Outer Banks

This morning I awoke to a cloudy, rainy, humid New York summer day- quite a shock when the past week was spent basking in the sun on the beaches of the Outer Banks. Aside from a few days of winds rivaling a sand storm in the Sahara desert, the weather was perfect. We shared our house with my aunt and her family and my grandparents, ate lots of fresh seafood, played cutthroat family on family games of Catch Phrase and Buzz Word, and basically had loads of fun.

This picture is a very proud one for my grandma because she's never actually been in the ocean. Ever. Although she has come to the beach with us almost every year we've gone, she never really learned to swim and has always been uncomfortable in the water. Unfortunately you can't entirely tell from this picture, but we're actually standing on a sand bar a few yards into the ocean. With my grandpa and uncle's assistance (she doesn't trust my grandpa to not push her in), she waded onto the sand bar and cheerily splashed around. Way to go, Beverly!

Our yearly beach picture (not on the beach due to sand blasting winds. My skin may need exfoliating, but not that badly!), lacking my brother and T-rav, but including our sister-in-law-to-be, Lauren.

And finally, I was exceedingly excited to finally go to Ocracoke Island, one of the more remote islands on the Outer Banks. The only way to get there is to take a 40 minute ride on one of 3 free ferries. The island is a whopping 9 square miles with a population of about 770. And it has a tiny but still functioning lighthouse on Silver Lake (it's really a bay). More importantly (to me at least), it also happens to be the home of the Ocrakoe Brogue, giving us charming little words like mommuck (to harass) and quamish (nauseated). I was hoping and praying to find someone who actually still speaks the brogue, but alas, we didn't encounter anyone actually from Ocracoke or under the age of about 30, and old people tend to be the only ones who hold on to their dialect these days. However, my disappointment subsided a bit when I found a charming little inn I intended to return to the next time I'm in the area. But since I wasn't able to bring back a real life sample of the brogue, here's a little taste of what we're all missing. Until next year...