Carolina Beach State Park, Fort Fisher State Recreation
Area and Lake Waccamaw State Park – 3/24/19 - 6 Miles
Early Sunday morning I waved goodbye to Surf City and headed
out to visit two more coastal NC state parks. My original plan was to camp at Carolina
Beach State Park, but in my gut I was undecided. What’s this hesitation all
about? I felt conflicted, nervous (afraid?) to spend the night alone, but why?
Because I will be bored? Lonely? I'm not afraid of
people/animals/weather. I’ll ponder this unsteady feeling and whether I should
“make” myself travel alone. [Sidebar: when I first considered hiking the
Smokies 900, I consulted a wise woman who had solo hiked the AT and I asked how
to overcome fears of being alone. She said, “Repetition.”]
An easy drive southbound past Wilmington to Carolina Beach State Park, which is not oceanfront as I had assumed from its name. Its northern border is the Intracoastal Waterway and its western border is the mighty Cape Fear River. The park makes good use of its 761 acres, featuring a picnic area for day visitors, overnight camping for individuals and groups (restrooms with hot showers!) and camping cabins for roughing it with heat and air conditioning. There’s an impressive 54-slip marina with two public boat ramps, a store for fishing and camping supplies (restrooms and hot showers again!)
A park map from the Visitor Center showed me the lay of the
land. There are 9 miles of intertwined and overlapping hiking trails. The trail key
gives the length, blaze identification and description for each, but it wasn’t
easy to determine accurate mileage for any combination.
Carnivorous plants are special to this part of NC, so I made
sure to walk the half-mile Flytrap Trail, featuring Venus flytraps (native only
within 70 miles of Wilmington, NC) and pitcher plants. This trail was bustling with Cub Scouts and
their parents who were camping at the close-by group sites.
Pitcher plants
Longleaf pine
Checking out the marina, situated where the Intracoastal
Waterway meets the Cape Fear River. I’m
not a boat person, but the still water and flawless reflection on this
beautiful day made me wish I was.
Consulting my trail map, I chose a route to the Oak Toe
Trail to a marsh overlook. First I took the Sugarloaf Trail (which is
overlapped for a bit by the Swamp Trail – why did they do this? Why couldn’t each trail just have its own
name? I guess because they name the trails for land features?) Took Sugarloaf,
then the concurrent Swamp Trail, turned right off of Swamp onto Sugarloaf (yes,
it was confusing in real life) then the Oak Toe Trail to its boardwalk end.
In hindsight, I wish I had skipped the Oak Toe overlook and
gone for the Sugarloaf Dune, as the timing would have been the same. During my return
hike to the car I decided not to camp overnight here, feeling the pull to get
home. Will I ever return? I think so. Carolina Beach SP has much to offer and
is a great base for more local adventures.
Now that I’d made the decision to sleep in my own bed at the
end of the day, I was ready to move on. Next
stop, Fort Fisher State Recreation Area, only 20 minutes further down Hwy 421
to the tip of Pleasure Island [How was Pleasure Island created, you ask?
Read here.] The Recreation Area is adjacent to Fort Fisher State Historic Site, the remains of a Confederate fort with an
interpretive signed walkway and a small museum.
I passed the historic site on my way to the Rec Area Visitor Center, which is the
gateway to six miles of undeveloped beachfront that allows access to four-wheel
drive vehicles. This is a huge attraction and plenty of people were signing up
and letting the air out of their tires to drive on the sandy beach.
The North Carolina Aquarium is next to the VC but I didn’t
have the time to do it justice – another reason to spend a base camp weekend at
Carolina Beach State Park.
There’s only one walking trail, so that’s simple. The Basin
Trail leads from the VC to a boardwalk overlook of the Cape Fear River Basin. It’s
1.1 miles one way, starting out in the maritime forest of stunted trees and
continuing flat flat flat over a couple hundred yards of challenging deep sand.
Did I mention that by mid-day the sun was H-O-T??
A sturdy boardwalk passes through salt marshes that fascinated
and intimidated me. It’s hard to believe
the waters are shallow. As I stood still on the wood decking, birds flittered
to and fro and a slight breeze rustled the grasses. A time traveler would have
been hard pressed to say what century she was in.
A human history point of interest along the Basin Trail: a
World War II bunker with a story within a story. Robert
Harrill, known as the Fort Fisher Hermit, lived in the abandoned bunker from
1956 to 1972 and shared his beliefs about "common sense" with
thousands of visitors every year while surviving on what nature provided in the
surrounding salt marsh and oyster beds.
Trail’s end looks across the might Cape Fear River Basin to
Zeke’s Island Reserve that protects shorebird feeding habitat.
I left Fort Fisher behind, checking to see that I had time
for one more stop, since I would pass close by on my way home: Lake Waccamaw State Park.
Armed with my newfound interest in Carolina bay lakes, I
learned that Lake Waccamaw is the largest Carolina bay lake in NC, covering
9,000 acres with 14 miles of shoreline. The park owns the southeastern third of
the lake and shoreline, plus the land encompassing the Waccamaw River as it
flows from the lake, and it provides the only public access to the water. Some
wealthy folks with nice houses own the rest. The park includes yet another
fantastic Visitor Center, picnic areas, primitive group camping (no individual
car camping) and hiking trails. The longest trail is the 4-mile Lakeshire Trail
from the VC to the dam at the mouth of the Waccamaw River – don’t forget that
it’s 4 miles back.
When I arrived, a friendly young ranger was sitting on the
front steps with a local landowner, no other staff on duty today. He opened up
the office to get me a park map and gave me an embroidered patch for free
because he couldn’t figure out how to start the computer for me to pay for it.
While his tech skills were lacking, his knowledge (and enthusiasm) of the flora
and fauna of the park was extensive. He said that alligators would be active on
this warm day but probably the best place to see them was along the road I’d
driven on leading to the park entrance.
I had about an hour to look around, so I walked from the VC to
the first boardwalk, feeling edgy the whole way for fear of tripping over an
alligator. Like the other bay lakes, the deep blue water seemed infinitely
deep. Next I walked 15 minutes on the Lakeshore Trail before retracing my steps
to the VC.
Mama longleaf pine
Baby longleaf pine
Spanish moss
No alligator sightings today. I know what you’re thinking: Lake Waccamaw State Park could also
be on the list of stops for that return trip I keep talking about. I was a
little bit wishing I had slowed down and opted to stay the night at Carolina
Beach SP, but you can benefit from my advance explorations, right? I covered a
whole lot of territory in this three-day weekend (including the FMST annual
gathering!) and I was glad to get home. Not sure what I’m trying to prove, but
everyone knows I do like checklists, and my new North Carolina State Parks passport is
waiting to get stamped.
“In wisdom gathered over time I have found that every
experience is a form of exploration.”
~Ansel Adams
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