The National Park Service is in the process of restoring the lighthouse, which will allow visitors to walk up it for the first time ever. The project is supposed to take 18 months. Use this link for more information:
http://www.nps.gov/caha/parknews/progress-on-bodie-island-lighthouse-restoration-project.htm

New Year's Eve 2009

We made the trip down to Hatteras yesterday and plan to be here through New Year's Day.  It rained hard this morning leaving us with a flooded street.  It cleared out this afternoon and warmed up to the high 50's.

The storm that hit in November has reshaped the beach, making it much wider.  It will be interesting to see if the wider beach lasts until next summer.  The house at the end of the street still has its carports full of sand and it appears as though no one is living there.  Enjoy the pictures (double click in the picture box for larger pictures).

Coastal Storm

A coastal storm hit the Outer Banks last week, wrecking havoc on Buxton, Mirlo Beach and Nags Head.  Dare County is estimating that the storm caused $5.2 million in damage.  The dune at the end of our street, Cottage Avenue, was breached and water ran all the way out to Old Lighthouse Road and beyond.  We were fortunate that our house did not sustain any damages due to the elevation of our lot.  Bobcats are in the process of rebuilding the dune, but the more significant issue continues to be the damage to Highway 12 in Mirlo Beach that is restricting traffic to the south end of Hatteras Island.

Check out slides 3, 4, 6 and 42 from the attached link.  The Porsche belongs to a woman who lives at the end of the street (closest to the ocean/dune)!
http://islandfreepress.org/2009Archives/11.13.2009-NightFallsOnIslandsBatteredByTheOceanAndSound2/index.html

OBX Half Marathon Finishers!

Carolee, Melissa and Kristyne ran the OBX Half Marathon this morning.  After an early wake up call (before 5 a.m), we drove up the beach to mile marker 11 in Nags Head and dropped the girls off at the race start.  It was an absolutely gorgeous day, with temps in the high 50's at race start (7 a.m.) and in the upper 60's when they crossed the finish line.  There wasn't a cloud in the sky!  The race course ran south through a couple of Nags Head neighborhoods and crossed over the Manteo bridge for a downtown Manteo finish.  Melissa had been sick all week and got off her death bed to finish in 2:07+.  Kristyne finished in 2:09+ and Carolee finished in 2:25+...a great showing by all three ladies!  Congratulations and wear the bling with pride!

Birthday Girl!

With school starting again we have been very busy, making it difficult to get down to the beach. This was our first visit since Labor Day and the entire family spent a long weekend celebrating Carolee's birthday (the actual day was Saturday). Melissa did the cooking for the birthday meal...stuffed shells and Emril's chocolate cream pie...topping off a day of running (12 miles for Carolee & Melissa), walking the beach, bike riding, watching football and fishing (3 speckled trout for Eric). The weather was nice on Friday (mid 60's) and has gotten progressively cooler each day. It has been very windy, but it is really hard to complain...its the beach! Anyway, Carolee is going home with books, CD's, clothes, kitchen knives and other booty from her birthday bash. P.S. I know this is somewhat topical, but exactly what did Obama do to deserve a Nobel peace prize?