Catch-up: Day 7
Day 7 began after a rainy night at the campsite in Avon, NC on the Outer Banks (OBX). We got up and packed up camp and got on the road early. This day ended up being on the opposite end of the spectrum compared to the headwinds and rain of the previous day. And this day was to be our first day at the beach. We rode on down the Outer Banks towards Cape Hatteras, the elbow of the outer banks. We got to the lighthouse at Hatteras and climbed up it while we were there. It’s the tallest lighthouse in North America. You can see pictures of it here. It was pretty cool to climb up all 12 stories of it but it was a bit tiring considering our legs are used to pedaling. The lighthouse was moved about 2200 feet about 7 years ago to get it away from the eroding seashore. After visiting the lighthouse we went to the neighboring beach for some ocean swimming and rest on the sand. After the fun in the sun we got back on the bikes for the rest of the day’s rid which included 2 ferries. The ferries were pretty cool and it was good to relax on the longer one (where I wrote a bunch of these ‘catch-up’ posts). We learned the value of a good tailwind this day too. It makes riding worlds better than riding in a headwind. I never thought it would matter that much but it does. At the end of the day we were more or less back on the mainland of North Carolina. We camped in a town called Cedar Island with three other guys next to us that had been touring the same route for the last few days. The total milage for the day was about 32 (not including the farries).