Leaving the Outer Banks

Up in the morning, walk Shadow, have breakfast, disconnect the electric, crank it up and drop off the trash on the way out. That's our usual morning routine when we're traveling. Today our plans are to visit the Wright Brother National Monument at Kill Devil Hill and then make our way back to the mainland and find our way north which means make a right turn.

The site of the monument is just wonderful. Big hill to the right, which has to be the Kill Devil, which has a monument at the top of the hill. long flat area which has to be the original take off area, a couple old  wooden sheds and a relatively new visitors center housing an interpretative area and a auditorium with a replica of the original airplane where a ranger tells you all about the Wright Brothers and their flying machine. We listened to the presentation and then walked up the hill to the monument where Shadow got his picture with one of the Wright brother - they had separate busts on columns twenty feet  apart.

Now as the story goes the brothers came to  this area because of the hill and the, most of the time, steady winds. In 1901 they brought a glider and used the hill for their take off. The glider didn't do too well so they made some adjustments and came back in 1902 and the older worked better. Happily they went home and installed an engine and props an were successful in the first manned flight. For takeoff they used a steel monorail and Orville held the wing level while Wilbur did the takeoff run. Or Wilbur held the wing level while Orville made the first takeoff. We left the presentation early and I'm not sure who was at the controls. Actually, their were no gauges and the only control was for the elevator in front (rudder was in the rear) of the plane. The pilot laid on the wing holding the rudder control in his left hand and held on to the front of the wing with his right hand. Just a beautiful Easter morning outside at the monument and, no, we didn't find any Easter eggs.

This is inside the visitors pavilion where the ranger is telling
the story about the Wright brothers and their flying machine

The Wright Brothers monument on top of Kill
Devil Hill. Just amazing that two bicycle
mechanics could design, build and actually
be the first to fly a powered aircraft. 

 On the way north we saw a sign for the ferry to the northern part of the Outer  Banks - we never heard of this before. So at Currituck we took one more short (free) ferry over to Knott's Landing - a
small rural farming area where we stopped at their downtown, a combination gas station, convenience store and cafe, for an afternoon picker, upper cup of coffee.  Our GPS got us out of there and up to Virginia Beach where we are now.

PS. Remember Cedar Point Ferry terminal? Forgot to tell you that there is a historical sign there that  said the Ocracoke Inlet was a major trading inlet back in the yesteryears. Also, and probably their
claim to fame, is that the notorious pirate Blackbeard was killed in 1817 somewhere near there.  Just thought you would to know especially if you're playing trivia at Sandy Bottoms.