A Tour Of The Entire Outer Banks Of North Carolina

For this trip, I took highway 168 south from Virginia and then over the Wright Memorial Bridge in the northern part of North Carolina. The goal would be to drive the entire length of the Outer Banks, a series of islands and island communities along the North Carolina eastern shore. The day was bright and sunny, but a chilly wind made it seem much colder than the 50 degrees it was that day. It was Wednesday, November 18, 2020 at about 2 pm.

The outer banks is actually a series of island chains. The northernmost part isn’t really an island per se, as it is connected to the mainland. This part is called the Currituck Banks. We’re here, in Corolla, and south of that is the community of Duck. We’ll drive south and see those two first.

At the top of Corolla is an isolated beach where you can drive your car, but south of that it’s pretty isolated. There are only a few hundred homes up here, spread out over about 10 miles. Homes here cost on average $600,000. We’ll drive this for a minute.

Then we take an isolated stretch to the next community, Duck. Now, we come to Duck. South of Corolla, this is the first community that’s on what is called Bodie Island, which stretches all the way down for about 27 miles. Duck has much more to do. There are about 580 people here, and homes cost about a hundred thousand less than in Corolla, at about $480,000 each.

After Duck, heading south, you come to a community named Southern Shores, which has close to 3,000 people. It’s pretty isolated as well.

Here we are along the coast in Kitty Hawk, a community of 3,500. Just on the other side of those homes is the ocean. Homes here average about $360,000, but along the coast, they are much more expensive, closer to $450 to $500,000.

After three miles along the coast, you come to Kill Devil Hills. They basically look the same.
Now, to show you the main drag again, we’ll re join Highway 158.

Now we’re into the heart of the entertainment section of this stretch of the Outer Banks along Bodie Island. As you can see there are all sorts of businesses and shops along this stretch. Now, we’re going to skip over and rejoin Highway 12 again, along the shore, where it’s much more isolated.

We’ll drive along the coast down to Nags Head. Nags Head looks basically the same as Kitty Hawk and Kill Devil Hills. There’s about 3,000 people in Nags Head proper.

Now as you leave Nags Head and get towards the end of Bodie Island, things get pretty isolated. That’s pretty much it in terms of the large number of hotels, restaurants, shops and most of the homes. Eventually, you come to a bridge, where you can take Highway 64 and head over to another island which is part of the Outer Banks, Roanoke Island. Most of Roanoke Island is made up of the town of Manteo, which has about 1,400 people on it. This is where the first colonists lived when they came to America way back in 1585.

Today, it has a few stores to cater to the locals, but most of it is a small, cute village with shopping. Homes here are about $300,000 on average.

Then we’ll cross BACK over the bridge again and leave Roanoke.

We will continue south, and then leave Bodie Island completely. It’s really isolated down here.

After a while, you cross another bridge over to Hatteras Island. The northern section of Hatteras is very isolated. There’s actually nothing up here really. It’s so narrow, the sand blows across the road, and it washes out during even minor storms. So there’s constant maintenance.

Further down Hatteras Island are three really small communities, called Rodanthe, Waves and Salvo. They all pretty much look the same. In total, there are only 250 people way down here, where they pay about $330,000 for a home.

Then you drive further to the bottom of Hatteras, which includes the communities of Buxton and Hatteras. Way down here is very different from the rest of the outer banks.

From Buxton, you head west to the end of the island to the community of Hatteras.
Here in Hatteras, there’s about 500 people, depending on if it’s the busy season. This is the end of the road.

To get off of Hatteras and back to the mainland, you catch a ferry over to Okracoke Island, about halfway back to the eastern North Carolina shore. It takes about an hour.
Then, you get off the boat and you’re on ocracoke island.

To leave Ocracoke, you hop on another ferry, and take that 2 and a half hours all the way back to Cedar Island. And you’re back onto the North Carolina mainland.

#outerbanks #northcarolina

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