North Carolina, Our Favorite State So Far

A stare down with an enormous bull elk in Smoky Mountain National Park

He was enormous, a truly beautiful specimen. He was no more than thirty yards ahead of me with grass hanging from his rack and mud coating all four legs. I’m talking about a male elk, called a bull. He had crossed the street following a female who wasn’t keen on his advances and ended up in the field right in front of me. I quickly crossed the road and left the area to the bull, but this brief encounter was exhilarating and exactly what I needed. I had been struggling and was pretty down. Standing in Smoky Mountain National Park, This encounter made me feel alive again and reminded me why we decided to go on this trip in the first place.

We haven’t been gone too long, having left on August 6th we have now been on the road for exactly four months as I sit here writing this post. While we have ventured as far south as Florida, we have spent the majority of our time in the Mid-Atlantic and just beneath it in Maryland, DC, Virginia, and North Carolina. While they have all been great, North Carolina has been by far our favorite state. The sample size isn’t huge but we can confidently say that we have been completely blown away.

One of our favorite aspects of the state is the diversity. We spent the first half of our time in the mountains of Western North Carolina. Heading west, you’ll hit Ashville and start to climb, and while not Colorado steep, you feel that you just keep climbing. Our first stop was Cherokee, which sits at the bottom of a valley in the Great Smokey Mountains. The climb down the winding mountain roads is interesting, especially when driving a forty-foot motorhome towing a Jeep. It was a good test of the brakes.

The beautiful mountains of Western, NC. It is a wonder when you learn that these mountains were almost logged bare, and that almost all trees in the area are now second generation growth.

The Cherokee KOA is perfectly situated, right on the Raven Fork River that runs through the center of town, with the Stony Mountain Range standing guard on one side, and surrounded by Great Smokey Mountain National Park on the other. The KOA is no more than ten minutes from the Oconaluftee Visitor Center. The park is so close to town that we spotted elk hanging out in front of the high school and walking through downtown Cherokee.

A Beautiful bull Elk hanging out in front of the Cherokee High School

It is truly a special place. Sitting at the campsite you are surrounded by beautiful lush green mountains. Water and hydrocarbons that come from the trees create the blueish “smoke” that settles in the valleys and gives the mountains their Smoky Mountain name.

The Blue Smoke rising from the mountains around Great Smoky Mountain National Park

Smoky Mountain National Park is the most visited National Park in the US and sees over 14 million visitors a year. The next busiest park is Zion at 5 million. After visiting I can see why. It is truly beautiful and is free to enter. It is one of the most accessible parks that we have come across.

The town of Cherokee NC is a Cherokee Indian Reservation and is home to the Eastern Band of the Cherokee Nation. It is a true tourist town serving the park, especially in the summer months. Downtown is wall-to-wall souvenir shops. The only other big attraction is the Harrah’s Cherokee Hotel and Casino. While we are not big gamblers, they had some very good restaurants. One of our favorites was the Brio Italian Grill. The town is also home to the Museum of the Cherokee Indians which we didn’t get to visit but heard great things about. While charming, the town is also a reminder of the struggles of the Indian people.

We really enjoyed our stay and we will definitely be back.

Beautiful Mingo Falls, just a short hike in and right down the road from the Cherokee KOA

After Cherokee, we made our way to Uwharrie National Forest in Troy, NC. Uwharrie was a place that I have wanted to visit for years. It is known for its Jeep trails throughout the Forest and is a gathering place for Jeepers and offroaders looking to test their abilities. Overland Experts, a top offroad driving school and training provider, has one of their training locations there. Some of the trails get pretty gnarly so you have to be careful.

While it was fun, the trails were somewhat of a disappointment. Maybe I had built them up too much in my mind. The Arrowhead Campground on the other hand was a real treat. Nestled deep in the trees, our site was private and backed up to the open forest. Miles of hiking trails weaved through the campground and were fun to explore. The only problem was that the deep tree cover made it difficult to get decent Starlink coverage. While normally not an issue, I work from home and need decent access to the internet, but we made do.

There is not much to do in the area other than the forest, and you need to head about 35 mins to Albemarle or one of the surrounding towns if you need to do any shopping or to find more than a couple of local restaurants around the forest.

From Uwharrie, we continued East eventually working our way to the Atlantic Ocean. Our next stop was the Cape Hatteras KOA on the Outer Banks. We were parked one row of RV’s from the ocean. Just a short walk over the dunes and we were right on the beach.

