Wednesday, April 1
The beginning of vacation! Even as an adult, the build up to vacation feels the same as the anticipation of the last day of school. Antsy, excited, and barely able to contain myself.
After work, we rushed home and started getting things ready. We had started loading around 10pm the night before and got about 80% of it loaded, but the last 20% was still a lot to manage. We ate a quick dinner and quickly finished gathering things before finally leaving at 7:00pm, 2 hours later than we had initially desired to leave. It was frustrating, but it was what it was.
Once on the road, we stopped at Dairy Queen for a couple chocolate milkshakes and made our way to Ohiopyle. On the drive, I noticed a lot of little peeper frogs in or alongside the road. Spring had sprung! Once there around 9:00pm, we quickly turned the couch into the bed and made our way to the bathhouse to use the restrooms. I found the cutest little frog outside of the bathhouse! Afterwards, we crawled into bed, exciting for the days to follow.
Thursday, April 2
We woke up the next morning, and I made my coffee and “made” a bowl of Life cereal for the two of us. We left around 9:00am and stopped at the Paw Paw Tunnel. It was about a 2 mile round trip walk to the tunnel, but it was so cool to see! It was about a mile long tunnel along a canal, and it got very dark in the middle!
Jeffrey explained how he rode in the tunnel on his bike (with no light!) when he completed the GAP trail in May 2024. I can’t imagine riding a bike along the bumpy trail along a waterway in the dark!
On the other side of the tunnel was a short, rock cliff with lots of small little water trickles, like mini waterfalls over the rock face. It was so pretty! There were also large steps that led to a landing at the top of the arch to the tunnel that Jeffrey explained he and his friends climbed to on their bike trip. It was fun to see a little glimpse into what his GAP trail experience looked like.
After leaving Paw Paw Tunnel, it started to get warmer! We were quite excited about this, as the PA winter had been dragging on, but we were surprised just how hot it got later in the afternoon.
We had put a “new” engine in the van this past winter, and this was the first trip driving anywhere substantial. She did well on this first day! We still were getting used to some new sounds and the power this engine gave us, but overall, we got where we needed to be! We did burn a lot of oil (which is foreshadowing for later), but we figured things were just settling on her first big trip. We got poor gas mileage to start with (13 miles to the gallon), but by day 4 of our trip, we were getting much better mileage (16 miles to the gallon!).
On the drive, we looked at homes, the budding plants, blossoming dogwood trees, and enjoyed feeling the sunshine. We had to be inspected to go through an underwater tunnel since we have a propane tank (which ended up being pretty worthless as he just had to confirm that the propane was turned off), and we drove over numerous bridges. On the first bridge over water, I cried, so excited to be close to the ocean. We had both been looking forward to a real break and spending quality time together, and it felt so good to finally feel so free for the first time in months.
Due to our detour at Paw Paw Tunnel, we ended up arriving at Oregon Inlet Campground around 9:00pm in the dark. It was fun seeing the main street lit up at night, but it made me even more excited to see it in the daylight.
We settled into our campground and booked it to the beach. Our camp site was directly behind a sand dune, and we had about a 5 minute walk over the dunes to the beach. It was a bit strenuous, as it was uphill to go over the sanddune and the sand was very soft and moved under your feet. Due to this, I spread my toes out as much as possible to gain traction in the sand, which would be my demise due to the landscape!
One thing that really surprised me were the amount of cacti! There were prickly pear cacti in the dunes but also as landscaping for many homes. One wild plant along the dunes had little spiky balls that would get stuck in between my toes as we were walking. (Think the spiky earrings from Claire’s circa 2004 but actually spiky.) From there on, I made sure to wear shoes to minimize the pain.
After the hike, we had a short walk on the beach (where I cried again) and tasted the ocean to “make sure” it was still salty (it was!). We walked for a short time before going back to the van to have a knock-off Panera soup dinner (but from Giant Eagle). It was during the heating of dinner that we learned that there was only one bathroom working in the entire campground (directly across from our site), and that the showers were still boarded and off, despite the campground website saying that there were hot showers and that this campground was open year round. It was a bit nerve wracking thinking that we may not have a shower for 5+ days. Normally, we’d find a stream to bathe in, but there are no streams that aren’t marshes or swamps in North Carolina! And the salt ocean would only make us sticky. We were hopeful that it would work out.
After dinner, the full moon shone BRIGHT, so we decided to go back to the beach at 10:00 and walk under the moonlight. It was so beautiful and calm. Just what we needed. We walked back over the dunes and went to bed, the temperature perfect for sleeping under the stars.
