Wall Collage: Getaway trip‏

We took advantage of our kid-free time with a weekend getaway. Going South to Fort Fisher - Oak Island - Southport - Bald Head Island. We had a great time and proved that, after almost 10 years, we still enjoy each other’s company. We managed to have a lot of long conversations on several topics (which it is very hard to do when you have kids around), however, most of them were about the kids! We miss them a lot.

Day 1:
Fort Fisher
Until the last few months of the Civil War, Ft. Fisher kept North Carolina's port of open to blockade runners supplying necessary goods to Confederate armies inland. By 1865, the supply line through Wilmington was the last remaining supply route open to Robert E. Lee's Army of Northern Virginia. When Ft. Fisher fell after a massive Federal amphibious assault on January 15, 1865, its defeat helped seal the fate of the Confederacy.

The Confederacy took control of a neck of land in southern North Carolina near the mouth of the Cape Fear River constructed what was to become the largest and most important earthwork fort in the South. Two major battles were fought there, and many Union soldiers received the Congressional Medal of Honor for their gallant participation in that fighting. Today only a few of the mounds remain, since much of the fort has been eroded by the ocean.

From Fort Fisher, we took the ferry to Southport. While we were waiting for the ferry, we visited with some folks from Georgia who were on their way to a show with their lamas. The lamas were generally friendly and let us pet them.

Oak Island
After we checked into the motel in Southport, we drove to Oak Island where we stopped at the Oak Island Lighthouse. It was completed in 1958 and stands 169 ft tall. The main light is a four light rotating fixture, reaching 24 nautical miles offshore and flashing every 10 seconds. There is no spiral staircase as found in most older lighthouses, but instead a series of ships ladders with a total of 131 steps to the lantern gallery level. The public tours has not resumed yet, so we did not have a chance to go to the top.

Southport

It is tucked away just below Wilmington and the mouth of the Cape Fear River and just 45 minutes or so above the South Carolina state line. We stayed at the Riverside motel. It is just a very small, basic motel, but in a very good location. It is Southport's only motel on the riverbank in historic downtown. The motel offers wide porches with swings facing the river with a panoramic view. We went to the Provision Co. for early dinner. It is a very casual place. They let people get their own drinks and keep their tabs by the honor system. It’s known as ‘the local’s hangout’. The view is great and it has a fun atmosphere. We ordered shrimp , crab cakes and tuna steaks. It was so good and fresh. We ended up ordering extra shrimp. We walked around historic downtown, but most of the stores closed around 5-6 pm.