By Sand and Raft down North Carolina’s Outer Banks
October, 2022
One year into my first job as a family doctor I was ready for a break. My day-to-day seeing people in our rural safety net clinic has been inspiring, but a serious grind and I needed a reset and a return to my adventure roots. Seeing day-riders on fat bikes on the beach got me excited to explore a remote part of North Carolina linking the ribbon of sand of the Outer Banks by bike and raft. After months of planning and studying the weather, I got lucky and found a window of early Fall weather right after Hurricane Ian had passed through. Here’s a day-by-day breakdown:
Day 1:
An early morning drop-off in Virginia Beach had me anxious for the unknown and the longest time away from my two year old son.
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| Packed and ready |
Strong storm-clearing North winds were blowing and made for a quick parking lot goodbye. After a brief detour through the Back Bay Wildlife Refuge on beautiful backroads, I made it to open beach as I crossed the border into North Carolina.
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| Back Bay Wildlife Refuge |
With the tailwind, I was absolutely ripping along on the sand at 20 miles an hour fully loaded to about 70 pounds on my fat bike. It was a pretty awesome feeling. That said, I couldn't help but notice many houses seemingly falling into the ocean and crews rebuilding after Hurricane Ian's recent weather. The effects of changing climate are acutely felt on the Outer Banks.
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| 20 miles per hour thanks to tailwinds |
By the end of the day I had made it 86 miles down to the town of Rodanthe. I was beat but had a huge smile on my face. The day featured some sections of open beach without anyone around and other sections zigzagging through lifted trucks and jeeps on the beach with long fishing lines.
I pulled into a campground early that evening and set my tiny tent next to a dozen RVs. Mere minutes later, I couldn't believe the hospitality that I was shown. A plate of fresh seafood with grilled chicken and veggies appeared in front of me with the man saying, “You look like you need this!” Every family surrounding my tent came over to give me food, drink, utensils and dessert. Southern hospitality is alive and well.
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| 86 miles on Day 1 |
Day 2:
Woke up before the sun with coffee and hot breakfast served from, once again, my RV neighbors. Grandmother Wendy from rural Virginia: “If my son were doing this, I’d want him to be taken care of as well.”
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| Stunning morning on Day 2 |
It was a bit of a slog in the soft sand with the high tide, so average speed came down quite a bit, only moving at a fast walk in my lowest gear. Beautiful early fall weather kept my spirits high and I even stopped for a latte break 20 miles down the beach--a big change from past dirtbag backcountry adventures of my youth. Getting older has its perks. I eventually made it down to the Hatteras Lighthouse past hundreds of trucks lined up to fish at the cape. Further on, I reached a more remote section of the coast with no one around and watched fish jumping beautiful little waves and even took advantage of the solitude for a quick skinny dip.
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| Beautiful section of Hatteras |
Eventually I made it to Hatteras just in time for the afternoon Ferry over to Ocracoke Island. Standing at the ticket booth was Charlie, a 76 year old long-bearded man, who over the past twenty years has completed the whole mountains-to-sea Trail in North Carolina on foot and bicycle. I loved chatting with him on the 2 hour ferry ride hearing his idiosyncratic life stories.
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| Okracoke solitude |
Once at Ocracoke, Charlie took off down the pavement and I pedaled over the dunes to the sand. It was one of the more magical stretches of beach of the whole adventure. Low tide, clear skies, and a slight tailwind were wonderful while I picked lines dodging tidepools.
I certainly could have pushed through to the next ferry trip but decided to make camp early. I got out my surf mat and fins and rode a few small waves in early Fall warm water. I watched the full moon rise and soaked in a magical day on a fleeting part of the planet on a sliver of sand in the ocean.
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| 46 miles on Day 2 |
Day3:
It was a pre-sunrise ride over to the ferry where I met Mike and Jim, two inspiring guys from Atlanta biking over 100 miles each day down the Outer Banks and then inland home to Georgia. We had great conversations on the ferry of their adventures and how much we all enjoy the unexpected in bike travel. We had a good laugh comparing the difference in our bike weights with my fully loaded fat bike and their “credit card touring” carbon roadie set ups--you can imagine the difference. With a huge effort I was able to keep up with them for a few miles before they effortlessly took off down the road.
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| Full moon ride to beat the ferry |
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| Mike and Jim: over 100 miles per day to Atlanta! |
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| My roadie set-up. Thanks for the photo Jim! |
I made my way about 40 miles down to the truly unique community of Harkers Island. I spent the rest of the day with my friend Gaston and his family. Gaston is a medical student who I worked with as a rural scholar in my clinic. Earlier this summer, Gaston heard me dreaming out loud about my trip down the coast in between seeing patients, so we made a plan to meet up.
