Not for the faint of heart (or faith)!
If the Outer Banks of North Carolina were a style of facial hair, they’d be that really thin sideburn/chin strap found on most Eminem-worshipping, diamond-earring-toting, Malibu’s-Most-Wanted-style white people.
And that’s not just a cartographical analysis. There are actually a lot of meth and heroin addicts on the Banks. That’s what happens when you live on a strip of sand small enough to throw a rock one way and hit the ocean, then throw a rock the other way and hit the sound. It’s called isthmus fever. Boredom leads to experimentation, experimentation leads to more enthusiastic experimentation which leads to crazy thin sideburns then dead.
The only way to escape the cycle is to embrace your imprisoning waters, and also maybe find God. Christianity is like… real big ’round those parts.
But back to the water.
The only normal people residing on that archipelago are the surfers and fisherman, and even those guys teeter toward lunacy. One fella who’s managed to remain relatively sane is Brett Barley — father, avid fisherman, and the Banks’ only legitimate pro surfer. Maybe it’s just an East-side pride thing, but I’m convinced he’s damn good, too.
And really, it shouldn’t come as much of a surprise; the Outer Banks boast the most consistently quality surf on the United States’ eastern seaboard. Just take the edit below, filmed by Banks’ native (I think?) Jeffrey O’Neill, as evidence.
The clip follows N.C.’s seasonal swings and showcases the best that the Banks have to offer — both in terms of waves and surfing ability. Barley steals the show, but he’s accompanied by studs like Fisher Heaverly (from southern N.C.), Bal Stack (NY), plus several local legends.
If y’ain’t afraid of cold tubes with a sprinkle of Jesus and meth, the Banks might just be for you!
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if outer banks is sideburn / chin strap facial hair, then san diego must be soul patch / fedora guy.
any other city in America on the coast has more drugs than the outer banks but it makes it more sad when you do them alone in desolation, at least the barrels are better than the blow in the powder banks
I call bullshit on the drug issues. I usually visit Hatteras every year or so and have been off and on all of my life. I usually don’t bother locking my car and most trips I never see a cop with the more recent exception of a police car that is usually parked at a house on highway 12 where a cop must live. That is likely the only cop on the island.
Brett Barley is awesome.
Is it me but does the paddle back out there always seem…. challenging? Does it only break when the period is less than 2 seconds?
Paddle outs can be daunting! Like most east coast waves across the world, the period is generally short on the Banks as the waves come from local storm systems, as opposed to faraway purple blobs.
Hatteras sits the farthest out on the continental shelf that plagues most of the east coast from truly maximizing swell height and period. Even with that advantage it still will feel affects once the wave period goes past double digits. Hatteras holds a special place in my heart and I can paddle. So I will leave you with that..
I have been humbled in Hatteras many times, getting washed in like the piece of debris that I am. When it gets head high or bigger that place is gnarly.
I just skipped to the end to check if the beat was the same. It was. So shit!
Meth or Jesus – helluva conundrum. I’m thinking Jesus might have the edge to brave some of those freezing thumping conditions.
What about the chocolate coloured water vs. having to have a cool name like Fisher Heaverly conundrum?
Good point; It seems like the kinda place where its helpful for your career to be named after a character in Moby Dick.
Fuck that repetitive music.