Friday, April 3
We woke up at 7:45, and I made coffee. We had Life cereal for breakfast and got ourselves ready before taking our morning beach walk. We met the neighbor-dog labradoodle named Izzy, and then walked over the dunes to the water.
If I could start every morning with a beach walk, I truly think my life would improve drastically. The water and the waves and the pelicans and seashells make me so happy and feel so carefree (which is not my natural state). On our walk, we decided that we would go far north to Corolla and explore Currituck Lighthouse and then work our way back down throughout the day to our campground for dinner.
We got ourselves ready and then started the drive north! However… when we passed Jockey State Park and saw kites, we just had to pull over. We quickly decided that instead of going north, we would stay local and check our all of the different activities near us.
We parked and packed our day bags and went to the state park museum (where I got a sticker and some maps). We then walked toward the largest sand dunes I’ve ever seen where they were having a spring kite festival! I was so excited that our time here overlapped with this event. Other than the occasional kite, I had never been to any event like this. The area was so vast and sandy and beautiful! The weather was also perfect- we could not have a more beautiful, sunny, perfectly warm day.
After looking at all the cool kites from Kitty Hawk Kites (the people who put on the festival), we got out our own kite that Jeffrey had bought from Kitty Hawk Kites nearly 15 years ago! It was so fun to be able to join this festival and share our own kite amongst all the others! Some of the kites included massive flying fish, a parrot, crabs and penguins that bounced along the sand as the wind blew, and many colored kites of different shapes and sizes. The dunes were massive, and it was magical to look across the sand to see so many colorful kites. It was just downright joyful.
After flying the kite for a bit (and getting a little sun burnt), we went to the Kitty Hawk Kites store (trip #1), to see what kites they had and maybe get a tail for Jeffrey’s kite. The options were a little overwhelming (so many kites, styles, types, and price ranges!), and we ended up leaving with nothing. It was still fun to shop though! I also found the sweatshirt that I would end up getting on our last day at this first stop. (I am a crewneck girlie, and I love getting a sweatshirt from our travels. My sweet husband even promised to shop with me for a sweatshirt on one of the less nice days of our trip before I even mentioned it. We looked around, but this flag “Outer Banks” design (pictured at the bottom) would be the sweatshirt I kept coming back to.)
We left Kitty Hawk Kites and noticed a lot of people in line for Cook Out, a fast food restaurant. It was lunch time, and typically long lines means good food, so we stopped. We got cheeseburgers, fries, and then two bonus sides of onion rings and fried mozzarella balls. We also got AMAZING chocolate milkshakes. The food was okay, but the milkshakes (and the 40 milkshake flavor options) was the redeeming quality of this establishment. We ended up saving almost a whole milkshake and putting it in our freezer to share for another dessert (which ended up being one of our best ideas of this trip).
After lunch, we paid the $20 to enter the Wright Brothers National Museum. We toured the building and learned about Orville and Wilbur, their upbringing, and the beginning of flight. It’s crazy how much can be invented over a little more than 100 years! We then walked up to the memorial on top of the hill to view their original flight path. We met the sweetest dog named Tinto here, who was a large black mutt who was named after a small cup of black coffee in Columbia. I loved the name, story, and connection to his family’s culture, and he was the sweetest boy. We walked back to the parking lot (where we met another black and white mutt named Rocket- so, so sweet!) and drove down to the metal statues that reenacted their first flight. We also got to see the single picture taken of this first flight, taken by someone who had never used a camera before and somehow managed to get the timing perfect for capturing this first flight. Wild!
From here, we decided to drive around the large beach home and dream about what it would be like to live on the beach and what the insides of these colorful homes looked like. I was a bit surprised at just how many rental homes there were, that most of these homes were not main residences for people. I don’t know how you wouldn’t want to live at the beach full time though! To live along the ocean would be a dream.
We then went to a beach with a long boardwalk. We didn’t stay here for long (really just to view the boardwalk and all the beach goers) before leaving for Roanoke Island. Roanoke Island was quite cute. Many single-family homes along the drive that were well kept and easy to envision the lives of those living in them. Roanoke felt quite detached from the Outer Banks, but I think that’s what made it special.
We made our way to Manteo where they had a “first Friday’s” event (kind of like a farmer’s market or block party). I had read online about the event, and while we did get there early, we were a bit underwhelmed at the number of vendors. Instead of the streets being filled with vendors and music as they had advertised, it was a couple tents, a couple musicians under shelters, and mostly just stores being open into the evening. Maybe if we had stayed later it would’ve been more exciting, but we ended up peacing out early and heading back to the van to make buttered noodles for dinner (which slapped). On a sidenote, the plant store called Bough and Vine in Manteo was soooo cute. I totally would’ve bought a plant cutting if the van would’ve been compatible for it. We also met a cute dog named Sprinkles!
