I had my reasons last Sunday for needing to get the heck out of my house. I had eaten breakfast at a gas station, gone to church, and still had a few hours to burn until I could finally go back to work on Monday morning.
The wind was coming out of the east–which is not good for riding my Jetski on the west side of Currituck Sound. I decided to call a buddy (Phil) who lives on the north end of Roanoke Island to see what the water looked like there. He said that it was flat and asked me if I wanted to drag my ski to his house. He lives almost an hour away, but I didn’t mind the drive–especially today.
We both put our skis in and headed out. We rode the west side of Roanoke Island to start off with. Unlike Currituck Sound, the water there has some depth to it and a sandy (not grassy) bottom. We rode under the “old Manns Harbor bridge,” past the airport and Burnside and then under the “new Manns Harbor bridge.” These bridges have names and I should know them, but everyone just calls them the old bridge and the new bridge.
We jumped off the skis and cooled off for a while out in the deeper water. It was great. Phil showed me some neat spots and told me stories about the changing shoreline in that area. We saw some remnants of old piers, an old radio tower, and even an old van that was half in the water and half out. We rode the creeks through the marsh on the southern tip of the island at Wanchese.
Directly across a choppy sound was the Bodie Island Lighthouse. Phil has a large ski that rides more like a living room couch. My ski is small and humble and rides more like a barstool. In fact, my ski was Phil’s at one time. He bought it brand new and kept it for 13 years before selling it to me. I wasn’t quite ready to tackle the trip across to the lighthouse, but peer pressure and testosterone prevailed and we headed off.
I rode in his wake for a while which smoothed the water out somewhat. We made it to the lighthouse and then turned south towards Oregon Inlet. We found a sandbar near the inlet and beached the skis there for a few minutes to rest. Phil wanted to make a run under the Bonner (AKA Oregon Inlet) Bridge. I wasn’t so sure but he is quite the daredevil on a Jetski. Once he rode what is now my ski through the inlet and out to the “Whistle Bouy” 8 miles offshore. I guarantee you that the ski will never see that buoy again but Phil has a neat story to tell anyway.
Oregon Inlet is a dynamic piece of water. The channel headed towards the inlet is like a snake doubling back on itself many times before dumping you out at the middle of the bridge. There is always a dredge down there trying to keep the inlet open against shifting sands and currents. I have been told that there have been times after storms where some of the pilings under the bridge were not touching bottom–only to have the sand shift and bury them again.
I agreed to go to the inlet and see what it looked like. How cool would it be to say that I had taken an 8 foot jetski under the Oregon Inlet bridge? It would be cooler to say it over beer around a campfire than it would be for someone to say it after my funeral though. “That dummy tried to take an 8 foot jetski under the Oregon Inlet bridge!”
We were nearing high tide and there were a number of trawlers headed out to sea for the evening. The last of the charter boats were coming in for the night and Phil and I are running full throttle towards the bridge. Some onlookers had wide eyes in amazement as they saw that we were planning to go under the bridge. Phil being a maniac hauled under the bridge and kept going. I went under the bridge, waved at the pretty girls on the beach, and went back into the protected waters of the sound.
With the exception of falling rain stinging my face and the low fuel light coming on, the ride back was very serene compared to the inlet run. Looking back on the Oregon Inlet run, it scares me more today than it did at the time. I doubt that I will do this again, but another adventure awaits.
