April 20, 2015.  After a wonderful breakfast with Jenny and Dick, we pulled out of Southport at about 9:30 in full sun (for a welcome change) and headed up to Cape Lookout. On the way, we passed through historic Wilmington and then took an interesting detour along the so-called Crystal Coast — a narrow strip of land separating the Atlantic Ocean from Bogue Sound and running from Cape Carteret to Beaufort (which rhymes with Yofort here in NC).  This pretty strip of land is thoroughly populated with hotels, inns, cottages, beach houses, restaurants, shopping meccas, a hand-full of condominium complexes, and several small towns, each with its own proud water tower.  In some places the strip is only one block wide, which kept our necks snapping back and forth trying to watch two shores at once.

We dropped the Airstream off at Cedar Creek Campground in Sealevel NC, a commercial campground catering to fishermen and offering full hookups (which means they provide water, electricity and sewer, which is very convenient).  While it is not as picturesque as a state or federal park campground, it is friendly and serviceable and also happens to be the camping spot closest to the Cedar Creek ferry to Ocracoke, which we will take tomorrow.   In Ocracoke, we will be “dry” camping, which means no electricity or sewer and only as much water as we can carry in our freshwater tank (39 gallons).  Should be interesting!

To treat ourselves this afternoon, we backtracked about 15 miles to visit Cape Lookout National Seashore.  True to our system on this trip of narrowly missing or making deadlines, we caught the last ferry of the day from the Visitors Center at Harkers Island.  The guide was getting on board the ferry and told us to run to the ticket kiosk and he would wait for us.  Doris was welcome!  Including us, there were six humans and one canine passenger on the ferry.  The guide/skipper gleefully tried to scare us to death.  We flew across the sound at 30 MPH, skimming by sand dunes and buoys, our hair combining into one hellish knot (not really — we each had our own hellish knot).  When, 15 minutes after departure, we tied up at the lighthouse dock, we were about 8 feet below the level of the dock and had to climb up a long metal ladder and scramble to safety.  The humans had no real problem with this, but Doris was scratching her head about how to tackle it.  The guide offered to keep Doris for us, but she pooh-poohed that and tried to climb up.  Brad had to lift her up as high as he could and I stood on the dock and spake encouragements while a man from Detroit helped her get her footing on the slippery dock.  After that, she was just fine and ran ahead confidently, as if she had been there before and was leading the tour.

Cape Lookout National Seashore is a 56-mile long, constantly shifting ribbon of sand running from Beaufort Inlet on the southwest to Ocracoke Inlet on the northeast.  Although the island teems with wildlife, there is little to no human habitation.  Portsmouth Village, chartered in 1753, was once a thriving village of 500 (human) inhabitants on the northern end of the island, with a Methodist church, school house and a number of houses still standing, although no one lives there today!  The village served as a “lightering port” to take cargo off heavily loaded ships that could navigate the Atlantic Ocean but not the shallow waters of the sound.  Goods were unloaded at Portsmouth Village, stored in warehouses, and sent to market on shore in smaller boats that could navigate the shallow water.  I guess UPS and FedEx have helped to put lightering ports out of commission.

The current Cape Lookout lighthouse at the south end of the island was installed in 1859 as a replacement for a shorter lighthouse built there in 1812.  It has a distinctive black and white diamond pattern.  I licked the lighthouse.  Literally!  In 1980 some friends and I (anyone remember Nil Toulme?) rented a house in Cape Hatteras.  A child had written in the guest book that he “licked” the lighthouse.  That struck us as really funny and we made a point of each licking the Cape Hatteras lighthouse when we saw it the next day.  It is now a silly tradition of mine.  I wonder if the others still do it.  You know who you are.  Fess up.