A Day at the Beach ft. Kevin Shen

So, one morning, completely out of the blue, the all too familiar sound of an AIM message grabs my attention. Normally this wouldn't be that big of a deal, however this message I realize is from our friendly, and at times psychotic (but who isn't psychotic at times, right?) Branner RA Kevin Shen. He informs me that he's staying in NC for the weekend and wants to have a true NC experience at NC's Outerbanks. I've nothing to do, so I'm like sure Kevin, why not?!

All in all, it was a fun, hot and humid day. It was a little strange being a tourist in your homestate in a place you've visited at least 4 or 5 times before. We started off visiting the Wright Brothers Memorial, and as we walked throught the small museum we concluded that Orville got everything: the looks, the longer life, and to ride in the plane. Wilbur looked like a psychotic serial killer, died fairly early in his life, and only got to run beside the airplane. He pretty much got the short end of the stick. Kevin theorized that the Wright Brothers were actually incestuous gay lovers, and while it's still just a theory nothing in the museum said otherwise. ;o) After the Wright Brothers Memorial we headed a little south to check out Bodie Lighthouse. It was a small lighthouse and actually a little strange because it wasn' t even on the water. It was a little inland. Across the street was a public beach, so we hung out there for a half hour or so before heading to our next excursion: hang gliding at Jockey's Ridge State Park. Jockey's Ridge has the tallest sand dunes on the East Coast. It's basically a desert, only not. We checked out the hang gliding school, but the decided we'd save hang gliding for another visit. The winds weren't that great and we didn't have 3 hours to spare for the beginners lesson. We did walk around of the sand dunes though. It was sooooooooo hot but once you got to the top of a dune is was cool because you could see all the way to the ocean.

After the sand dunes we had dinner at the local fave restaurant, The Lone Cedar. Then we headed to Manteo, NC to check out the Elizabethan Gardens and the outdoor production of The Lost Colony. Brief history lesson if you aren't familiar with the lost colony: the first colony in the new world tries to survive on it's own while being neglected by England b/c she's at war with Spain, when the war is over England learns that the colony has completely disappeared. No one knows what happened. No bodies were found or anything. The production was nice: good sets, actors with a combo Southern/British accent, and good singing.

And that concludes our day at the beach. Now, I have a week before I leave for Orlando and two weeks before New Orleans. I'll blog about those when the time comes.

Hope everyone is having a good summer! Bye for now!