When we got to Cape Hatteras, that’s about when our road trip really started to feel real. North Carolina was the first state on our trip that I’d never been to at all before, it had begun to not rain all of the time, and it felt like a truly different part of the country.

We entered the state from Virginia, in the small town of Wise, where we caught US 1 (which I suppose we could have taken all the way from New England to Florida, but that wasn’t part of the plan) and headed on 158 directly east, past the Great Dismal Swamp, and onto the narrow islands of the Outer Banks. We passed on the pricey Kitty Hawk experience, and, after driving along beautiful, narrow islands and long bridges, we camped in Cape Hatteras National Seashore. We finally had a chance to let our soggy tent dry out from the previous week’s soaking, and enjoyed America’s tallest lighthouse and the sound of the surf as it crashed outside our tent.

The next morning, we continued down the strip of islands, and hopped the two ferries, the first to Ocracoke Island, and from there to Cedar Island (home of the infamous vending machine french fries), and on down the coast of mainland North Carolina. After leaving the state that day and heading into Charleston, South Carolina, I haven’t been back, which means I’ve never been to Raleigh, Durham, Chapel Hill, Charlotte, the Great Smoky Mountains, or anywhere else in the state. I’ll have to work on that one day.