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We had the awful drive from Salem to Florida--3 LONG LONG days. We were driving through North Carolina the second day--and staying about an hour away from an old Deltak buddy. We got into the campground about 5:30---and Larry kindly offered to drive over to meet us. He arrived about 7:30 with his new girlfriend. By that time, I'd already had two glasses of wine...and nothing to eat. More wine and a shared pizza....we had a great time--but the day after was miserable. Nothing like a hangover with 500+ miles to drive! John did let me rest for awhile on the sofa while he drove.
We had an appointment with the RV dealer in Wilmington for Tuesday at 7:30 am, so we stopped by to introduce ourselves and “build rapport”. Our first impression was one of extremely friendly and helpful people. It continued over our stay in Wilmington. Everywhere we went, we found people willing to go out of their way to help – and we found people who actually knew something about the area.
On Tuesday, we arrived at the dealership at 7:30 and they actually had us in on time and had the problem diagnosed within an hour. It meant ordering a part for the hydraulic line and rescheduling the work. The service we got was phenomenal. Becky, the parts guru, called Winnebago. When they couldn’t get the part immediately, she called the manufacturer who could ship it but would charge overnight shipping. So, she called Winnebago and got them to pick up the shipping. We scheduled the service for Thursday .
We spent the afternoon driving around downtown Wilmington. Even in the pouring rain, we could tell that it was our kind of housing and neighborhood. The historic district is the largest in NC and one of the largest in the country. The houses were typical Southern style- front porches on the sidewalks with brick. The streets were alternately paved with brick. Evidently there is an ongoing battle with the city who keeps trying to repave the streets with concrete – and the people in the neighborhood come out at night and clear off the concrete from their brick streets.
The next day, we took a look at properties on the Intracoastal Waterway. On the waterfront, the homes were beautiful- graceful split staircase entries going up one floor (to allow for hurricane flow-through on the ground level) and multilevels with decks overlooking the waterway. We called for a price check with a realtor- lots for $700-900, homes from $1.4M.
The Minnie Winnie was ready that afternoon. 
While we waited for them to finish up, we took a tour of the Class A and Diesel Pushers on the lot. What a selection- everything from $100-$450K. The high end coaches were gorgeous- 3 TV’s (plasma and flat screens), side by side refrig/freezer, convection microwave, granite countertops, marble baths, washer/dryer. You could easily imagine living full-time in one of these. The sales guy told us that you can count on about 20% discount off list - and then about 10% depreciation the first year.
They fixed the slider and the shower in about an hour and we were off. I finished shopping while John continued the march on “Humpty Dumpty”. We stopped for dinner at the local fish restaurant (owned by a guy from Boston) – fried catfish, hush puppies, baked potato, and cole slaw (and unlimited glasses of coke and iced tea).
We decided to spend one more day in Wilmingon. It was beginning to feel like home. We drove out to Wrightsville Beach. It was very tasteful (for beach property) – not at all honky-tonk. The houses along the Intracoastal were lovely and they had a number of good restaurants right on the water. We stopped for a quick lunch and a waterview before taking the trolley tour of historic Wilmington. After the tour, we drove around picking up realtor sheets. The price range looked good- historic homes still available under $300K. We stopped at one, built in 1930. They were asking $299 and it was small but lovely. It had a beautiful backyard with a 2 car garage and potting shed, original hardwood flooring, 10’ ceilings. It would need some work in the kitchen, but otherwise was in move-in condition. Two guys were looking at the property and probably made an offer on it. We had a nice talk with them and the realtor –getting the local input on the town, real estate, etc. We made one last stop at the Chamber of Commerce and got a relocation package. Then, we headed home through Wilmington traffic – it was pretty bad.
Note: Come back here in the summer – humidity can be dramatic.
The next day, it was time to leave Wilmington. We had a sunny day for our drive to New Bern. It was only 85 miles from Wilmington and we arrived at the Neuse River Campground to find another “Mount Doo-doo”. Most of the campsites were filled wth full time trailer folk. We parked on Squirrel Alley, right next to Bee Hive Trail and I took Mija for a walk to the river (trying to avoid the muck and standing water left over from the rain).
