|
|
|
|||||||
|
Manteo/Roanoke
Island
The Outer Banks are a family vacation destination, famed particularly for their beaches. Everyone should visit the Wright Brothers National Memorial at Kill Devil Hills, where the intrepid brothers launched man’s first powered flight. Jockey’s Ridge State Park, site of the East Coast’s highest sand dunes, is known for great sunset views, kite flying and hang gliding. The Cape Hatteras National Seashore, a 75-mile strand, is the country’s first national seashore. As opposed to a beach playground, Roanoke Island promotes itself as an educational and historical experience. Fort Raleigh National Historic Site, Roanoke Island. The park service oversees the 143-acre property where Sir Walter Raleigh’s explorers and colonists settled in 1585, about three miles northwest of Manteo. In the visitor center, a seventeen-minute movie details the fascinating drama of the lost colonists, who disappeared without a trace three years after their arrival from Britain. Beyond the center, trails lead to the restored fort, which amounts to little more than earthen embankments. A nature trail winds through the woods past the site of the long-gone dwellings built by the colonists outside the fort. (252) 473-5772. Open daily, 9 to 5, to 6 in summer. Free. "The Lost Colony," the nation’s oldest outdoor pageant, is performed under the stars in the Fort Raleigh National Historic Site’s newly refurbished Waterside Theater. First produced in 1937, the pageant proved so successful it has played every summer since, attracting more than three million spectators and inspiring the creation of other pageants. The symphonic drama of song and dance is constantly evolving, recreating itself with new talent and technical improvements. (252) 473-3414 or (800) 488-5012. Nightly except Saturday at 8:30, early June to late August. All seating reserved. Tickets, $14. North Carolina Aquarium/Roanoke Island, Airport Road, Manteo. One of three state-supported aquariums, this is a place for families, who were out in force at our visit. There are touch tables, small tanks and all kinds of hands-on and audio-visual exhibits. For us the highlight was the outdoor courtyard with a pond, a "turtle crossing" and three languid alligators. The grounds extend to Croaton Sound. The aquarium was closed in 1999 for renovations and a major addition. It was scheduled to reopen in spring 2000. (252) 473-3493 or (800) 832-3474. Open Monday-Saturday 9 to 7 in summer, to 5 rest of year. Adults $3, children $1. Roanoke Island Festival Park, Manteo. Opened in 1998, this new festival park occupies 26 acres fronting Shallowbag Bay across from the Manteo waterfront. It represents the expansion of the Elizabeth II State Historic Site. The Elizabeth II, a 69-foot sailing ship moored along the waterfront, is a reproduction built in 1984 of the 16th-century vessels that brought the first colonists to Roanoke Island and America. Costumed guides explain the intricacies of the ship and the lifestyles of those who sailed it. A new exhibit hall is a hands-on, interactive museum. Visitors enter through the facade of a tall ship to walk through four centuries of history, including an Elizabethan parlor, an English colony, the Freedman colony, and boat building and fishing exhibits. A 50-minute movie, "The Legend of Two Paths," portrays Native American culture during the early English settlement. The Roanoke Island Institute of the North Carolina School of the Arts presents cultural arts programs in the new amphitheater pavilion near the water. Boardwalks connect the main building to nature paths and bike trails throughout the park. (252-475-1500. Open daily, 9 to 5, April-October; 10 to 4, rest of year. Adults, $8. In Manteo, the George Washington Creef Memorial Park, on waterfront land donated by local families, contains a boardwalk extending from the marshlands across from the Roanoke Island Inn to the bridge to the festival park next to the Tranquil House Inn. The Davis Boatworks building on Queen Elizabeth Street is becoming the North Carolina Maritime History Museum on Roanoke Island. It’s linked with the Roanoke Island Festival Park but under auspices of the North Carolina Maritime Museum at Beaufort. The museum opened in 1998 with several small race boats built by the Davis brothers and two of the only four surviving shad boats built locally by George Washington Creef. It’s open daily in summer; free. Shopping. New stores seem to pop up every year in downtown Manteo. Most of the action is centered around the Waterfront Shoppes. Grouped around an interior courtyard are stores like the Island Trading Co. with artworks and dinnerware, Island Nautical with antique lanterns and life preservers, and Charlotte’s, a women’s apparel boutique. Across the street are the new Carriage House for flowers and gifts and Water Street Station, an apparel and gift shop. The large Manteo Bookstore has strong regional and nature sections. Candles incorporating shells are featured at the Candle Factory. We admired the cute painted birdhouses at My Secret Garden. Clemmons on Budleigh is a good new antiques shop. Bonnie and Bob Morrill, who have a studio in Wanchese, sell their delightful Wanchese Pottery in a retail shop in a former boat shed at 107 Fernando St. Manteo is also home of the world-famous Christmas Shop and the Island Gallery, a complex of seven multi-level buildings along Highway 64 on the east side of town. Here you’ll find an extravaganza of 33 rooms, decorated Christmas trees, thousands of ornaments, gifts, collectibles and artworks. Otherwise, the area’s most interesting specialty stores and boutiques are in Duck. Extra Special The Elizabethan Gardens, Fort Raleigh National Historic Site, Roanoke Island. This formal English garden is a shady and tranquil waterside retreat away from the hubbub. The Garden Club of North Carolina created the 16th-century-style garden as a living memorial to the ill-fated lost colonists. From a brick gatehouse furnished with period furniture and English portraits, you wander along pine-needled walkways through a variety of gardens and trees. Antique statuary, fountains, a sunken parterre garden and herb and rose beds are among the highlights. Relax and listen to the bird songs in an English thatched-roof gazebo near the shore of Roanoke Sound. Then check out the ancient live oak, believed to have been alive in 1585 when the first colonists landed. (252) 473-3234. Open daily 9 to 5, to 8 in summer when "The Lost Colony" is playing next door. Adults $3. Material excerpted from Inn Spots & Special Places in the Southeast, by Nancy and Richard Woodworth. Copyright 2000. Wood Pond Press E-mail feedback to: Home
page |
Full destination index | |
|
|||||||||||||||||||
