THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1994, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SUNDAY, June 26, 1994 TAG: 9406230193
SECTION: CAROLINA COAST PAGE: 50 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: Ron Speer
DATELINE: 940626 LENGTH: Medium
Most of them scoff at the idea of a sailing vacation around the Outer Banks, where they say there's more mud than water. I know that's what strangers say, because not long ago I was saying it, too.
{REST} The Chesapeake Bay was the only place for me, I thought - until I sailed the Wind Gypsy down the Pasquotank River, across the Albemarle Sound and into Roanoke Sound and Manteo.
And now I'm all for spreading the message that the Roanoke Island Business Association and the Dare County Board of Commissioners are trying to send:
Roanoke Island and other parts of the Outer Banks would make a fascinating stopover for the 8,000 or so boats that travel the Atlantic Intracoastal Waterway north in the spring and south in the fall, captains and crews spending money as they go.
I've traveled the waterway as far north as the Delaware Bay, and I have some wonderful memories of layovers at St. Michaels, the Solomons, Oxford and Crisfield in Maryland, and Onancock, Reedville, the Rappahannock and Piankatank rivers, Mobjack Bay, the Salt Ponds, and Hampton and Norfolk in Virginia.
They are wonderful places to spend a night, a week or a summer. But frankly, Manteo is every bit as charming as any of those towns. And the Outer Banks is a short day sail off the waterway which goes up the Alligator River to Elizabeth City or Coinjock.
The people are friendly, the facilities at the Manteo waterfront are superb, good restaurants are everywhere, and the beach is just over the dunes, something not offered often along the waterway.
There also are superb repair facilities for transients at Wanchese, and plenty of things for bored kids or jaded wives or weary husbands to do for a week or so while recuperating from days on the water.
There's plenty of water for all but biggest of boats. My centerboard wouldn't come up on my 24-foot sloop when I sailed from Elizabeth City, so I needed 6 feet of water. I never hit bottom, and I've since hauled the boat at Wanchese and gotten it back together.
Transients love to watch watermen at work as they travel, and the Outer Banks is loaded with crabbers and shrimpers and trawlers.
And the Carolina winds are a delight to sailors because they rarely pipe down, a common summer occurrence on the Chesapeake Bay where dozens of days I've rocked away on flat waters.
So how do you spread the word that the Albemarle and the Outer Banks are well worth a visit by all those sailboats and yachts traveling the waterway?
``We think word of mouth is probably the best way, because cruisers talk to each other all the time,'' says Chris Toolan, who has been trying to lure sailors here for a couple of years as economic development chairman of the Roanoke Island Business Association.
But before much money is spent, the group wants to make sure it is economically feasible. So it has gotten the support of the Dare County commissioners who are asking the state to kick in three-fourths of the cost of a $15,000 study to see what impact transient boaters would have on Dare County.
Some advertising has been done on signs along the waterway encouraging transients to pay a visit to Roanoke Island, and Toolan says once-fuzzy charts have been updated and channel markers improved.
``But we need to get boaters on the waterway talking about our area, because that's what leads them to seek out new places,'' says Toolan.
And like most people, sailors like company and the sight of other sails is a big draw when exploring new waters.
I haven't seen many in my few trips out of Manteo, so I hope the campaign forges ahead.
by CNB