We took a drive to downtown New Bern to grab some lunch and check out the town. Trying to find anything open on a Monday afternoon was tough. The downtown area was deserted. We stopped at a restaurant claiming to be the home of Pepsi Cola.
The historic district of New Bern was absolutely charming- a mix of colonial and Victorian architecture. It had an Annapolis feel. Once again, there was a beautiful waterfront with virtually no restaurants or bars taking advantage of the views.
November 19th --We got up at 5:30 am to see the Leonid meteor shower. The next viewing won’t be until 2098.
That day we drove north of New Bern to a small town, Washington. It was a cute town with very inexpensive real estate. It reminded us of Havre de Grace – using their waterfront for a parking lot. The downtown was filled with empty storefronts. You definitely got a feeling of a depressed economy.
From Washington, we drove to the coast to the town of Oriental. It had gotten tremendous press in the guidebooks for it’s historic sailing charm. We completely missed any charm. We found the one restaurant in town that was open- Mis Sal’s Kitchen. It was like eating in an old age home- complete with a room full of senior citizens eating from a huge buffet (featuring ham, yams, cole slaw..)
From there, we took the ferry from Minnesott Beach to Cherry Branch and drove down to the Beaufort (BOU-fort, not BU-fort). Beaufort was a cute little resort town- only a few streets of restaurants and shops and a few streets of historic houses. Evidently the summer is packed with tourists. In November, there was no one on the streets.
We drove back through Morehead City and Havelock (a military town). The countryside is ticky-tacky –dotted with mobile home parks and gated golf communities. We had seen a young girl living in a trailer with her very large mother at Neuse River Campground. As we watched her going to and from school, we commented on how difficult it must be to live like that and deal with peer pressure at school. Driving around NC, we realized that living in a trailer park doesn’t have a stigma- it’s a way of life.
A few comments about North Carolina:
Coastal NC (except Wilmington) – you have to drive forever to get anywhere.
There are churches everywhere – Baptist, Pentecostal, and a host of denominations that we’d never heard of before.
Black and whites do not mix – not in the restaurants, stores, or bars. The blacks do not make eye contact with whites.
Life is country, cars, Christ, fuhball, fishin and firearms.
Bookstores (except Bible book stores) and computer stores are virtually non-existent. Auto parts stores and car dealerships are everywhere.
The Coastal plain is either swamp or scrub pine.
NYC has Ralph Kramden, Mpls has Mary Tyler Moore, NC has Andy Griffith. (They’re even building a statue to him in Raleigh)
We drove back to Morehead City for lunch at the “Sanitary” Restaurant.
It was, again, senior citizens on parade. We’re not sure how much more fried food we can stand- lunch was fried fish, french fries, fried onion rings, fried hush puppies and unlimited ice tea or coke.
The Atlantic beachfront was nothing short of the best of honky-tonk Florida. The only quasi-quality place was Emerald Isle.
Time to head to North Carolina. First stop- Raleigh. It gave us a chance to see an inland NC city and get to an RV dealer. It was another day of driving in the rain. It seems like every travel day is a stormy day. John stopped at every truck stop to try to get air in the tires. The tire valves that Winnebago supplied just wouldn’t work.
We arrived in Raleigh and headed to College RV. The dealership was filled with “good old boys”. They got us set up in their back lot/campground with some vague promises for “fitting us into the schedule” in the next few days.
We drove the RV back to the “campground” and discovered a whole new breed of “trailer trash”. We’d always thought of “trailer trash” as those folks living in mobile homes permanently affixed to the ground. These folks had travel trailers permanently hooked to their sites. For $270/month, they got a water, electric and sewer hookup. 
They wrapped their pipes for winter freezes, had used tire planter boxes (a lot with plastic plants) and some even had container gardens (growing vegetables). Most of them had barking dogs on leashes (and none of them cleaned up after the dogs). After a few days, we renamed the park, “Mount Doo-Doo”. We spent a lot of time cleaning dog shit off our shoes.
While waiting for the RV service, we explored Raleigh. It has an Atlanta feeling – shopping malls everywhere and huge roads to handle the tremendous traffic volume. The driving style is reminiscent of Nascar. Speeding is prevalent and they typically speed up and ride your bumper. They hate to be passed and speed up whenever you attempt to pass them. They also ride in your blind spot. It’s a very irritating driving style, not to mention being dangerous.
