Surf: A better big-wave spot found way outside in front of the Ranger Station on Pea Island. A shipwreck has built up sandbars around it, which prefer lower tides and NE swells to get the long walling lefts and short bowly rights working. It also breaks inside on smaller swells that reform after the trough. Environment: A walk over the dunes from the free car park is the only way to check it. There’s camping at nearby Oregon Inlet and no lifeguard to tell the ladies what they can or, in this case, cannot wear. Once you’re past the white pointers on the beach, keep an eye out for their cousins cruising the shipwreck. Surf: General: Cape Hatteras, in the collective sense, is especially vulnerable to the combined effects of intense winds, abnormally high tides and heavy flooding due to both tropical and non-tropical systems. The highway through the Pea Island National Wildlife Refuge has been redesigned and pushed inland toward the Sound as storm activity continues to threaten this thin, 13-mile strip of sand. Before entering Pea Island, though, you pass over the new Marc Basnight Bridge which spans Oregon Inlet and connects Bodie Island to Hatteras Island and replaced the old Bonner Bridge in early 2019. You can become part of one of the most picturesque scenes on the island when you cross over the new bridge at sunrise or sunset.

Once you arrive on Pea Island, you know you're in Hatteras. Sea oats, cacti, herons, 5,000 acres of marshland and not much more on this ribbon of sand, except the ocean. This is one place that has no true spots, but little lumps of sand that turn on and off with the ebb and flow of tides and the push and pull of winds. A good first check would be at the first visitor center you see. This spot is appropriately named "The Boiler" for the partially submerged boilerplate of a wrecked ship extending out of the water, hundreds of yards from shore.

Aside from that, your best bet will be to pull off the side of the road, avoid the soft sand and check some spots on your own. If you see a pack of cars, keep driving and find your own little piece of sand -- it is one of the few places you still have that luxury. Tides: All tides depending on the sand. Size: Head high-double overhead Wind: Southwest Swell: SE, NE Bottom: Sand Paddling: Depends on the swell -- south swells can be treadmills. Spot Rating: It depends on how hard you want to look. Just don't be lazy and pull over where all the cars are. Access: It's wide open, but be wary of the soft sand. Crowds: Crowd Factor: Doesn't have to be if you check for yourself and avoid the packs of cars. Local Vibe: Find your own peak, don't be the 20th car at the same spot. Environment: Probably the cleanest water on the Outer Banks Hazards: Mosquitoes the size of small birds. Season: Storm dependent: tropical cyclones in the late summer and fall with frontal activity and nor'easters in the late fall and winter.