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| My local host and medical student Gaston |
I learned so much about his family’s deep roots in the area and the challenges affecting their community varying from the opioid crisis, commercial fishing regulations, and climate change. A home cooked meal was quite a treat as well. Another example of wonderful hospitality in a new place.
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| 40 miles down to Harker's Island |
Day 4:
I started off a bit nervous because the first packraft section was planned for later in the day. I grinded out a few miles over some sketchy bridges down to busy Atlantic Beach.
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| Obligatory jump selfie on Atlantic Beach |
I again had beautiful sunny weather and after a food restock, I noticed my rear brake had all but fallen off. Amazingly, with one bolt holding it on I realized I didn't need to brake very much when the whole trip was flat. So I tightened the calipers down and kept moving, one bolt lighter.
By late morning I made it to the Intercoastal Waterway, a highway of sorts for boats going up and down the sounds. After a few side eyes from some Park Rangers and a slow rigging of a very heavy set up, I was in the water. Conditions were great at first with wind at my back and an outgoing tide. It’s a wonderful sensation realizing on the bow of my raft was all my gear and although it took a lot to get here, the proof-of-concept that traversing the coast via bikeraft was possible.
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| Beautiful conditions |
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| Before the tide turned |
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| Slow lane on the inter-coastal waterway |
The last two miles took nearly as long as the first eight as the tide changed and the tailwind disappeared. I was moving slower than a walking pace, but eventually made it to the take out zone.
A story for a different day is how I ended up inside a military base and then getting turned around by an active amphibious training op. As ordered, I hightailed it out of there doing a big reroute inland making it down to Topsail Island by dark. 70 long miles, including those on the packraft, allowed me to sleep pretty heavily that night after Dominos delivery to my campsite.
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Glamping
Day 5: Started the day with 20 miles down to the tip of Topsail Island with more nerves as I approached the first open ocean inlet crossing of the trip. Conditions-wise, everything seemed to be lining up well with the tides, the swell report, and lack of wind. However, upon seeing the inlet, with underlying rip currents and unpredictable shallows with waves, it was immediately evident that this would be too dangerous to attempt without a support boat or a kayak that can really get some forward momentum. Maybe ten years ago in my hey-day I would have given it a go, but with my growing family at home the high risk-to-benefit ratio made it an easy choice for a reroute. |
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| Seemingly innocuous conditions before discovering rips and waves around the corner |
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| Last view of the coast before heading inland |
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| Coast forests for miles |
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| Cotton fields as I moved further away from the coast |
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| Walmart. |
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| 65 miles to Richlands NC on Day 5 |
Another near 65 mile day--this time on pavement---with a fat bike and packraft was still not an easy task, but I felt lucky to experience a part of North Carolina that I wouldn't have seen otherwise. Endless coastal pines transitioned to cotton fields, MAGA signs, church steeples, very courteous drivers, and a wonderfully anticlimactic ending at the Walmart Superstore in Richlands, North Carolina.
The adventure didn't go fully to plan getting all the way down the coast of North Carolina, but I couldn't have been happier to have traversed the whole Outer Banks mostly on the beach. I met great people and explored so many places along the way. This is really the whole reason why we travel by bicycle in the first place: to experience the unexpected and humbly learn along the way. As a native Californian, it can be easy to brush off the humbler geography of a place like North Carolina. I'm excited to get back out to the Outer Banks to continue exploring on the fat bike, searching for waves on the surf mat, and returning to see the unique people and places I met in my new home state.
Additionally, the trip served a second goal. Through some modest fundraising, we raised money for a patient support fund that covers unexpected costs in our safety net clinic. We raised nearly $3,000 through small donations. Thank you to my friends, colleagues, and family who contributed.
For those interested, here's details on the rig and gear list:
Thanks to @thirdeyeheadlamps and @pocsports for the support!
A bit about me:
I’ve had lots of adventures on a bicycle. Thanks to the outdoor education background of my family, we were the first group of young people to bike the length of the Great Divide Mountain Trail between 1999 and 2000 over two summers when I was 14 years old. In 2001 at age 16 I was lucky to join Expedition360’s human-power circumnavigation of the planet on their Australian leg, mountain biking 3,000 miles across the Outback. Later, after finishing high school, I spent 4 months solo touring down the coast of Chile with my surfboard on my bike trailer learning Spanish, riding waves, and being taken in by incredible hospitality.
Since these epic journeys in my late teens, my adventures have continued, but have been closer to home and more time-limited due to my work and studies, as well as the adventure of raising a toddler. Whether exploring by paddle or pedal, the spirit of curiosity and wonderful vulnerability that travel by human power permits is something that continues to inspire me.
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| Atacama Desert, Chile, 2004 |
