Ocracoke Village and Lighthouse
A sandy, bike-friendly fishing village around a harbor, 13 miles of empty beach, a white 1823 lighthouse and the waters where Blackbeard died.
- Open
- Always open; many shops close in winter
- Price
- Free
- Time Needed
- 1–2 days
- Address
- Silver Lake Harbor, Ocracoke, NC 27960Google MapsApple Maps
- Getting There
- From the free ferry, 13 miles down NC 12 to the village. A passenger ferry from Hatteras also runs in summer.
Why Go
This is the Outer Banks as it used to be. Golf carts and bikes outnumber cars around Silver Lake harbor, and many locals still speak an old dialect, the Hoi Toider brogue. The pirate Blackbeard was killed just offshore in 1718, at Teach's Hole.
See the state's oldest working lighthouse (you can't climb it), the small British Cemetery for sailors of a ship torpedoed in 1942, and the Banker ponies at their pen on the road in. The beach here is often ranked among America's best, and it has no buildings on it at all.
Tips
- Storms close NC 12 on the island from time to time. Check before you go in hurricane season.
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