The sunset’s on the Outer Banks were spectacular

On our first evening, we had dinner right on the water at Waterman’s Bar and Grill just down the road from the Cape Hatteras / Outer Banks KOA Resort. Dinner was fantastic and the sunset that we were treated to was even better. The sunsets and sunrises were spectacular, and on the needle-like island of the Outer Banks, the two are merely across the street from each other. All I had to do was climb the dune and I would be treated to a sensational sunrise.

The sunrises were not too bad themselves and were a peaceful way to start the day

Cape Hatteras is another tourist spot and while we were there in early October it was quite empty and restaurants and shops were starting to close for the winter. While not overly, warm, it made for a fabulous time to visit as we had many of the beaches and restaurants to ourselves and shared them only with locals. One of our favorite restaurants was Dirty Dick’s Crab House in Avon, NC. While the food was fantastic, I think our favorite find was our “I got crabs at Dirty Dick’s” t-shirts. We couldn’t help ourselves. Cape Hatteras is a beautiful place that we enjoyed very much, but I can also see it becoming overrun with people during peak periods like summer.

From there we traveled just over four hours south to Wilmington NC. Wilmington is a port city in North Carolina and is known as a gateway to the Cape Fear Coast and beaches like Wrightsville and Carolina. While also a coastal city, it was a stark difference from the Outer Banks. With over 115,000 people it is a decent size city and had the traffic to back it up. We were at the KOA right off Rt 17. We are more accustomed to quiet parks in remote areas, but here we were right in the thick of it. We had every shop and restaurant we could think of right at our fingertips. The park was well situated though and felt protected, and other than the sirens from the fire station right outside, we didn’t notice too much noise.

Both Carolina and Wrightsville Beach are just over half an hour away and are extremely beautiful, but they do have relatively high surf. Wilmington had a really quant waterfront down by the port that we would like to explore more next time we are in the area.

The surf breaking on Carolina Beach

If you are ever in the area it would be a crime if you didn’t stop by Sweet D’s Bakery. While they offer a variety of bakery items, they are known for their croissants which come in every flavor from glazed to maple bacon, and filled croissants like bavarian and blueberry. To say they are decedent is an understatement. The only thing better than their baked goods is the people, Brian Dickey and his team at Sweet D’s were the nicest people that we had the pleasure of meeting in Wilmington and they made our visit special. Brian opened Sweet D’s as COVID was breaking out and I am thrilled to see that they are not only surviving but thriving. We wish them all the best.

We experienced so much in North Carolina, from the mountains in Western NC and Great Smoky Mountain National Park to Uwharrie National Forest, and the beaches of the Outer Banks and southern shore. But North Carolina had one more surprise to offer up, the Wild Spanish Mustangs of Corolla. These horses are unique to Corolla and Currituck, NC, and roam free on the beaches and surrounding areas. These horses were brought to the Americas in the 1500s on Spanish ships and are thought to have survived one or multiple shipwrecks, swam to shore, and have been roaming the area ever since.

Though wild, the horses were clean, well kept, and were stunningly beautiful

Corolla is located at the northern end of the Outer Banks. If you drive far enough you run out of pavement and end up on the sand heading up to Carova Beach. As you keep heading North you start to see exit points over the dunes that take you into a cluster of houses from one side of the island to the other. It is an interesting place and I have never seen anything quite like it. There is a network of roads connecting neighborhoods of houses, though not paved and only made of sand. There are no stores or restaurants that we could find, and the only way to access the area is by boat or by driving down the beach.

The horses would graze peoples yards, often in groups of at least two or three

What makes it even more unique is the horses. They wander these roads and neighborhoods eating the local seagrasses. There are signs everywhere warning you not to feed the horses as it can kill them, and you can find their scat scattered across the roads and fields. While there are groups that will take you in, we found no problem finding the horses on our own and stumbled on 24 throughout the afternoon. It was surreal as many of them were hanging out in people’s yards. It was a special experience that we will not soon forget.

We stumbled on this pack a couple of times. They were led by the blond on the right, which we nicknamed Fabio

North Carolina truly had a lot to offer and is a place we look forward to exploring even further. It even has us wondering if this a place that we could end up in when we are ready to finally settle down again. We will see, only time will tell.