This is the first of a 3-part travel review series of North Carolina’s Outer Banks.

Part I: Camping at the Outer Banks

This past weekend a few of the guys from the Sports Chief and myself visited the Outer Banks of the great state of North Carolina. Our plan was pretty simple: we really didn’t have one. Other than knowing where we were going to stay, everything else was pretty much left to what we wanted to do in the moment. We began our trip in Nags Head and completed it in Ocracoke (right down Hwy 12). We decided to camp out throughout this trip, so that’s what Part One of this series will be all about, our experiences camping.

I’ll start out by just saying I would NOT recommend camping at the Outer Banks during the summer months. We found out very quickly that we were going to be in for a long couple of nights in the tent. Our first night we didn’t arrive at the campground until about 11:30 p.m. We thought we were doing good after a long day of traveling, getting there before midnight, but found out very quickly that getting there after dark was a big problem.

Putting up the tent in the dark is a breeze and something I’ve done many, many times. The problem we quickly encountered, however, was bugs. Since it was dark when we got there, we needed light to be able to set up the tent, so we set up a lantern and lit a few candles (citronella to keep the bugs away). What seemed like a billion bugs (not exaggerating) were suddenly all around us, attracted by the lights. There were even swarms of bugs (mostly gnats) that had gathered inside the vehicle while we carried out our things, flying around the lights in there. We actually had to roll down the windows and take a short drive to get most of the bugs out before we could roll the windows back up.

Oregon Inlet Campground; Credit: Steven L. Markos

So, bugs were issue #1. The tiny gnats would not go away and even after as much as we tried to prevent it, many ended up in the tent to bother us all night long. I think I was swatting away a gnat every 30 seconds or so for hours.

Problem #2 was the heat. Now of course it’s going to be hot because of summertime, but we figured being just on the other side of the dunes from the ocean we would feel the ocean breeze. Instead it was hot, still, humid air that made it almost impossible to sleep. A lot of small breezes that we may have gotten were blocked by the tent. Between the gnats and the heat, we were all still wide awake after 3:00 a.m. I remember just sitting up at that time, telling everyone, “there’s a really good chance I don’t fall asleep tonight.”

But actually I did. We all managed to somehow fall asleep within the next 30-40 minutes, which was nothing short of a miracle. But then it was time for the next problem. Just before 4:00 a.m., we all were wide awake again after hearing BOOM BOOM BOOM over and over. The trash truck was making its rounds through the campground making so much noise I’m convinced it could’ve been heard from Kitty Hawk. All in all, we all got 2-3 hours of sleep that night. That was at Oregon Inlet Campground in Nags Head.

When we had moved on to Ocracoke Campground two nights later, we had the same two problems, with each being not as bad. One thing that made a huge difference was being able to set up our tent in the daylight so by the time darkness fell we just had one small candle and could just climb into the tent whenever we were ready to go to bed. It also still took a while for everyone to fall asleep because of the heat, but there was more of a breeze that made it a little more bearable. And we could also easily hear the ocean, a lot better than at Oregon Inlet Campground, because we were just on the other side of the dunes again.

Ocracoke Campground; Credit: Steven L. Markos

The bugs were once again an issue at Ocracoke, but we were able to sit outside the tent with just a small candle and relax without having TOO much of an issue. Ocracoke Campground provided a much better experience for all of us.

The coolest thing about camping at the Outer Banks was being so close to the ocean. Being just on the other side of the sand dunes allowed us to bring our chairs and chill out on the beach at night. I’m not sure what the difference is between the Outer Banks beaches and Myrtle Beach, but thousands of crabs come out at night. They may be what’s called ghost crabs, but if you would turn on a light all of a sudden, you would always see 2-3 crabs around you. However, they acted really scared of us and would run like crazy if you got too close.

I very much prefer camping in the mountains rather than the beach. I’ve never encountered the amount of bugs that we did, and the mountains are never nearly as hot. It would be a much different experience camping out at the Outer Banks in the spring or fall because it wouldn’t be so hot and the bugs might not even be as bad. But as far as camping out there in the summer, I wouldn’t do it again. The park ranger even told us herself that she wouldn’t camp out at the Outer Banks in the summer. “Fall and spring, only,” she said. We now completely understand where she’s coming from.

Garett

Travel Review: Camping at the Outer Banks