A Lighthouse a Day, Mar 30

Today's Lighthouse is New Point Comfort Lighthouse near Mathews, VA

A Lighthouse a Day, Mar 29

Today's Lighthouse is St. Augustine Lighthouse near St. Augustine, FL

A Lighthouse a Day, Mar 28

Today's Lighthouse is Morris Island Lighthouse near Charleston, SC

A Lighthouse a Day, Mar 26 & 27

Today's Lighthouse is Tibbetts Point Lighthouse near Cape Vincent, NY

Another 1000 Island Lighthouse (close enough anyway) and one of my favorites!

A Lighthouse a Day, Mar 25

Today's Lighthouse is Sunken Rock Lighthouse near Alexandria Bay, NY

Right in the middle of the 1000 Island region, a really cool place that we'd definitely like to see!

Our 100th post!! (OBX Part 4)

This post marks our 100th post on the blog!!  What a great post this is going to be since it is a continuation of our honeymoon adventure on the Outer Banks in North Carolina. 

While just seeing Cape Hatteras Lighthouse would have been enough of an adventure, we decided to make the most out of the day and a half that we were on the Outer Banks.  The recaps of our trip do not follow the chronological order that we saw the lighthouses, we actually saw Bodie Island Lighthouse first (Mike's post coming up soon), then Cape Hatteras, followed by the two lighthouses that I am going to share with you now:  Ocracoke Lighthouse and Currituck Beach Lighthouse. 

We had arrived at Cape Hatteras Lighthouse around 8:30am so that we could cram as much stuff into less than 24 hours as possible.  After we finished climbing the lighthouse and taking a lot of pictures, we hopped into my car and made our way to the ferry that would take us to Ocracoke Island.  Ocracoke Island is only accessible by water or air.  Our friend Vanessa told us that the ferry leaves every half hour, therefore, we tried to make it so that we would catch the ferry without having to wait.  Lucky for us, we did (the way there anyway).

Welcome aboard!

We enjoyed the 45 minute ferry ride by taking in the scenery.  The ride there wasn't too bad but on the way back we were all the way in the back and our car got sprayed by a lot of water.  The impending hurricane was causing some rougher seas, but we were fine!

As soon as we got off the ferry, we made our way to Ocracoke Lighthouse. 

Ocracoke Lighthouse is the second oldest active lighthouse in North Carolina and the lighthouse and keeper's cottage will often house people during hurricanes because of their location on higher ground.

Before trying to catch the ferry to head back to see our fourth lighthouse of the trip, we stopped for some "lunch".  We bought some candy, salt water taffy and fudge from an amazing candy store called Sweet Tooth.  Along with some chips we had brought with us for the drive, we had a really unhealthy lunch (but it was still pretty good!)

Unfortunately, as I alluded to before we didn't make the next ferry and had to wait in line.  We also made some other pit stops along the way like these before making it to Currituck Beach Lighthouse.

 A huge Adirondack chair!

 The Wright Brother's Monument 

Replica of the first flight

Because of our wait for the ferry and some of our stops along the way, we didn't make it to the lighthouse in time to go on the grounds.  We will just have to go back to see it again!

You can climb Currituck Beach Lighthouse and you can even have a wedding on its grounds!  We also went across the way to a beach in order to get some other pictures of the lighthouse. 

There you have it!  The last two lighthouses that we saw on the Outer Banks, but don't worry Mike will fill you in on how our Outer Banks adventure actually started soon!

I hope you enjoyed our 100th post!

A Lighthouse a Day, Mar 24

Today's Lighthouse is Fort Niagara Lighthouse in Youngstown, NY

Yet another repeat, but a pretty cool picture from across the way (most likely from Canada).

A Lighthouse a Day, Mar 23

Today's Lighthouse is Charlotte-Genesee Lighthouse in Rochester, NY

Our "Home-Towner" again, not the same picture as last time but pretty close...

A Lighthouse a Day, Mar 22

Today's Lighthouse is Point Aux Barques Lighthouse near Port Austin, MI

This one's a repeat and the last time it was up I liked the sunset picture, well I like this picture even more!

A Lighthouse a Day, Mar 21

Today's Lighthouse is Presque Isle Lighthouse on the Presque Isle Peninsula near Erie, PA

Recognize this one?

A Lighthouse a Day, Mar 19 & 20

Today's Lighthouse is Sanibel Island Lighthouse on Sanibel Island near Fort Myers, FL

Anyone up for a trip to Florida?

A Lighthouse a Day, Mar 18

Today's Lighthouse is Old Port Boca Grande Lighthouse on Gasparilla Island, FL

Definitely a Cape Cod-Cottage style lighthouse.

A Lighthouse a Day, Mar 17

Today's Lighthouse is St. Marks Lighthouse near St. Marks, FL

A repeat, but a good one.

A Lighthouse a Day, Mar 16

Today's Lighthouse is Cape St. George Lighthouse on St. George Island, FL

A Lighthouse a Day, Mar 15

Today's Lighthouse is Ludington North Pierhead Lighthouse in Ludington, MI

A Lighthouse a Day, Mar 14

Today's Lighthouse is Grand Traverse Lighthouse in the Leelanau State Park near Northport, MI

A Lighthouse a Day, Mar 12 & 13

Today's Lighthouse is Old Michigan City Lighthouse in Michigan City, IN

It's Michigan City, Indiana weekend! Must be a great lil' side-trip to take if you're up in Michigan trying to see all the lighthouses the Great Lakes State has to offer.

Climbing Cape Hatteras (OBX Part 3)

As Mike mentioned yesterday, in addition to taking pictures of Cape Hatteras at sunset and from the old location, we also climbed the tallest lighthouse in the United States.  It was the first lighthouse that either of us had ever climbed, which made it an even more memorable experience!

As you can see climbing the Cape Hatteras lighthouse is the equivalent of climbing up a 12-story building!  As the tallest lighthouse in the United States, Cape Hatteras clocks in at 208 feet tall!  This surpasses the second tallest lighthouse by 17 feet, which is the Cape Charles Lighthouse in Virginia (a skeleton lighthouse) at 191 feet tall.

After purchasing our tickets to climb the lighthouse, we had a short explanation from one of the park rangers about climbing the light.  She mentioned that we should take our time to get to the top and stop for water if needed.  In addition, she mentioned that it is recommended that climbers wear closed toe shoes as the lighthouse's steps are made of cast iron (we may have been wearing flip-flops) and if you stubbed your toe it would really hurt!

 The National Park Service's website states that the climb is "strenuous", however, we are avid hikers and the climb wasn't too bad.  We did stop along the way at a few of the landings to take pictures out some of the windows. 

Half-way there!

We continued up to the top most point that you can climb to (completing the 248 steps) and had our picture taken by another park ranger, it was really windy that day.  In fact, when we went to the Outer Banks most of the beaches were closed because of the amount of wind and rip-currents that were caused by Hurricane Earl.  We were lucky and just missed the bad weather in the Bahamas, Key West and the Outer Banks!

At the top you can get a 360 degree view of the land surrounding the lighthouse.  Here are some of the shots that we got.

Of course, Mike had to take a picture of the lantern room!  We also were able to get a picture of the shadow of the lighthouse that was cast on the ground.

There you have it, our complete Cape Hatteras experience!  We would recommend that anyone who visits the Outer Banks make a stop at this amazing lighthouse, however, do climb the lighthouse at your own risk.  

What is the tallest lighthouse that you have climbed?