Carolina Beach State Park Hike and Beach
On the nice, sunny, warm and breezy Labor Day of September 1, Janet, Gracie and I went for a hike and played on the little beach beside the Cape Fear River at the junction with Snows Cut in Carolina Beach State Park.
Being the Labor Day holiday, the park was packed with visitors and vehicles, mostly pickup trucks with motor boat trailers. When we arrived, we joined a crowd of other vehicles parked beside a road near a parking lot. Immediately, a Ranger walked up and said our space is illegal to park - we had to move to a paved, painted parking space. Of course, there were none open. And, there were many other illegally parked vehicles scattered all over the park which did not move. We eventually moved to a grass field with a sign, “Only For Boat Trailer Parking Overflow.” We parked there anyway and nobody bothered us. Later that afternoon, when we returned to our vehicle, we saw that none of the illegally parked vehicles had been ticketed, towed or moved.
At the small beach beside the marina, there is a small Caribbean looking kayak and SUP rental business. The manager very kindly placed in the front a bucket of sticks collected for dog owners to take and throw in the water to their dogs. So, we took a few sticks and threw them in the Cape Fear River to Gracie, which she joyously retrieved.
We then took the Sugarloaf hiking trail through the center of the park. All went well.
When I was at our parking lot, I noticed that the water in Snows Cut was flowing towards the southwest. My GPS showed the tide was rising, which seemed backwards to me. I sent an email query to several paddling friends, who informed me that the main flow of water into the Cut on a rising tide is from the Intercoastal Waterway to the northeast, rather from the Cape Fear River to the southwest. Phenomenon explained.
