Nearly forty years ago my Uncle Austin and I took a trip to the North Carolina coast in my old Bronco which managed to carry me to places as far away as Cape Breton Island in the northern part of Nova Scotia.

In those days, something like the Bronco was required to reach the Point on Emerald Isle. In fact we drove down the beach a long way to get to the Point. Roads were a rarity on Emerald Isle forty years ago.

Roads have come to the Island as have lots people. The ocean does not really care. It keep moving sand just as it always has. I recently wrote about shifting sands on the Crystal Coast Living blog that I write for our real estate company.

As I wrote in my article, it was only last year that the ramp to the Point on Emerald ended up being damaged. In fact most of the Point was under water last November at high tide. That was a big difference from early 2007 when I took this picture of a sunset on the Point. In January 2007 I went for a walk on the Point and posted this album of pictures.

During the summer we watch at the beach in the area began to repair itself. Frank Rush, the Emerald Isle city manager, made some statements that the beach would be okay at the Point. It turned out that he was right. The currents and probably the lack of a big storm this summer helped the sand to keep accumulating.

This week we read about the ramp being fixed. We went over on Saturday before the football games and saw that things were in pretty good shape. I took some additional pictures and posted them to the web.

Tags: Beach

Today was a great day.

We visited the nearby Eastern Regional Access on Emerald Isle.

Surprisingly there were no other vehicles at 5:15 pm when we parked.

It me only a couple of minutes to get down to the water.

For the first time in 2008, I left my shoes up on the steps.

The sand was not that cold. That must have gone to my head since the next I knew my bare feet were in the water.

It might be just a little early for wading, but I did it and my feet did not turn blue.

My guess is that the water temperature is in the fifties, but it is hard to tell if you are only using your feet as a thermometer.

The sunset was not nearly as spectacular as yesterday's golden sunset on Bogue Sound, but I cannot complain.

There was no wind, and we had the beach to ourselves on a very nice February evening.

The even better news is that even warmer temperatures are expected later this week.

I put up an online picture tour of Emerald Isle during the winter.

Tags: Beach

We took advantage of the warm weather and went walking yesterday just off Inlet Drive in Emerald Isle yesterday.

I wanted to get close to the Point so I could see what the beach is doing.

According to what I have heard, the large wide beaches are moving towards the Point which would be a good thing since there isn't much left of the beach over there.

It is hard to believe how fast this has changed. I bought my permit to drive on the beach and went over to the Point and noticed the beach was getting smaller. A week later the access point was closed.

I am really impressed with how wide the beach is just down from the Point.

It will be interesting to watch this since I do not have a house there.

Tags: Beach