After our buttered noodles, we went for an evening beach walk where we met Reba, a golden retriever shepherd mix who would find dead, dried fish on the beach and try and play with and eat them. It was hilarious watching her mom chase her to try and get the dead fish out of her mouth. It was quite a game Reba was playing!
After what seemed like the longest and most fun day, we made our way to bed.
Saturday, April 4
Saturday morning, Jeffrey was tired and wanted to sleep in a little bit, so I made my way to the beach solo for my morning coffee. Dolphins greeted me upon my arrival which made it all the more special. I set up my blanket and sat, watching the birds, listening to the ocean, and enjoying the comfortable breeze. Jeffrey joined me not long after and me met a couple dogs named Max and Angel (they were large dogs with short hair and were breeds I had never heard of!). We decided that today was the last warm day on the radar and the perfect day for a beach day. We decided that we should get some sort of shade so we weren’t cooking in the sun all day.
We started at a Wings store first where we met the cutest Aussie/lab/husky puppy named Birdie. There were some umbrellas, a couple cheap canopies that didn’t seem to actually work, and some very expensive tailgating-like shades. Next we made our way back to Kitty Hawk Kites (trip #2) to look for a sun shade, since it was a kite store after all and the shade we were after was made of kite material. I looked at my sweatshirt again (where Jeffrey promised I’d have time later to look), and we looked at the same kites again for a second time, but ended up leaving empty handed. We went to our final store next to Kitty Hawk Kites that was a general beach and surfing store. We thought it was a loss, but as we turned around to leave, we found a little kiosk with the Shibumi shade we had been looking for! We ended up getting the mini version that, while still very expensive for what it was ($232!!!!!), was cheaper and smaller to fit in the van than the full size version. We didn’t want to spend as much as we did on it, but as we set it up on the beach and created a large section of shade and dreamed of using it on future beach trips, we understood the need and appreciation for it.
We set up our shade, laid out the blanket, and ate some lunch. This was the life. We tried to fly Jeffrey’s kite but learned we had accidentally dropped a piece when packing it up at Jockey State Park, so Jeff took a few reeds from the dunes and made a temporary piece to allow it to fly for a little while. Eventually, the reeds became broken and we had to put the kite away, but it was fun while it lasted!
We enjoyed lunch on the beach, Facetimed our families to share the sun and sand, and packed up.
We had relaxed most of the day, so when we got back to the van, I was ready to explore! We drove to Bodie Lighthouse, got our national park stamp and walked out on the boardwalk for a view of the marsh and lighthouse.
We then drove down to Rodanthe over a large bridge and checked out some local fishing spots. We decided to call it a day and headed back to our campground where we had fajitas for dinner and took showers. (The showers were stalls outside with a chain with a large ring on the end that you had to pull and water would drop. You had to repeatedly pull it to get a steady stream of water. It felt like the bucket of water at a splash park just being dumped on your head each time. The water was lukewarm at best- not the hot showers they had promised- but we felt clean by the end of it.
Sunday, April 5
Easter Sunday! I woke up for sunrise, something I had hoped to do this entire trip but just couldn’t find the gumption for. It was a chilly morning, but it felt good to be close to the ocean and watch the sun rise, especially on Easter Sunday.
After spending a solid 45 minutes on the beach, I worked my way back up to the van, made my coffee, and painted my nails for church. Once Jeffrey starting rousing, I toasted some bagels for breakfast. Normally we just do butter (which I made for Jeffrey), but I had some left over avocado from the fajitas and decided to make avocado toast. It was deliciousssss. I will definitely be making that again for van breakfast! It really hit the spot!
We got ready for church and started making our way down to Cape Hatteras to Cape Hatteras United Methodist Church. We had plans to spend the day in the south, so this was a good starting point for us.
The church at Cape Hatteras UMC was gorgeous. The wooden ceiling, the beautiful beachy stained glass, and the cross filled with flowers to celebrate Easter was stunning. People chatted, kids ran around, and the choir sang. It was a joyful morning, and it just felt like a thriving church. We took communion, sang hold hymns with a piano (and a congregation that could stay with the beat!), and enjoyed celebrating the resurrection of Jesus Christ. What a great morning!
We asked a local for lunch recommendations and we landed at Isola for a split meatlovers and Hawaiian pizza with Dr. Peppers. It wasn’t too bad! We dreamed of traveling and living on the beach, learning to surf and live as locals.
