I absolutely love being at the beach in the off-season. I always have. I don't like crowds, traffic or waiting in line for things, so I will sacrifice being able to swim in the ocean for the solitude of the beach in winter. To me, that is the only sacrifice. Everything else is pretty much the same. My two visits to the Outer Banks of North Carolina these last few months have both been in the off-season, and both were amazing.
Back in October, before setting off on this current journey, I had to take Shadow Catcher, my van, out on a test run. I wanted to be sure everything worked, to see how it handled on long drives and what I might need to add or remove from my packing list. My folks were headed down to the Outer Banks for their annual vacation there, so I decided to join them...