In mid-October my wife and I decided to create a short adventure. We rented e-bikes for the day and took them to the Alligator River National Wildlife Refuge on the mainland side of Dare County. On the way to the Refuge we stopped by the Gateway Visitor Center, https://www.fws.gov/office/coastal-north-carolina-national-wildlife-refuges-gateway-visitor-center, on the north end of Manteo to pick up a map of the Refuge. This is important because cell service is very spotty and some roads may not be marked. The map is very good by identifying all the roads as well as sharing the rules of the park.
Our goal was to see bears. According to my friend, Joe O'Grady (check out Episode #013 to hear him on my podcast), the area has the largest black bears in the country. The current world record for the largest black bear is from northeast North Carolina which weighed 880 pounds. I kept wondering if our e-bikes were fast enough to out-run a bear. My wife must have been wondering the same thing because she insisted I carry the sandwiches.
We parked next to highway 64 and unloaded the bikes. The first section of dirt road was loose gravel and the e-bikes were a little squirrely. Within 15 minutes of riding we saw our first bear. He was checking out something in the road so we kept our distance. When he finally decided to cross the canal and head into the field we determined it safe to continue down the road.
The roads improved to varying degrees. Sometimes it was packed gravel, other times packed sand. The literature alludes to the road conditions changing with the weather so take recent rainfall in to account. This is a low-lying area surrounded by swamps and wetlands.
We enjoyed the speed of the e-bikes as we cruised at 18-20 miles an hour. I would recommend sticking to about 15 miles an hour so that you can observe better. At high speeds you tend to concentrate more on the road (not a bad thing) and less on everything around you. Like when Bonnie didn't realize she almost ran over a poisonous snake.
I was a little surprised to see as many cars as we did did. Apparently we weren't the only ones who wanted to spot a bear on a nice Saturday afternoon. Vehicles will often stop and ask if you've seen anything.
If you want to see bears it's best to go in the late afternoon when the bears like to graze in the fields. We also saw a couple snakes; one on the road and one in a canal. It's possible to see owls, other birds of prey, and wolves. We weren't that fortunate. However, we saw our second bear in the woods just before the parking lot on our way out. This was just a few hundred yards from the highway.
We didn't try to use the GPS on our cell phones because we're pretty good with a map. If you're the kind of person who gets lost walking around in Sam's Club you might want to keep it simple. Straight out. Straight back. I recommend bringing a bottle of water, some snacks, basic bike tools, and some bug juice. Although we didn't get attacked I'm sure the biting bugs get hungrier when the weather gets hot and you're moving slowly.
With a little bit of planning the Refuge is a great place to see wildlife and it's still in Dare County. Be sure to do a little homework before leaving the house and you should be fine.
Happy Trails,
John Van Lunen
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