After lunch, we tried to drive to the southern most point, but it ended on sand, and not having four wheel drive, we couldn’t take the risk of getting stuck. We ended up parking in a real parking lot near a beach access point.
And it was good thing too, because we immediately came across someone who risked their vehicle to drive across the sand, and it didn’t quite work out. That would’ve been us. A man had driven his SUV on the sand and had almost made it out but had gotten stuck pretty deeply in the sand. He had recovery gear, but it wasn’t quite adequate. Jeffrey started to help and soon we had others (a local man and a family from Maryland with 2 teenage boys who were VERY eager to help) helping as well. After a while, a local North Carolina man came with allllll the right gear and pulled him out very quickly. He definitely saved the day! The ironic part was that the beach patrol came through on their golf cart, going right past the stuck car and then got themselves stuck! They hadn’t put it in 4 wheel drive before entering the sand, and Jeff and I had to push him out! It was pretty funny! Jeffrey also loves watching YouTube videos about off road recovery, so actually stepping in to help someone was a true joy for him.
We walked along the beach a bit more before heading back to our campground. We made a few stops along the way, one being at a pull off to watch kite surfers. Jeffrey discovered quickly that he really, really wants to learn to kite surf, so we had a fun time watching them and learning what we could from observation. At this point, the wind was really starting to pick up. My poor hair was not having it!
We also stopped at another Kitty Hawk Kites (trip #3) to look at sweatshirts and get a (free!) replacement for the kite part that we had lost the previous day. We left with a couple stickers and then the sky got pretty dark, so we made our way back to the campground.
We used the campground bathrooms for the final time as the dark clouds rolled in, and as I made chicken noodle soup for Easter dinner, lightning struck, thunder rolled, and the heavens opened up. It was so cozy and dry in our small van as it stormed. While the rain is never fun while camping, I do love when it rains at night and we are self-contained and cozy in our little white box. It always makes me more appreciative of the fact that we are dry, warm, safe, and cozy even in the storm.
Monday, April 6
Monday morning was COLD. We had layers of blankets, but even with those, I woke up numerous times throughout the night chilly. We slept in a little, and then I made coffee and toasted bagels. After coaxing Jeffrey out of the warm bed, we drove the hour north to Corolla to see Currituck Lighthouse. Along the way, we got to see all the beautiful beach homes, especially in the town of Duck, and loved seeing both the ocean and the sound. We climbed the lighthouse, stopping at each landing to learn about the history of the light and other lighthouses as well. I stopped in the gift shop and got a few souvenirs and then we toured a small boat museum.
We had lunch at Corolla Village Bar-B-Que where we had pulled pork sandwiches and mac n cheese. We decided that there wasn’t much more in Corolla we wanted to see, so we decided to try and find a beach to have a beach afternoon. We drove around Corolla and Duck trying to find public beach access, and we actually found it kind of difficult! There were a couple small parking lots in some neighborhoods, but it was still a good half a block walk to the actual beach. We drove around looking at the homes (while looking for the beach access) and noticed that it was trash day. There were SO many rusted grilles and bikes out for the trash! We almost came home with a bike but decided that fixing the rust wasn’t worth the effort of dragging it home. After we realized how hard it was to find beach access and we had exhausted looking at all the pretty homes on public streets, we decided to head back to our campground beach and set up there.
At this point, I had decided I wanted the flag Outer Banks sweatshirt for sure, so we stopped at a Kitty Hawk Kites store in Duck (trip #4), and I got my sweatshirt! We also looked once again in the kite section where Jeffrey continued staring at some of the trick kites with a bar and 2 strings instead of one. After watching the kite and wind surfing, he was even more invested on getting one that would help train him in the use of the kite to one day upgrade to the surfing level, either on sand or on water. At this point, I said, “Jeff, we’ve been in this store 4 times now. Just get a kite and we’ll enjoy it on the beach this afternoon.” He laughed, and after another half hour debating the type of kite with the cashier, he decided on a yellow and red fabric kite (with no rods) that would imitate the kind of kite the kite surfers used, just at a smaller scale.
Excited to use his new kite, we raced the hour back to our campground and quickly gathered a small bag of things for our final beach day. It took a few tries to get the kite in the air (there was much less wind this afternoon than on previous days), but once he got the hang of it, he was zipping the kite all over the sky! It was fun to watch. I tried a few times and started to get the hang of it, but I plummeted the kite numerous times straight into the ground. The bar that you hold feels like you should steer it side to side in like in a car, but in reality, you have to pull the bar toward you to maneuver the kite left and right, similar to how you’d use bike handle bars. I did get the basics, but I definitely wasn’t doing the tricks Jeffrey had started performing!
