Completed Freeman Park Carolina Beach NC

[navigator]

We took a little camping trip to Freeman Park in Carolina Beach.
It was our first offroad trip in the TB.

Here we are about to blast off.


Just landed at our spot


Our neighbors


Cooking a little dinner, nothing fancy, our kids are picky and we kind of threw this together last minute.


Checking out the tidal pool


Turning in for the night.


Next morning sunrise


I aired down to about 20lbs and really wasn't too concerned. There was some deep sand in places but the worst part of the sand was near the entrance there were lots of ruts that intersected making it kind of bouncy if you kept up any speed. We also felt like we hit the tops of some ruts in a few places. I might be able to use that as leverage to talk about lifting in some conversations with my wife!

Great trip, my daughter said it was "the best vacation ever", pretty good for a one night camping trip on the beach.
The only major things I would change is I didn't choose the best fishing location so we only caught a few. this was a great spot for the kids though with the tidal pool in front. We found some better places for our next trip.

The other major thing is next time I've got to bring the air mattress. You would think beach sand would be all nice and soft well it isn't

Also glad to say my tow rope is still in it's cellophane packaging!

[dirty anton]

that's a great 1 niter,the beach i was on in maryland had camping sights but not on the water. your not allowed to sleep on the beach,but you can fish all night with a permit of course. would love to set up camp on the water. looks like you guys had a blast though. you cant beat that sunrise!

[dlcsjoyce]

Nice trip looks like you had a lot of fun.

[NC_IslandRunner]

Cool trip, never been there nice looking beach.

[navigator]

It was pretty nice, there wasn't too much driving after we turned in for the night. I could see that in the summer the traffic could be more annoying. My biggest complaint was that you aren't supposed to drive below the high tide crest so we camped just past the crest and folks would drive in between us and the surf which was annoying and concerned me some with the kids. I finally put a few rod holders down there and my lantern and it they pretty much quit except for a cop, he did the same thing(I think he was making sure all our stuff was right). I asked him about it and he said that was the rule and he would make sure to warn folks that were doing it. I figured out later that while it is a rule I don;t think it is enforced unless you are causing problems. The cops patrolled regularly but didn't seem to bother anyone which was a comfort.

Their permits are $20 per day or $100 per year. I figured they are close enough unless it was a total disaster I would go ahead and get the season pass.

We plan on going back when it warms up a little and moving to a better spot. I imagine we'll get our moneys worth out of it.

I might regret it but next time I might not air down, it was a pain to sit there in the street and air down and then come out and pay to get air. Most of the sand wasn't bad and the extra height might actually be better to keep from hitting the tops of the ruts over the wider footprint.

Now to go pressure wash the underside of the TB.

[Trail X]

That trip is what it's all about. Getting out, enjoying places with minimal crowds, spending time with the family.

If you don't air down next time, make sure you bring a shovel, and always start out in 2nd gear to keep the wheel spin down. I've heard carpet strips help when you get stuck. Did you have a jack to lift the vehicle with if you bottomed out? Just make sure you're well prepared, especially when bringing the family.

[Gordinho80]

Cool trip... but those are TINY pics.

[navigator]

yes, I had a jack, shovel and some wood if needed to jack/dig out.
the only real bad part is right there at the beginning of the access and you start out on pavement with momentum, I think we only bottomed out because it was bouncing from the cross ruts.

I'll figure it out more the more I get to go.

[navigator]

here is another pic, I made this one larger. I was trying to keep them small so they would load quickly.
they still looked big in MSPaint but small on here .
My wife took several pics just before and after sunrise, this one was my favorite.

[navigator]

odd, my other pics were 500 pixels, this one was 2000.
The originals are about 4200 pixels.

[Trail X]

You're hosting in photobucket and I beleive they resize things automatically. You should be able to choose which size to link here. FYI, normally 800 or 900 pixel width is good.

[HARDTRAILZ]

Looks like a good time.

[djthumper]

Looks like a fun trip.

Which code are you using? It may be the one that you are choosing that is doing it. If you choose the IMG code it seems fine. [.IMG]http://i618.photobucket.com/albums/tt263/cbordea/FreemanPark/JustLanded.jpg[/IMG] gives you this below.

[navigator]

I used the img tags. I even tried the photobucket tag but that made it look like a video.
I'll try looking at the photobucket settings.

[Trail X]

It's all in which image address you use.

You used the below image (with th_ in it):

http://i618.photobucket.com/albums/tt26 ... Landed.jpg

You should use the one below:

http://i618.photobucket.com/albums/tt26 ... Landed.jpg

In photobucket, the th_ image is a thumbnail image.

The [photobucket] tags are for embedding photobucket videos only.

[navigator]

thanks James, that was the issue, I went back and corrected the pics in the original thread.

[engus]

I live in the Wilmington are and camped out on Freeman Park April 30. The park is great, however our camping trip was not as great. The problem we had was all the college age kids there and drunk people. The later in the season the more they will ba an issue. People were also driving around at all hours of the night. Next time we go camping there it will be either later in the fall or earlier in the spring.

[navigator]

man, hate to hear about your bad experience. We went on a week night so that might have helped.
We went again Sunday after church and the place was packed out until about 4:30 or so then it started thinning out but we had to leave around 5pm to make the evening service.

Where about was your camp site? On our trip we were on the surf side about marker 14 but it got a little windy at night and the surf was loud. We thought about going more around the point next time like marker 20 or so where it would be calmer but I wonder if more loud folks hang out there.