Pocosin Lakes

I had to use up some PTO from work, so for the last weekend of the year, Sandy and I headed out to the Outer Banks for some hiking and wildlife photography. We left before 6 Saturday morning and made our way east along US-64 towards our first destination – Pocosin Lakes National Wildlife Refuge. The sun was coming up as we reached Plymouth and took NC-45 towards the entrance to the Pungo Lake unit of the refuge. From the turn off NC-45, we took Refuge Road to the maintenance compound and turned left on Van Staaldulnen Road. At the end we turned right on South Pungo Road and then left on Hyde Park Road. At this time of year when the migratory waterfowl are in the refuge, this is the only route to Pungo Lake. The other roads are gated. If you are visiting, I would highly recommend bringing a map from the Fish & Wildlife Service that shows which roads are open and which are closed. It would be easy to get lost in the refuge with all the gated roads and Google Maps or GPS are of no real help. At the end of Hyde Park Road, we stopped at the Pungo Lake Observation Platform and Charles Kuralt Trail Site and got our first view of Pungo Lake.

There were a tremendous amount of tundra swans on the lake and even though they were mostly on the other side of the lake, the sounds of their honking was quite loud. We got some pictures from here and then drove to down South Lake Road to the trailhead for Duck Pen Wildlife Trail. This half-mile trail follows a gravel road out to Pungo Lake Observation Point, a photo blind on the lake.

We were a little closer to the birds from here and got some pictures hidden from view. Although there were a lot of birds here, I don’t think it had quite peaked yet.

I did manage to get some nice pictures, including a few of the swans running along the surface of the water as they took flight.

We headed back along the trail and Sandy saw something move in the distance. Bears are very common in the refuge, but using the zoom lens, I could see this was a deer.

We walked ahead especially carefully, but as we got closer, she took off into the swamp. From here, we left the refuge and got back on the highway.

It was getting towards lunch time by now and we had woken up very early, so we headed to Pettigrew State Park and had lunch in the picnic area.

We walked down to the boat dock on Lake Phelps and could hear the swans, but they were quite far away.

So we hiked along the Moccasin Trail west to the overlook to try and get a better look. This trail runs along the north shore of the lake, but there is a dense swampy forest between the trail and the lake, which blocked views of the lake for most of the trail.

There were a couple of openings with views of the lake and some very large cypress trees. But these openings were few and far between. In a couple of places along the trail, the flora is so dense, it creates a completely covered tunnel to hike through.

In just under three miles, we reached the Moccasin Overlook.

A boardwalk leads from the trail out to the lake through a beautiful swamp of bald cypress trees draped in Spanish moss.

At the overlook, we were a bit closer to the swans, but still a good ways.

We rested for a bit at the overlook and got some pictures of the swans and the beautiful trees and Spanish moss and then headed back.

From here, we headed to the rest of the way to the Outer Banks. Just over the bridge, we stopped in Nags Head at Wings. Normally, they’re a bit overpriced, but in the off season, everything was 50% off or more so we picked up some bathing suits and beach hats that we won’t have to buy this season when they’re much more expensive. I called D, our Airbnb host, and told him we would be on the way. We checked in with him, unpacked our stuff, and chatted for a bit. Then we headed into town to Pigman’s Bar-B-Que for dinner. We both had pulled pork and it was very good. After dinner, we got to bed early after a very long day.