4/19 Ferry to Ocracoke Island

In order to get to Ocracoke, you need to take an hour-long ferry ride on a really small ferry.  They hold a maximum of 26 cars or fewer if there are buses or motorhomes.  Here is the ferry that left just before mine. It had one covered lane and two outside lanes.  Can you believe it carried three buses on this trip??

 

 

Here is a picture of the ferry I took from the internet.  It has a center bridge and two lanes on either side.  In the middle of the trip, the waves got to be 4-6 feet high so it was a rough ride.

 

 

You can see how close my vehicle was to the bridge, especially the overhang at the top.  Because it was so wide, there were no cars parked between mine and the railing.

 

I have been told that I should climb up on top of my vehicle and check my roof at least once a month.  So far, I have not had the courage to do that, but I was able to perform these duties from the passenger area at the top of these stairs.

 

 

So, I think the roof looks fine, don't you?  No cracks or missing caulk as far as I could see.  Job done for a few months, I think.  There certainly are a lot of vents on my roof.  The bathroom vent has a tendency to pop open on its own.  I need to get vent covers installed on this one and the kitchen vent.  These go over the regular covers but are open in the back, so you can leave vents open as you drive.

 

Here is the ferry that had the buses on in the Ocracoke dock.  Amazing how they can fit three huge buses on it along with other vehicles.

 

Wild and windy ride to the Ocracoke and the national park campground.  Here is our arrival and the road to the town of Ocracoke at the other end of the island.

 

If you look at a map, you can see how really long and narrow these barrier islands really are.  At some points, they are only 300-400 feet wide, and at the widest, possible 2-3 miles wide.  It would not take much of a hurricane to wipe them out, but they have somehow survived a lot of winds and storms so far.   Something interesting is that they leave road maintenance equipment along the highway because they are constantly plowing back the sand.  In the last picture above, they have also used a front end loader to clear the road.