Jan. 29-31, 2021
This weekend we ventured about 2 hours north to Cedar Point Campground. Cedar Point is a National Forest on the coast of NC, near Emerald Isle. No Monday holiday this week, so we headed out Friday afternoon, arriving at about 4:30 – still plenty of daylight to get set up and go for a walk.
Cedar Point is a National Forest campground, but reservations are similar to the state parks. Each has a centralized reservation platform – https://www.recreation.gov for the national forests, national parks and Corps of Engineers campgrounds, https://reserve.southcarolinaparks.com for SC state parks and https://northcarolinastateparks.reserveamerica.com for NC state parks. We were within 3 days of arrival, so we couldn’t make a reservation for a specific site – within 3 days, the sites are first come/first served. I could see that only a few had been reserved, so there should be plenty of choices for us. We drove the loop through the campground, scoping out a site to choose, and checked in with the host. All of these sites have an electric hookup, and there are water stations scattered throughout the campground. There is also a potable water filling station and dump station. No need for us to fill as we are just using bottled water for now.
We do have an annual National Parks pass, but only the senior pass will get you the discounted rate ($17/night instead of $27/night). Just a couple more years… Still a great deal at the full rate.
Dinner was a salad of roasted brussel sprouts, lentils, greens and salmon (all prepared at home this time).
Saturday breakfast was pancakes – freshly made in the camper!
Saturday was nice and sunny. We walked down to the boat ramp where quite a few people had launched that morning. One fisherman said that they catch red drum in the area – we were at the end of the White Oak River, not far from the open ocean waters. There is a very nice nature trail with 2 loops – .6 miles and 1.3 miles. We took the long loop and enjoyed walking through the marsh and forest, with some good bird sightings. There are a few feeders along the way, and the local girl scouts have put up many bird houses. This tufted titmouse was at one of the feeders. The great egret was across the river – a few of them flew over our heads, but we aren’t fast enough with the camera.
The tide was high…
After our walk, we headed over to Emerald Isle – about 4 miles to the fishing pier on the beach. Emerald Isle is a small barrier island just south of the Outer Banks. The fishing pier was closed, but we enjoyed a nice walk along the beach. The sun was warm and it was really nice when the breeze died down.
In case there was any question…
Out of the 40 sites, 12 were occupied on our first night. Many had campfires, but it was really cold again! This campground does not sell firewood, but allows you to collect anything that has fallen on the ground. One guy had his electric hand saw and was cutting up some long pieces – a note for future trips, bring something to cut firewood. We collected a few pieces the first night, and in the morning I found an armload that had fallen during the night. Inspired, I did some foraging in the woods and came up with a pile worthy of burning. Now it’s time for that fire! There has been a lot of rain lately, so all of the wood was pretty damp. I took a lot of coaxing, but my persistence paid off!
We woke to rain on Sunday morning, so headed home after breakfast. Another successful trip in the books!