We spent most of the day shopping (seems like we do a lot of shopping in this new lifestyle). There’s always something that needs to be fixed, groceries that need to be replenished, etc). Fortunately, Raleigh was awash in Target, Home Depot, Kmart, WallMart…
We finally got to tour Raleigh's beautiful historic district, Oakwood. The neighborhood had a wonderful feel – quiet, tree lined streets with lots of houses with southern front porches. The houses were a mix of Craftsman and Victorian styles. North Carolina not only marks the beginning of the “south” in terms of attitude (Maryland and Virginia are more transitional states), but the housing also has the southern tradition of high ceilings (to deal with the heat).
We headed back to the RV to see if they’d been able to fit us into the schedule. Finally, at 4:30, they came to get the vehicle. They got it into the shop and got the tire valve extenders installed (and did a diagnosis of the slider problem). After the frustration of dealing with the dealer, we tried to find a restaurant for dinner. We settled on a Mexican dump across the street.
We headed to the coast in the morning. It was going to be a long day of driving, but we got an early start and it was fascinating to see the change in topography from Piedmont to Coastal Plain. We drove to Edenton (a town that most retirement books recommend). It was charming. The downtown was another Mayberry RFD main street. The housing was Summit-esque – large houses on beautifully manicured lawns. The waterfront housing was Big Chill-esque and the waterfront was truly spectacular. We searched for a restaurant with a water view- with no luck.
We had lunch at a little lunch spot and got the low-down from the locals. The real estate prices are rising- largely due to the influx of northerners and lots of homes are on the market with people trying to take advantage of the market prices. Hurricanes don’t appear to be a problem – no problems with tidal surges. They’re 1/5 hours from Norfolk (where most people go for serious shopping) and 1.5 hours to the beach. Although it was a beautiful town with wonderful housing and a great waterfront, it definitely felt as if it would close in on you in time.
We drove from there through Elizabeth City and onto the Outer Banks. The Outer Banks beach towns weren’t as honky-tonk as Delaware, but still beachy. We stopped at Kitty Hawk.
With another day in Raleigh, we took a trolley tour of historic Raleigh and went through the downtown area and Oakwood district. The downtown was virtually empty – void of life- on a Saturday afternoon. The only activity was around the City Market park (mostly blacks sitting around in the park and white people shopping in the cute little stores). The South is so segregated to this day. Whites and blacks live in completely separate areas, eat in separate restaurants and appear to have very little interaction.
We drove through several other areas of Raleigh proper. Cameron had a Cleveland Heights feel to it- housing built in the 1930’s. We also got some shopping done (shoes and rain gear for John). Cary, a suburb just outside Raleigh, was shopping central with every store known to man. We also found an ethnic enclave there –with a Korean restaurant and Indian grocery store. Dinner was take-out Korean (the woman in the restaurant couldn’t believe that we knew anything about Korean food- half of their menu was Chinese food and we ordered “off the menu”)
Dan and Joanne were in Winston Salem visiting their daughter, Meredith, so we decided to meet them for brunch. Another rainy day and horrifying NC drivers. We did find two truck stops along the way- a Petro and Flying J. We got a truck stop directory and marveled at the ammenities in these stops. Brunch was fun. Joanne kept us entertained – just by being Joanne. She told us that the first time she had ever been out of New Jersey was on a date with Dan. Her dad, a carpenter, thought a big outing was to take the family and drive Route 80 to see the progress. For a big treat, they’d stop by Dairy Queen on the way back for a cone. Jennifer, their daughter, suggested she write a book, “Life beyond Route 80”.
After brunch, we took a drive around Winston Salem. The West End was touted as their “historic district”. It was a Cleveland Heights-esque area and the downtown area was sterile (and dead –although it was a Sunday afternoon). The downtown looked and felt a bit like Rochester, NY.
On the way home, we stopped in Chapel Hill (home of the NC Tar-heels). It was definitely a college town (the campus looked a bit like the UofM campus without the beautiful old buildings and without the large city attached for life outside campus. We did find a NY Times and headed back to Mount Doo-doo.
