My Life is a Reality Show...: Vacation Time!! Day 3!

We are really making our way around! On Day 3, we decided to head to another town that seemed to have a lot of things going on...Beaufort, NC (pronounced Bo-fort) What a quaint little town!

We started out the day making a trip to the NC Maritime Museum.

If you have children, this is a great place to visit. It is free (donations welcomed) What drew me to visiting this museum was reading that there are relics from Black Beard the Pirate's Ship, Queen Anne's Revenge, that are on display.

A few years back, QAR was discovered sunken in the Bogue Inlet. The ship has not come to the surface, but many items have been pulled from the ship, cleaned, preserved and put on display.

Aren't these dishes cool?

Black Beard seems pretty proud of his stuff....

This was a fun museum for the kids since everything was hands on and even offered a scavenger hunt. My boys were in heaven!

Even the littlest one was searching...

Up front, they had a costume area that was perfect for pics with the kids. Who wants to be Black Beard and who wants to be his pirate dude friend?

Guess Reiner won Mr. Black Beard!

After our visit to the museum, we were famished. We had read about a really neat place with yummy food and a cool story...Clawson's.

This was the "General Store" back in the day and still has the setups on the inside. Original cash registers, shoe shine area....even the post office! My daughter thought it was a jail...

With full bellies and a wonderful time had, including having a nice couple pay for my meal, we hit the boardwalk in Beaufort. It was a very beautiful walk along looking at boats and flowers. I had read about Carrot Island that was across the water. On a good day, you could see the wild horses. These wild horses are said to be the offspring of horses that many, many years ago were shipwrecked and swam to shore. It must have been a good day, look what we saw!!

It was amazing watching them walk right alongside the beach goers. Very tame for being wild! They share their beach nicely.

We walked to the new General Store and grabbed some ice cream. It was so hot out!

We found the car pretty quickly after for some much needed air conditioning, but our Black Beard Adventure wasn't over just yet. I had read about a place called Hammock House, which was a place that the pirate would stay in when he made his way to town.

It is called Hammock House because many, many years ago, the water used to come right up to the porch and Black Beard was able to tie his boat right to the rails which made the house appear to resemble a hammock the way it stood above the water. Legend has it that one of Black Beard's wives stayed here with him once and the next morning before he left, he hung her from the tree in the front yard. On certain nights, it is said that you can hear her screaming....

We'll just drive away before night fall, just to be safe...

While browsing the web for more ideas in this area, I came across a roadside attraction....The Old Burying Ground. This was an interesting find!

A map is available at the entrance and markers are located near the coolest graves....did I just call a grave cool?

You be the judge....

This is the gravestone of a boat captain who wanted to be buried with his cannon. This is the very cannon from one of his ships.

Rum Barrel Girl Grave. This little girl was promised by the father to the mother that after taking her on a trip, he would return her. When she passed away on the trip from an illness, he didn't want to break his promise to the mother so he put her in a rum barrel and brought her home to bury her. Many trinkets people left here.

British Naval Officer who insisted on being buried standing up so he wouldn't have to remove his boots. This is why there is a square cement pad. Buried saluting his majesty.

Glass Casket Baby. A baby that was buried in a glass casket. When vandals tried to dig her up, they saw her body in tact right through the glass...when they attempted to open the glass, her body disintegrated.

Onto Atlantic Beach!