If you don't live in this part of the world you probably don't know what the hell either of the things in the title are all about.
These are beach areas in Northern North Carolina and they are quite unique even though there is nothing particularly special about the actual water other than the fact that it is clean.
Something that is kind of unique about this part of the world is that most of the beaches have rather massive sand dunes that separate the living part of the beach from the actual ocean. You could attempt to crawl over them to get to the beach but most of the time people just build this bridges that go over them. There is a claim that the dunes are necessary in order to maintain some sort of ecological integrity or something like that, and it can be illegal to climb on them in some places. I don't know the details but I do know that a bridge is easier than climbing over a sand mountain.
Another interesting part of this area is that there are absolutely huge houses all up and down the beach and most of these are either the playground for the elite people or they are rental properties. They cost a lot to rent especially in the summer but they normally have something crazy like 6 bedrooms so me and a bunch of pals will get our families together and AirBnB one of these places that costs $500 a night and split it between 6 families. My "family" is the easiest to accommodate because it is just me and my girlfriend. The other people that go have kids and while that is a bit annoying, they pay more because they are occupying more space.
This is something we do every year about this time because after the middle of May when the kids are out of school on summer break the price per night doubles. It is difficult to imagine that people would pay $1000 a night to stay somewhere like this but they are pretty luxury places and when you do cross over the "bridge" to the ocean you basically have the place to yourself because the nearest public beach access is normally really far away.
Surfing can be done here but that isn't really our sort of thing anyway. I just like getting in the water and trying to bodysurf a wave in every now and again and then returning to the provided beach umbrellas and having a beer with friends I have known for more than 20 years.
I didn't do it last year because I was afraid but on the really huge sand dunes hang-gliding is offered and I promised my college buddies that I wouldn't punk out this year. It's not a super huge distance or anything but it should be kind of fun.
When people think about North Carolina I don't know what comes to mind but for many people, it probably isn't beaches. Most people think that in order for a beach to be nice that the water has to be that kind of crystal blue that doesn't exist in USA until you get to Florida. The water here might not be see-through, but it is clean and for the most part, jellyfish free. That's all I really need.
I'll take a bunch of photos while we are there. Just 6 days till we head out!