Before leaving the island, we wanted to see the Wright Brothers Memorial near Kitty Hawk, NC. We walked to the top of the hill where the brothers performed many tests using gliders. A monument is located on top of the hill (pictured below). We walked passed each of the markers which showed the distance of their first four flights. Along the way, Lauren pretended to be an airplane, soaring through the sky. It was a windy day – she almost took off!

After learning some history, we went to Panera to work on planning the next few days of our trip. Our next destination was to be Virginia Beach, where (spoiler alert), we would never actually see the beach. On this trip we have been 5 minutes from two of the most popular beaches (Myrtle, Virginia) and haven’t even seen them. Our reason for staying at Virginia Beach was that there was a KOA we could stay at to save some money. We were planning on seeing Norfolk and Richmond in the next couple days.

Remember how in yesterday’s post Lauren was eager to get off the island because of the impending storm? Well today, she decided she was perfectly fine with camping right near the beach on the very night that tropical storm Irma was to hit. She’s adventurous, that’s for sure. We made a campfire and roasted hot dogs and s’mores for dinner. We decided that we were going to sleep in the back of the car in case our tent was not as waterproof as it advertised. We spent a good while shuffling things around in the car so we would have room to lay down. Around 10pm, as we were lying in the back working on the blog, we got a knock on the side of our car. We opened the door to be greeted by KOA employees who informed us it is illegal to sleep in the back of the car per Virginia Beach law. So, right as the rain starts pouring down, we set up our flimsy tent. It was all we could do to hold it down in the wind. Thankfully, we stayed relatively dry during the setup due to our raincoats. The inside of the tent, however, was soaking wet. It was a sleepless night – for Myles at least. As the storm grew stronger and stronger, Lauren slept harder and harder. It was as if she was trying to drown out the sound of the storm with her loud breathing. At least it was working for her. Myles, on the other hand, was on the side of the tent that was being pummeled with nonstop rain and wind. The tent kept collapsing on him and water was seeping through ever so slowly. Our tent was Sylvester Stallone from Rocky; no matter how many times the wind momentarily flattened it, it would pop right back up. It came through the night victorious, although somewhat battered. Okay, maybe not victorious, we’ll call it a tie.

End Day 14.