Escaping Hanna to Hunting Island
Actually, I was supposed to be frolicking on Nags Head, but Hanna storm-ed in, and blew away all my plans. Instead of wasting time staring at the ceiling of a hotel room, or eating the entire menu at one of the restaurants nearby, I decide to hightail it out of NC and head for Hunting Island State Park, which boasts of one of the most vibrant natural eco-systems on the East Coast. Not to mention 5 miles of one of the most virginal beaches I've ever seen.
Only comparison to it I have is the Point Reyes Seashore near San Francisco. Same marshy kind of backdrop, same migrating birds, and turtles and deer and racoons and pelicans and stuff. The weather's a lot different though. Hunting Island is a lot more tropical and the entire park is a lot flatter than Point Reyes, which has a more severe landscape and tapers off into Inverness Ridge.
Anyway, let's leave the wildlife and the rattlesnakes and the 170 ft lighthouse aside, cause my job here was to conduct a 'professional survey' of the Hunting Island Beach. By the time I reached there, Hunting Island had mostly re-opened, except for a few pockets on the southern side. Some trees were knocked down and the beachfront was a mess, so judging cleanliness would have to be skipped. But inspite of the uprooted trees, the beauty and the pristine nature of the beach shone through very clearly. There was literally nothing to see except for the dinky cabin homes on the beachfront. It was a bit of a mystery to me how a storm could be strong enough to uproot trees, and not do any harm to the cabins. Guess that's what we call the wonder of engineering. Battening down the hatches, by any other name.
And one more thing - the loggerhead turtles. Seems I just missed the nesting season, and I didn't see any baby turtles or nests. But if you come here in late spring, and you're willing to be patient, you might even get to see baby loggerheads coming out of their eggs and poking around the beach trying to find the water. If you're on the beach evry early in the morning or late in the evening, don't shine a light, cause that attracts the just born turtles, and will draw them away from the water.
In summary, its a pretty neat beach. Not much in terms of amenities like beachfront resorts and hotels and other touristy stuff (which is not necessarily a bad thing), and its a really peaceful setting. The only thing that troubles me is that the beach seems to have some natural problems. Its a barrier island, and prone to get hit time and again by storms which further the already bad erosion. The cabins which are mostly rented out to visitors and tourists as vacation rentals are really not so strong, and not at all protected by the State. A whopper of a storm could easily wash out the entire beach, cabins and trees and all. Anyway, I'm still planning on visiting Nags Head, and hopefully, I'll be able to get something out of the Carolinas before I head for New Jersey.