After a solid 2 hours on the beach, we headed back to the van for leftover fajitas. It was quite chilly at this point, so we opted for a relaxing evening in the van and an early bedtime. We were already dreading the drive home the next day.
Tuesday, April 7
I woke up early Tuesday morning and started getting ready for the long drive home. I got myself ready, made coffee, toasted our bagels, and coaxed Jeffrey to get ready so we could squeeze in a beach walk before we left.
As we were walking to the beach, we saw the cutest golden retrievers and talked to their owner for a bit about them. We then walked to the beach where the sky was clear and the waves were beautiful. I picked up shells, we watched pelicans skim across the waves, and as we were leaving, we saw dolphins! The perfect beach goodbye. It was heartbreaking.
We made our way back to the van and started our journey for home. At ever peak of the ocean, we craned our necks to soak in the final views. We crossed the large bridges over the water and the long tunnel under the water. We saw our final glimpse of water and resigned ourselves to the fact that our beach trip was over. We felt relaxed, carefree, calm, and we really wanted this feeling to carry over into our lives once we got home.
Well. We did not, unfortunately.
In Williamsburg, Virginia, Jeffrey starting losing power in the van. He decided to pull off at a 7-Eleven and check the oil, as the light had come on right after making this decision to pull off. We let her rest a few minutes, and when we tried to crank the key, the engine started making awful sounds. We decided to limp her to the O’Reilly Auto Part store a mile down the road to see about getting a couple parts to try and save her. As soon as we exited the 7-Eleven, we made it about 100 yards before the sounds got worse and we realized very quickly that we needed to stop immediately. Once pulled over, we moved all our stuff off the engine cover in the back of the van and Jeffrey opened up the engine. Everything looked normal, but when we cranked the engine, the sounds only got worse. We were not going to be able to drive her another foot, let alone the 7.5 hours we still had to go home.
These are the type of situations, while stressful and not fun, where Jeffrey thrives. He is a natural problem solver, and within 10 minutes, he had a Lyft driver coming to pick us up to take us to the Uhaul place 2 miles down the road where he had already reserved a truck and trailer. From there, he would drive the truck to a nearby Tractor Supply to get a come-along winch, and then we’d load the van to trailer her home. It was quite the fiasco alongside the road near the onramp to the highway, but I am so grateful for God’s provision in this circumstance, that everything was so readily available for us. We lost about 3 hours in loading and having to make multiple stops to check the tie straps and refuel, but the fact that we were still able to get home the same day after breaking down so far from home was a huge blessing.
The most annoying part of the entire day wasn’t even the van breaking down…it was the oblivious people in our way as we were trying to maneuver the truck and trailer in small spaces. The number of people who would drive directly in our path and just stop, directly in our line of movement, was ASTOUNDING. Even at McDonalds, there was a large semi in the main passageway of the driveway of the restaurant, and when he told us to go around, he was blocking that exit too! As we were trying to back out of the gas station pump, a car whipped right behind us and quite literally stopped directly in the pathway, blocking everyone, just watching us. He then drove to a pump as soon as we were ready to leave. Like, why?! Why couldn’t you have done that before when you saw we were clearly struggling. We had multiple instances like this the entire way home. It was insanely frustrating.
The most stressful part of our day wasn’t until we got home, actually. Backing a Uhaul truck and trailer down our weird and not-straight driveway proved to be quite challenging and frustrating. It was much colder than at the beach, so my attire wasn’t appropriate either. On top of that, I had never backed anything as big as this down a driveway, so I had no idea how to help Jeffrey in directing him since he couldn’t see anything behind him because of the truck. It was a mess. It took us a solid half an hour just to back everything into the driveway.
Once parked, we collapsed inside, grateful to be home. We crawled directly into bed with plans to forget it all until morning.
Wednesday, April 8
The next morning we had to go to work, so we pulled ourselves out of our comfy bed and reluctantly returned to the real world. Once home, I unloaded the van. Jeffrey and I managed to get the van off the trailer and use our lawn mower to move the van into the right orientation to get it into the garage.
Jeffrey started looking at the aftermath, and we think we had some troubles with our oil pump that then impacted some pistons and valves. When Jeffrey drained the oil, there were metal shards, meaning we will most likely have to rebuild the entire engine. Yikes.
While frustrating and expensive, we’re grateful that we’re safe and that everything is fixable. We will slowly rebuild what needs rebuilt to be able to keep exploring throughout the summer. And thankfully, we kept the old engine. So we have plans to put the old engine back in for the 2026 summer and try this whole “new engine” thing again come fall.
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