False Cape State Park Hike 3/15/2016

False Cape to N. C. Hike March 15, 2016 After checking with Kyle Barbour (Park Manager) at False Cape State Park to see if I could use the bus to transport the Tuesday Group the 9 mile into the park, (He said yes) the trip was on. People started signing up and at twenty I thought that would be all but then 21, 22, 23, and all the way to 40 had signed up by Monday morning. Then the rains came Monday evening and into the night and was forecast for Tuesday morning, but by 6:00 A. M. it had stopped. The fog and mist were heavy enough that I had to use my windshield wipers as I left Portsmouth and the temperature was only 49 degrees. We of the Breakfast Bunch met at Hardees on Mt. Pleasant Rd. at 7:30 and we had 5 to show. I left at eight in order to pick up the bus and be back at Little Island City Park by 9:00, while others stayed and finished their meal.

When I got to L.I.C.P. there were already 3 cars in the lot and out of the 40 people that had signed-up we had 35 to show. Driving through Back Bay Wildlife Refuge we only saw 2 Osprey and a few ducks but as we drove on through False Cape some saw a Coyote running in the woods. We dropped 2 people off at the office that didn’t want to do the hike with us on our seven, maybe eight mile hike and continued on 3 more miles down to Wash Woods Road. Leaving the bus the hike was on, heading out towards the ocean everyone moved faster, I think it was because I had told them of the Pit Toilet at the end of the road and not the beautiful blue ocean waiting for them. As the line formed at the little wooden house, the rest of the group walked over the dunes to the beautiful empty beach there at False Cape and waited. All together we started down the beach a little over 3 miles into North Carolina and at the first road crossing there at Carova, called Bass Road, we headed west.

Here we passed some of the million dollar homes built there waiting for the “Big One” to wash them out to sea someday and a few others that were further back only costing 3 or 4 hundred thousand. As we reached Ocean Pearl Road it was time to head north and back into Virginia. Stopping at the state line to see the Monument, placed there in the late 1800’s to mark the boundary between the two states and get a few pictures; we then headed to Dudley Island for our lunch. With the 33 people we had on the hike, we took up the whole dock, one that the TATC had built 2 years earlier; we spread out from one end to the other. After lunch we had two others stops, one at the Church and Cemetery Site and the other at the Old Swan Hunt Club now the Education Center for the park. Getting back on the bus we headed out of the park, stopping at the office to pick up the two people we had left there and also use the bathrooms, the trip was almost over. After saying our goodbyes and some heading home, 6 of us in True Tuesday Group Fashion, headed to Pungo Pizza and Ice Cream Parlor to round out a perfect day. Thanks to everyone for coming on my hike today and letting me show off my park to each of you. Hope you had as much fun as I did! Bruce

View Bill's photos: https://www.flickr.com/photos/137344663@N04/sets/72157663691260903/

View Jim's photos: https://imagesbyjimarend.smugmug.com/Sports/Tuesday-Group-Hikes/20160315-False-Cape-Hike/