Visitors Welcome

By Molly Harrison | Monday, March 29, 2010
Signs of spring include a new filly in the Ocracoke pony pen

I'm expecting more than the usual amount of competition on the beach-combing and grocery-shopping fronts this week. * It's not only the Easter holiday weekend, which means Spring Break for most of the nation's school kids and the official start of the spring tourist season, but it's also supposed to be a sunny and balmy weekend - like high 70s. If I didn't already live here, I'd be coming for the weekend for sure. All the stores and restaurants have opened up and things are happening on the Outer Banks. * Come on down, visitors. It's been a long winter and everybody here is ready to see you...

Besides warm weather, an early Easter and the arrival of some new faces, Outer Bankers are enjoying signs of spring, like the ospreys hard at work building their nests. * BTW, did I ever tell you that once I saw a pink plastic hairbrush woven into an osprey's nest that I happened to get close to? * Basnight's Lone Cedar Café in Nags Head is offering - I love this - Osprey Watch meals. You can sit by the window and watch their resident bird couple - who they call Ricky and Lucy - catch fish and work on their nest in the sound outside the restaurant. That certainly beats TV in the bar...

More happy springtime news, this time from Ocracoke Island: A new filly was born last week in the Ocracoke pony herd. The filly was born to Spirit, a full-blooded Ocracoke pony, and was named Paloma, which means dove in Spanish, by children from the Ocracoke School. She's a cutie...

It's a great time to be a kid on the Outer Banks. * Being that it's Easter, it's egg hunt-a-rama this weekend. * The folks at Outer Banks Child Magazine pulled together a comprehensive list of candyfests, I mean egg hunts, and let's just say it's extensive. (Don't know about you but my kids are still fighting with me about their St. Patrick's Day Parade candy.) * I can't bore you with all the details here, but here's a quick lowdown: Roanoke Island Festival Park, Friday at noon; Whalehead Club, Friday at 1 p.m. (lots of other activities too); Elizabethan Gardens, Saturday 10 a.m. (other activities too); Kitty Hawk Kites in Nags Head, Saturday at 11 a.m. (they say it's the largest on the OBX); Town of Nags Head in Nags Head Town Park, Saturday at 1 p.m.; Digger's Dungeon in Poplar Branch, Saturday 10 a.m.; Sea Turtle Egg Hunt at the N.C. Aquarium on Roanoke Island, Saturday at 10 a.m.; Hatteras Realty Egg Hunts, Monday at 11 a.m. * Adults can get in on the egg-hunt action at Kelly's Adult Easter Egg Hunt from 11 p.m. to 1:30 a.m. on Sunday, April 4...

This Friday marks the beginning of Manteo's super-fun First Friday celebrations. * From now through December, First Friday offers a good excuse to head to downtown Manteo to enjoy good eats at Full Moon Café, Ortegaz, Adrianna's, 1587, Magnolia Grille and Poor Richard's, live music at various locations around town, special deals at the local shops and galleries and an art opening at the Dare County Arts Council. * This month, the DCAC gallery is opening a show called Girls! Girls! Girls! A Celebration of Women. How entirely springlike and appropriate to celebrate women and the things women love. The reception will be held from 6 to 8 p.m. at the DCAC Gallery and the show will hang through April 30. * Music-wise, Full Moon has Sea Level on Friday and Poor Richard's has the Walker Brothers...

I'm looking forward to seeing the Front Porch String Band play at the Nags Head location of Front Porch Coffee Shop on Saturday afternoon from 2 to 3:30 p.m. (Yes, p.m. Is that early enough for ya?) These guys feature flatpicking guitar, mandolin and standup bass and they're great...

Competing in that 2 p.m. Saturday timeslot is very cool-sounding musical event at Roanoke Island Festival Park * Western Carolina University is presenting two Gamelan concerts featuring examples of traditional Javanese music. This music is restful and contemplative, and we don't get that kind of thing much here on the Outer Banks. * There will be two shows, one at 2 p.m. and one at 7 p.m., with the early one geared to a younger audience....

It's mighty kind of Ocean Boulevard to host Locals' Nights this week. On March 29 and 30, locals get 30 percent of their entire meal. That's a good excuse as any to gather up some friends for dinner...

If you've got some time on your hands this week, head up to the beach in Corolla to see a shipwreck that's been uncovered on the beach this winter. * It's a 400-year-old wooden ship, and state archaeologists are saying that it could very likely be the partial remains of the steamer Metropolis, which sank about 300 yards off the Corolla beach on January 31, 1878. The Metropolis shipwreck, which resulted in 102 lives lost, is one of the most well-known Outer Banks shipwrecks... The wreck was first seen on the beach across from the Currituck Beach lighthouse, but it has drifted south about 2 miles, to the surf due east of Sailfish Street in the Whalehead Beach neighborhood...

Allright, y'all, that's it... I've got to go. Keep checking the site all week as businesses and organizations on the Outer Banks are adding new stuff here every day. I'll be back with a new blog of Outer Banks snippets and events next Tuesday. And if you've got a business or organization that wants to get the word out about something - a sale, a special, an event or a fund-raiser - click on Get Involved just on the right column of this page...

And Please put your 2 cents in. If you'd like to contribute or add your voice to this blog, you can do that below. Keep in mind that the blog comments are moderated so that this site is only putting positive vibes into cyberspace * We'd really love to hear from you...

About the Author Molly Harrison
Molly Harrison is managing editor at OneBoat, publisher of OuterBanksThisWeek.com. She moved to Nags Head in 1994 and since then has made her living writing articles and creating publications about the people, places and culture of the Outer Banks.